Girlhood - Rambling Readers

Hardcover, 320 pages

Published March 30, 2021 by Bloomsbury Publishing.

ISBN:: 978-1-63557-252-0
OCLC Number:: 1243268981

(1 review)

In her powerful new book, critically acclaimed author Melissa Febos examines the narratives women are told about what it means to be female and what it takes to free oneself from them.

When her body began to change at eleven years old, Febos understood immediately that her meaning to other people had changed with it. By her teens, she defined herself based on these perceptions and by the romantic relationships she threw herself into headlong. Over time, Febos increasingly questioned the stories she'd been told about herself and the habits and defenses she'd developed over years of trying to meet others' expectations. The values she and so many other women had learned in girlhood did not prioritize their personal safety, happiness, or freedom, and she set out to reframe those values and beliefs.

Blending investigative reporting, memoir, and scholarship, Febos charts how she and others like her have reimagined relationships …

In her powerful new book, critically acclaimed author Melissa Febos examines the narratives women are told about what it means to be female and what it takes to free oneself from them.

When her body began to change at eleven years old, Febos understood immediately that her meaning to other people had changed with it. By her teens, she defined herself based on these perceptions and by the romantic relationships she threw herself into headlong. Over time, Febos increasingly questioned the stories she'd been told about herself and the habits and defenses she'd developed over years of trying to meet others' expectations. The values she and so many other women had learned in girlhood did not prioritize their personal safety, happiness, or freedom, and she set out to reframe those values and beliefs.

Blending investigative reporting, memoir, and scholarship, Febos charts how she and others like her have reimagined relationships and made room for the anger, grief, power, and pleasure women have long been taught to deny.

Written with Febos' characteristic precision, lyricism, and insight, Girlhood is a philosophical treatise, an anthem for women, and a searing study of the transitions into and away from girlhood, toward a chosen self.

2 editions

crabbygirl reviewed Girlhood by Melissa Febos

Review of 'Girlhood' on 'Goodreads'

1 star

following the essay format almost too closely (wide platitude to narrow thesis), most intros started with greek myths that were too obscure - making the 'capture your audience first' part of the essay fall flat for me. Then there was the actual content of the essays: sex work as a dominatrix, addiction to heroine, embracing the concept of slut: stuff that might surprise a reader (like me) who thought a book entitled "Girlhood" would be about the more universal difficulties of puberty.

but all bad books contain something for me to learn and this is my takeaway: perhaps my longing to be a popular girl was birthed and thwarted when I was a late bloomer and that maybe the social stratification of middle and high school girls is destiny based on the timetables of puberty (sort of like Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers where professional hockey players are mostly born in the …

following the essay format almost too closely (wide platitude to narrow thesis), most intros started with greek myths that were too obscure - making the 'capture your audience first' part of the essay fall flat for me. Then there was the actual content of the essays: sex work as a dominatrix, addiction to heroine, embracing the concept of slut: stuff that might surprise a reader (like me) who thought a book entitled "Girlhood" would be about the more universal difficulties of puberty.

but all bad books contain something for me to learn and this is my takeaway: perhaps my longing to be a popular girl was birthed and thwarted when I was a late bloomer and that maybe the social stratification of middle and high school girls is destiny based on the timetables of puberty (sort of like Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers where professional hockey players are mostly born in the first 3 months of the year, giving them a leg up and opportunities not afforded to the late-in-the-year birthdays) Because this book made me think of something I never have: How do shy 11 and 12 year olds, with no agency to speak of, or peers, or role models, handle being the 'experimental' firsts down the puberty pathway? How do they escape the eyes and clutches of older boys when they present as 16 year olds? What to do with the acquiescent nature of girls when the very act of acquiescence in young womanhood marks you as easy, as a slut?