The Guilty Feminist
You Don't Have to Be Perfect to Overthrow the Patriarchy
Ratings4
Average rating4.5
A funny, frank, accessible book about embracing both feminism and our imperfections, from the host of the hit comedy podcast The Guilty Feminist. From confidence to crying, from motherhood to activism, Deborah Frances-White explores what it means to be a 21st century woman in a series of essays that will make you laugh and think. Deborah's writing has the same qualities warmth, humour, sharpness, intimacy and honesty - that have attracted a dedicated and ever-growing following to her podcast, but you don't need to have listened to the podcast: this will be a book for anyone who has enjoyed reading Sara Pascoe, Caitlin Moran and Bridget Christie. Though sharing the same tone as the podcast, it will be all new material. The Guilty Feminist podcast has 500,000 regular listeners, with over 2m downloads total. Celebrity fans include Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Gemma Arterton, Sharon Horgan (all of whom have appeared on the podast) and Giovanna Fletcher, and other podcast guests have included Rachel Bloom, Sara Pascoe, Sarah Millican and Shappi Khorsandi. They have regular sold-out live recordings and a line of merchandise and workshops, and their audience is only growing.
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Does anyone else find starting new podcasts more intimidating than reading a book? I have no idea why I feel that way, but I do. If a podcast has a backlog of hundreds of episodes, then I just seem to panic and not know where to start, so put it off, listen to old favourites I'm already caught up on, or start a very new podcast with a low episode count. I've had this podcast recommended to be so many times over the years, so when I noticed the podcast creator had released this book, aimed at being an easy-going and accessible introduction to feminism, I convinced myself it would be better a place to start.
Maybe I should still give the podcast a go, but this book left me a little disappointed. The first chapter was really good, but the rest of the book's structure felt off, being entirely made up off anecdotes from France-White's own life, chucked-in interviews, and a few random factoids from feminist history. I also felt put off by how the book seemed to be striving to be “inclusive”, but the discussions with feminists from varied, minority backgrounds didn't seem to lead anywhere. Being disabled myself, the few mentions of disability felt really hemmed in, like “oh, we forgot to mention disability!!”, rather than being explored in any depth. Maybe that's fine for an introduction, but for how repetitive some parts of the book were, I really think there would have been space for more.
And... I do have to say... I am a feminist, but my biggest disappointment with this book was that despite being a written by a comedian it just didn't have enough humour or jokes...
