We need a new voice for women ... Sadly, Girls® has no answer for our problems – old or new ... India has been led to 'adopt a stance that looks very much like quietism and retreat' ... India fell victim to what she has criticised. Her book has been sucked into the commodification vortex through massive PR campaigns. Without social media, it’s unlikely that she would have blown up in the same way as Naomi Wolf had over three decades ago ... It is a shame that Girls® falls to this irony.
Readers of India’s Substack, also called Girls (50,000 subscribers and counting), will know that she’s a compelling stylist, able to briskly marshal the facts of her case and deliver her conclusions in firecracker prose. But what works as a newsletter begins to fray when expanded to book length ... Very specific about the ills of modern life. It’s less clear about what the alternatives should be, although India offers some hints in the conclusion ... If you want to really understand today’s girls, take India’s advice and go into the real world. There are plenty of reasons to worry for girls, but there are also plenty of reasons to be hopeful.
India is less concerned with offering alternatives than laying out quite how impactful digital culture has been on her generation ... Objects on a conceptual level, not digging in.
The book is strongest when India is sharing her very real and raw experience of the challenges she faced having to go through adolescence ... It’s a shame that while she can be upfront on those details, she isn’t as forthcoming about her political leanings and views on women’s roles and marriage, because at least then the reader could meet her where she is. Unfortunately for this book, the most exciting part about it is its clever cover art.
Occasionally the book feels repetitive. India makes the same points in different forms, and the first part of the conclusion summarizes what readers have already processed without adding much new insight ... Most worryingly, I wonder if it is too data-heavy for the youngest segment of her audience. The book contains a whopping 85 pages of endnotes ... But the strengths of the book far outweigh its weaknesses ... India’s book provides comfort and clarity to girls who are straddling two worlds and want to know which one is real.
This book may be a starting place for young women seeking guidance and their concerned adults, yet its slanted analysis should be met with a dose of healthy skepticism and would do well to be supplemented with broader context ... An exploration of the ills of modern girlhood that will likely appeal to more conservative readers.
Troubling yet rocky ... The book is derailed by the author’s tendency to reach for well-trod conservative talking point ... Unsatisfying ... It’s a disappointing attempt to grapple with the runaway exploitation endured by a generation.
