Reviews for Good Girl Messages: How Young Women Were Misled by Their Favorite Books

The average rating for Good Girl Messages: How Young Women Were Misled by Their Favorite Books based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-01-24 00:00:00 James Peterson Written by an apparently 50-something woman who asserts that the messages in typical childhood books of our generation and earlier "misled" us by fostering passivity, acceptance, etc.. Unfortunately I was never a big reader of "girl books" such as Little Women, Secret Garden (have yet to read them to this day), the Hitty books or most of the others that she cites as examples- my favorites were horse/animal stories and mystery adventures like Nancy Drew & Dana Girls. I did, however find several 'ahah!' moments where I totally agreed with the author and saw parallels to my own experiences in life if not in reading those specific books. Overall the major premise was a little belabored and the section on more recent developments for the better seemed a bit rushed. Still, much to ponder. A good read for anyone studying the history of children's literature or child development.

Review # 2 was written on 2009-01-10 00:00:00 Jason Mangawan I've been skimming this online, and it is interesting but does she miss the point with Betsy-Tacy by saying, "Books like this are about what you are, and how that relates to what everyone else is - they are not about what you do." She describes Rosamond du Jardin's books as offering three guidelines: be beautiful, be manipulative, and be yourself. "It was hard to be yourself and be beautiful at the same time, and impossible to be yourself and also manipulative, but the contradictory nature of the rules was not acknowledged." Come on, Tobey Heydon has a great sense of humor as do most of du Jardin's heroines. Isn't that what makes these books so charming? And really Julia Ray is more manipulative than any du Jardin heroine!