Barbie, sex dolls, and philosophy. This book was ambitious and complex and I desperately wanted to enjoy it. However instead of a history of Barbie it was a philosophy of all things plastic/dolls. I spent most of the book incredible confused and just wanting to understand. The writing was beautiful and lyrical, but I struggle to make sense of it. This is the perfect book, however, if you have a good grasp on philosophy and literature as it mimics much of it and references a great deal.

An interesting look at the history of the Barbie and the many social implications that the doll has spawned over the decades, but more than a little letdown by its over-ambitious (and at some points, nonsensical) form.

This book offers everything you wish to know about barbie, its history, its impact on culture and everything in between. I bought it for a friend that was obsessed with the doll growing up.

You get Barbie from all angles in the book from direct history to how the doll has impacted our culture. There are also parts of this book written as poetry. The author has done everything to fill you in on everything about the doll we all know as Barbie. There are parts about how Barbie has affected the lives of its creatures and workers at Mattel. We learn how Barbie has made people feel like they need plastic surgery to look better, how she influenced the sex doll and more. I recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn about Barbie and her effects on the world today.

It's ambitious as all get-out. It's several facets of the Barbie legacy presented in slightly different forms: You have some direct history, some slice-of-life stories from those who have attempted to become living Barbie dolls, some interesting insight about how the doll's impacted our culture, a segue into some talk about modern sex dolls, and then a poignant ending, which gives the reader a moment to ponder, and I mean seriously ponder, where all of those dolls go in the end.

Now, most of this is in some sort of form of poetry, so it's not your typical aggregation of information by an author to be absorbed by the reader. I'm by no means a poetry buff, but there were slight variations in the way many of the stories were presented, so you're spared an event of the same cadence leashing you and leading to the last page. Some pieces came off like it was Barbie history by way of Miranda's Hamilton; others seemed absolutely stream-of-consciousness. Having said all of that, it's impressive to behold. I couldn't do it, that's for sure.

I think a person who is already familiar with the history of the Barbie doll (or recently finished some sort of work that recounts how the doll grew to its current status) would have more to gain here. Maybe it's on account of the unique way the book goes about things, but I was struggling at times to see if we were delving into the abstract, or if I was being given straight-up facts.

It's a recommend if this is a subject you're interested in, for sure. So much of this is thought-provoking and beckons for a good unpacking after the reading's done; it transcends being just an average history book and is a different vessel of knowledge-dropping.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Guernica Editions for the advance read.