*Thank you to Penguin Press and NetGalley for the E-Arc! All opinions are my own.*

I chose to DNF this title around 11%.

All of the early reviews are I'm seeing for this are either bowing at the author's feet or hiding behind a 3 star rating in the name of feminism and dancing around the actual issue this book has, which is that it's performative nonsense pretending to be groundbreaking. Right away it's clear to me that for Gilbert, "feminism" means if you choose to have a silly fun life as a woman, you're doing it wrong. If you choose to reclaim sex as power rather than leaving it in the hands of men, you're doing it wrong. Somehow, inherently, these are all still living under the thumb of the patriarchy no matter how you slice it. The few chapters (over an hour long each, by the way) I read were steeped in this rhetoric that female sexuality in media is somehow bad but also the Spice Girls are also bad??? And also by the way we chose to focus on the Black-majority genre of hip hop and glaze entirely over the white-majority genre of glam rock music that was most popular just before it. She actually says this even, not even to make a point of some kind. And that's when I chose to stop reading.

The reviews that were brave enough to be a little critical of this book mention that Gilbert never actually gets to the point, just listing all these examples in rapidfire succession for an unrealized purpose. Incredibly disappointing. Very tired of books like this that claim to be the next groundbreaking fair in feminist rhetoric when all it is is words on a page.

Really enjoyed this cultural critique on feminism's state of being in the 21st century, particularly in the early aughts. Lots to discuss and digest - would be an excellent non-fiction book club selection.