it’s like florence given looked up struggles of bisexual women and instead of portraying them with any kind of complexity she turned them into a caricature that had me (a bisexual woman who understands the source of the problems she was trying to portray here) rolling my eyes. like there is literally a scene in this book where the main character makes out with a man and some random girl bursts into the room, films her and then yells at her how she is a fake queer woman (the internet later on agrees with her and cancels eartha lmao) and then the next second the dude eartha made out with tells her that he thinks that women having sex with each other is hot but that he doesn’t want anything to do with her if she would date women and is disgusted by her bisexuality. i can tell that florence given really thought that she was a genius for touching upon three issues bisexual women face at one when, in reality, she only turned them into a joke by exaggerating this scene to no end. Is there really anything else to say? Florence Given introduced Florence Given into Florence Given’s literary universe. The final act of girlbossification. AND SHE CALLED HERSELF “COOL”. Across all of her work, Florence's message is the same. She aims "to bring women together and give them a permission slip to define feminism on their own terms." Ongoing Covid restrictions, reduced air and freight capacity, high volumes and winter weather conditions are all impacting transportation and local delivery across the globe. It was also very affirming to read a book that had a non-binary character that didn't have a big moment where they have to profess their identity, The reader simply discovers that Rose uses they/them pronouns.

This was my first Florence Given book. And it was amazing. I absolutely loved it. Our main character Eartha is in an unhappy relationship with a guy. At the beginning of the book she's learning more and more about her sexuality. Her best friend Rose (aka a legend) helps and supports her and is hands down my favorite character in this book. However the main part of the book is centered around Wonderland. It's a fictional social media platform in the book which is a bit similar to insta (but not quite). For some reason Eartha goes viral on that platform and we follow her on this new journey. In Given's debut novel, we follow Eartha on a wild, weird and seductive modern-day exploration as she commences life as an openly bisexual woman whilst also becoming a viral sensation on Wonderland, a social media app where people project their dream selves online." The reflections and commentary on so many topics were insightful. It put a lot of things into perspective, especially regarding the use of social media. In Given's debut novel, we follow Eartha on a wild, weird and seductive modern-day exploration as she commences life as an openly bisexual woman whilst also becoming a viral sensation on Wonderland, a social media app where people project their dream selves online.If you follow florence online, it just sounds like a fictional version of her life and friends and experiences - maybe it was a cathartic exercise for FG. Would have liked something more imaginative / completely new as a piece of fiction! This could have been intentional but I am not sure it worked for me. It was messy, the text message formatting in the book frustrated me and was hard to read. Every now and then there was "Directors Notes" sections which was so strange and added absolutely nothing to the book other than making it feel like a weird half script half book. Women Don’t Owe You Pretty was a concise, witty, compassionate guide to navigating feminism. Did it achieve what you wanted it to? I started this book thinking it would be a story about a girl who realises she is bisexual and would begin exploring the world of dating women and stumble upon some Internet fame. Whilst all of this did happen, I think that my attempting to summarise what happened in Girl Crush would do the book a massive disservice. I read this book in one sitting, I could not put it down. I was seriously invested in Eartha’s journey.

Spannend fand ich die Entscheidung des Verlags, hier tatsächlich alles strikt durchzugendern. Machte für mich auch voll Sinn und passte zu Eartha, aus deren Sicht wir die Geschichte erzählt bekamen. Es passte so gut, dass mir erst im Nachhinein auffiel, dass das nicht so im englischen Original stehen kann. Die meisten Bezeichnungen sind im Englischen auch so schon genderneutral (zumindest meines Wissens nach), deswegen muss während der Übersetzung diese Entscheidung gefallen sein. Wie gesagt, ich fand das super spannend. Und es machte mir auch Lust, mal das Original in die Hand zu nehmen, um zu sehen, wie das denn dort geschrieben wurde und ob mir dort überhaupt irgendwas auffällt. This author has tried to do something pretty wonderful; use their voice to promote feminism, queerness, bisexuality and show us that social media is detrimental to our health and well-being… and that the world is still controlled by men. I’ve been asked if I’d like to go into politics. No! I’d be awful at it. I know my strengths. I’m a writer, I’m an artist. And I’m good at talking. But I don’t want to be a politician. I want to write books for the rest of my life. Florence Given won a legion of fans with her debut book, Women Don't Owe You Pretty, thanks to its unique illustrations and empowering message, encouraging women across the world, of all generations, to recognise their worth. The plot was also questionable imo, the "twist" at the end felt like it was inserted as an afterthought and didn't seem to fit with the first 3/4 of the book... Spelling errors irritated me. Maybe it was rushed out for publication or more suited for a younger audience (what is happening to me)

Basically, Florence uses the “F” slur far too comfortably throughout the novel, when it wasn’t ever a word for queer women to reclaim. Phrases like “d**e daddy” and “a random butch in leather” have pissed people off, too. The general consensus seems to be that Florence – a bisexual woman – has massively reduced her lesbian characters down to stereotypes.

Erst im Juni habe ich mein erstes Buch der Autorin gelesen, die dafür ja auch sehr gehyped wurde: "Frauen schulden dir gar nichts." "Girlcrush" wiederum hat online weniger Aufmerksamkeit bekommen. Das hängt wahrscheinlich unter anderem mit dem Genrewechsel zusammen, zumindest ist das meine Theorie. "Girlcrush" ist nämlich kein Sachbuch bzw. Ratgeber, sondern ein Roman. Und noch dazu nicht unbedingt der einfachste Roman, den ich je gelesen habe. Was jetzt für mich nicht unbedingt etwas Negatives ist, ist halt einfach nicht mehr für alle Menschen einfach so zugänglich.I adored the first half of it. Couldn’t get enough of it. It was a hot mess and I loved that about it. Very raw, very relatable. I liked the flow of it. There are some “directors notes” which plays out more like a movie than a book (I listened on audiobook and finished with reading it - it worked well on audio but was confusing in the book). I definitely recommend the audiobook more. Also, as someone who has gone viral on the internet many times myself, the statistics in this book are all wrong. Why does Eartha get sooooo many followers overnight in comparison to how many views and likes she gets on her video. It’s completely out of proportion and in reality, if anyone posted a sloppy drunken video being like “I hate men, I think I’m gay”, it would just be scrolled past. It isn’t inspirational, it’s normal, and wouldn’t garner anywhere near as much attention as Florence claims it would in this book. It’s sold in Tesco: women have come to my book events saying: “I’ve never considered myself a feminist. I bought your book because it looked pretty. And then I came out the other end of it saying no to my husband, growing out my armpit hair, telling him when I don’t want to have sex.” I want women who think that they haven’t got the education to be a feminist to talk about this stuff. It should not be gate-kept.

She then went on to say: "GIRLCRUSH is all about women, our obsession with each other and what happens when we’re crushed and reduced into the screens of our phones I’m grateful to Eli for this thread… and I hate it. Really, really, really hate the way that Given (a bisexual woman) writes about lesbianism

This book was a mess. On paper, it should have been really compelling. Using modern social media as a way to explore the Jekyll and Hyde themes of duality, public life vs. private life, and addiction while also talking about what it's like to come into bisexuality "later" in life, like on paper this should have been a great story. We are experiencing delays with deliveries to many countries, but in most cases local services have now resumed. For more details, please consult the latest information provided by Royal Mail's International Incident Bulletin. I did not like this! There are lots of very valid, intelligent reasons that I did not! This book is an extremely superficial exploration of bisexuality, feminism, social media, 'cancel culture', and sexual assault. The bio-essentialism and queer stereotyping in here made me uncomfortable, and also I didn't find this book sexy at all. It also did not deliver on its taglines as 'twas not a hot, dark story, nor a Jekyll and Hyde retelling, nor a feminist dark comedy. I would not suggest reading this!!