Shaidle spends the first few pages of this combination memoir, essay and rant detailing her failed attempts to fit in with the female norms of her youth by trying to display a sexuality that did not really fit her.
This part of her book is interesting and even a little affecting.
After she finishes with the biographical bits, however, the book becomes a potpourri of her many prejudices.
She offers them cleverly — she has a way with words — but sometimes her views seem more like a random list of annoyances.
In particular, she hates “beta males” (which is problematical, since she is so obviously a beta female), the Canadian government ( I’m with her on that one), Madonna (but she loves Siouxsie Sioux), National Review, academics, giving arguments for her screeds, and probably people who like her.
She is fun, and she is a master of snark. But she rarely gives you a good reason why you would want to share her views, and maybe she wants it that way.
