Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud is the ultimate feminist call to arms. Anne Helen Petersen examines with a critical eye what it means to be an “unruly” woman, and how society’s constant need to hinder and hide unruliness contributes to the systemic cutting-down of women.
Using high-profile examples like Melissa McCarthy, Hillary Clinton, and Serena Williams, Petersen presents not just women challenging societal norms, but society’s inevitable backlash. In addition, Petersen is able to pose the question that ultimately, really, has no answer: why?
It is easy for me, as a young woman in the twenty-first century, to find both solace and strength in this audiobook. As narrator, Petersen conveys and emphasizes exactly the points she wants the reader to take away. She presents ample facts, statistics, and quotations to back up her assertions, and after two full listens, I’m still discovering, relating to, even arguing with new aspects of the book. Clearly this audiobook did what it intended to do: it kept me thinking.
Too often, feminist literature forgets about the more marginalized members of the movement: women of color, of advanced age, women in the LGBTQ+ community. Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud crosses the boundaries of intersectionality, carefully and respectfully capturing and amplifying voices that for too long have gone ignored. Petersen is able to insert herself carefully into a particular narrative without overpowering the subject’s voice. Serena Williams’s story, for example, is told with the admiration and respect it deserves: her persona shines through to the listener.
It is my firm belief that women of all ages should listen to this audiobook at least once. It empowers without preaching, sympathizes without wavering, and is altogether a beautiful way to link women of all sizes and colors and sexualities and ages in the nuanced tapestry of “female.” In Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud, no woman can ever be too anything. And if that isn’t the breath of fresh air that society needs, I’m not sure what is.
Listen to an excerpt TOO FAT, TOO SLUTTY, TOO LOUD[/product]