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A review by hooliaquoolia
The Geek Feminist Revolution by Kameron Hurley
2.0
Nothing new, occasionally catchy, mostly annoying.
These are more blog posts than essays. Not even expanded blog posts--I'm pretty sure she just copied and pasted randomly and maybe added a few sentences here and there. Every other paragraph contains a plug for her book and all the stories she's written and how they're sooooooo feminist and revolutionary etc etc and how she's done sooooo much research on all the subjects she writes about. As she mentions on every other page, she has a masters degree, so I don't understand why she can't write like a decently informed researcher and instead chooses to embody the immortal voice of Teenager Who Just Cruised Through A Wikipedia Article And Is Now An Expert. She also feels the need to constantly mention that she's a "been writing fiction for almost 20 years" and how she's such a veteran writer blah blah blah. Those statements would have more weight if even a third of these pieces were bearable. As it is they're poorly organized, thinly-veiled attempts at self-praise without center or direction. About halfway through she mentions that her "day job" is marketing and suddenly the whole book made a lot more sense because I realized I felt the same way I do when I stumble across an infomercial.
"We Have Always Fought" is a good piece. Truly good. In fact it's why I'm not giving this book one star. Still not worth buying the whole book for it though; despite the title there is nothing revolutionary here. It's just the same old stuff mixed in with an unnecessary number of weird Gaiman-style one-sentence paragraphs that make everything seem disjointed. Spend your Saturday afternoon reading Rebecca Traister instead.
These are more blog posts than essays. Not even expanded blog posts--I'm pretty sure she just copied and pasted randomly and maybe added a few sentences here and there. Every other paragraph contains a plug for her book and all the stories she's written and how they're sooooooo feminist and revolutionary etc etc and how she's done sooooo much research on all the subjects she writes about. As she mentions on every other page, she has a masters degree, so I don't understand why she can't write like a decently informed researcher and instead chooses to embody the immortal voice of Teenager Who Just Cruised Through A Wikipedia Article And Is Now An Expert. She also feels the need to constantly mention that she's a "been writing fiction for almost 20 years" and how she's such a veteran writer blah blah blah. Those statements would have more weight if even a third of these pieces were bearable. As it is they're poorly organized, thinly-veiled attempts at self-praise without center or direction. About halfway through she mentions that her "day job" is marketing and suddenly the whole book made a lot more sense because I realized I felt the same way I do when I stumble across an infomercial.
"We Have Always Fought" is a good piece. Truly good. In fact it's why I'm not giving this book one star. Still not worth buying the whole book for it though; despite the title there is nothing revolutionary here. It's just the same old stuff mixed in with an unnecessary number of weird Gaiman-style one-sentence paragraphs that make everything seem disjointed. Spend your Saturday afternoon reading Rebecca Traister instead.