BOOK REVIEW: It’s Not That I’m Bitter

It’s Not That I’m Bitter . . .: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying About Visible Panty Lines and Conquered the World by Dr. Gina Barreca

It’s Not that I’m Bitter, by Dr. Gina Barreca, is a somewhat philosophical, somewhat autobiographical, definitely funny book about professional, well-educated women. Dr. Barreca, a professor of English and Feminist Theory at the University of Connecticut, is also funny enough to be endorsed by the likes of Dave Barry.

This is an enjoyable read which can be left on the surface of funny stories about weeping while trying on bathing suits at T.J. Maxx every year. However, if you want to dig into the feminist underpinnings of why this is so, when the correlative man is still wearing the bathing suit his mother bought for him when he was 17, Dr. Barreca will dig along with you.

As a loud, out there woman who clearly does not ‘know her place’, Dr. Barreca knows that femininity and feminism are not mutually exclusive. She will cheer along the feminist cause, all the while recognizing that you don’t have to give up femininity to do so. Cute shoes and feminism can go hand in hand. Smart women can do silly things like go to psychics and not give up their credibility. Powerful women are not the same as powerful men only with girl parts and more restrictive underwear: they are their own sub-species, and it’s high time they were recognized. That sort of thing.

To read more about this book, or to buy it, click on the handy-dandy Amazon link below.