382 pg, paper, ‘07

Martin offers a long overdue critique of our culture's unhealthy obsession with physical appearance, and what it's doing to our kids. Drawn from more than 100 personal interviews, pop culture analysis, and the insight of iconic feminists who precede her, this book is a searingly honest look at how the desire to be thin overlies an even more insidious and ultimately impossible goal: the desire to be perfect. With its vivid and often-heartbreaking personal stories, this book has the power both to shock and to educate. Highly recommended.

CONTENTS:

1 – Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters
2 – From Good to Perfect: Feminism’s Unintended Legacy
3 – The male Mirror: Her Father’s Eyes
4 – (Perfect) Girl Talk: Inside Today’s Teenagers’ Minds and Stomachs
5 – Sex as a Cookie: Growing Up Hungry
6 – The Revolution Still Will Not Be Televised: Pop, Hip-hop, Race, and the Media
7 – What Men Want: The Truth About Attraction, Porn, and the Pursuit
8 – All-or-Nothing Nation: Diets, Extreme Makeovers, and the Obesity Epidemic
9 – Past the Dedication is a Disease: Athletic Obsession
10 – The College Years: Body Obsession Boot Camp
11 – The Real World Ain’t No MTV: How the Body Becomes the Punching Bag for Post-College Disappointment
12 – Spiritual Hunger
13 – Stepping Through the Looking Glass: Our New Stories

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Courtney E Martin, MA has written for the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, and other publications, and received degrees from Barnard College and New York University.

REVIEWS:

“Fresh analysis…will bring insight to a whole new group of teenagers and young women.”
— Naomi Wolf

“I’m the mother of two teenage girls, so Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters hit me like a hardcover punch in the gut…Martin sounds a clarion call for all of us—mothers, daughters, pundits—to stop counting calories and start changing the world.”
— Arianna Huffington, author of Fanatics and Fools

“Shatters society’s perception of perfectionism. Through the collection of personal stories and interviews, she reveals an extensive impression of females with eating disorders.”
— Ira M. Sacker, MD, author of Regaining Your Self