Non-Fiction Friday: Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud

Author: Anne Helen Petersen Title: Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud Publisher: Plume Date Published: 06/20/2017

Read Dates: 09/05/2026- 09/08/2026
Rating:⭐⭐⭐⭐

This was my non-fiction pick for September.

Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud is a nonfiction collection of profiles on women in the public eye in America that have been deemed “too much” in one way or another. It is not a blanket defense of each profiled woman, as author Petersen acknowledges critiques (both warranted and unwarranted), but rather calls attention to wait trait each woman is highlighted for, and examines why it is that the public finds faults with these traits, especially when demonstrated by women. It includes 10 chapters and profiles of 11 women: Serena Williams, Melissa McCarthy, duo Abbi Jacobson & Ilana Glazer, Nicki Minaj, Madonna, Kim Kardashian, Hillary Clinton, Caitlyn Jenner, Jennifer Weiner, and Lena Dunham.

I love the idea behind this book and it definitely made me think. Some of these women I admire, some I am unfamiliar with, and some I am decidedly not a fan of. Wherever the profiled women fell on that scale, I found the chapters interesting, informative, and thought provoking. The forward for this book speaks, in part, to the need for unruly women in the world with the rise of Trump’s America and MAGA movement. Written mostly before his first presidential term, it is disappointing to see some of the women highlighted (either in passing like Roseanne Barr, or with specific chapters like Nicki Minaj and Caitlyn Jenner) having embraced the misogyny and anti-woman fueled movement, lending a very disappointing feeling to the book and the hopes that we can recover from this current era of American politics. But I came away with the feeling that hope and optimism were not the goal, that being angry and disappointed in the current social norms was kind of the point, and in that this book definitely succeeded.

You know the type: the woman who won't shut up, who's too brazen, too opinionated--too much. It's not that she's an outcast (she might even be your friend or your wife, or your mother) so much as she's a social variable. Sometimes, she's the life of the party; others, she's the center of gossip. She's the unruly woman, and she's one of the most provocative, powerful forms of womanhood today.

There have been unruly women for as long as there have been boundaries of what constitutes acceptable "feminine" behavior, but there's evidence that she's on the rise--more visible and less easily dismissed--than ever before. In Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud, Anne Helen Petersen uses the lens of "unruliness" to explore the ascension of eleven contemporary powerhouses: Serena Williams, Melissa McCarthy, Abbi Jacobson, Ilana Glazer, Nicki Minaj, Kim Kardashian, Hillary Clinton, Caitlyn Jenner, Jennifer Weiner, and Lena Dunham.

Petersen explores why the public loves to love (and hate) these controversial figures, each of whom has been conceived as "too" something: too queer, too strong, too honest, too old, too pregnant, too shrill, too much. With its brisk, incisive analysis, Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud will be a conversation-starting book on what makes and breaks celebrity today.