Thursday, December 13, 2007

Book 17 – Tiny Ladies in Shiny Pants

By Jill Soloway

To continue my brief sojourn into 'chick-lit' is this collection of essays from one of the top writers from the TV show, Six Feet Under. This is most definitely not something I would ever consider reading (the only reason I delved into this was because the book was a gift). All in all, TLISP provided a mindless distraction from the usual stuff I read, providing amusing little nuggets about life as a middle-class Jewish girl growing up in Chicago to juicy anecdotes about being a struggling writer in L.A.

Some of the passages were funny and insightful, like bitching about public toilet seat “hoverers”. But others weren’t so funny, like her rants about patriarchy and feminism. If you’ve read a book or two by de Beauvoir or Friedan, or taken a first-year Women’s Studies course, you'll likely wince at Soloway's so-called theories, which have already been said more intelligently and articulately by a generation of feminists before her. But when Soloway sticks to cute subjects, like Why Jews Go to the Bathroom with the Door Open, or morsels of advice, like how to make a decent living as a writer in L.A., then it’s a little more bearable.

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