Review: The Little Book of Vaginas: Everything You Need to Know
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
After over 40+ years on this earth, I saw this book and thought, what don't I know about the vagina? It will be good to see what they didn't teach in school. I am not sure if this book should be classified as non-fiction or fiction. It certainly is providing some interesting facts, even though there is zero annotation for the quotes, statistics, and some of the claims. The book started up really well and I liked how it tried to dispel the myth of some words. Unfortunately, I couldn't really find good sources to validate the author's claims.
There is one thing I learned in this book, I didn't know about that made me go hmmm. I didn't realize the vagina is only 2 to 5 inches deep. At least that is what the book claims. I thought about this and then think, why the hell do women want dicks that are more than 6 inches then? I mean, it won't go any deeper, right? I'm flummoxed. I did know the elasticity of the vagina accommodates for something much girthier. So wouldn't we want a thicker dick instead of a longer one?
The book does cover menstruation, hormones, and some fads with pubic hair or bare pussy. These were all known to me but I tend to be a bit more sexually educated than most, I guess. I also didn't realize that talking about periods, the symptoms, and sanitary products are taboo. I have never shied away from talking about it with other women and in mixed company. I'm not sure why guys get queasy about it. It is a natural biological function.
Learning a little bit about how some other cultures view women when they are menstruating is nicely done. This section alone could have been an entire book. I appreciated the brevity even if there were zero annotations. I think this is my biggest pet peeve with the book and why I think many will not take it seriously. There are no citations that make this entire book come across more like a commentary or editorial in perhaps Cosmo, as the book talks about the magazine as being vagina positive.
The book tended to jump around and one section seemed to have repeated itself - the bit about self cleaning vagina as well as pussy hair being better for the body than being bare. There is also a bit of education on the waves of feminism, transgender, and why she believes it is imperative we call it menstruating PEOPLE not menstruating women. The author emphasizes this point with an "End of Story". This perhaps will cause many readers to roll their eyes and the book may lose a bit more credibility. Her points are valid, but they are her opinions. Others may disagree and that is okay.
Overall this book was okay. I learned nothing earth-shattering. The most interesting part is probably the section where she explains the biology of how the ovaries work and specifically the follicles. This is something new to me as I didn't get to this detail in my health classes in school. I also didn't know that freezing eggs for later was actually a procedure that SLICES off part of the ovary. Yikes. This book is a quick read and for those who want to see if they missed anything about the human reproductive cycle and the stigma attached to it.
*provided by Edelweiss
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