FEMALE DIFFICULTIES: Sorority Sisters, Rodeo Queens, Frigid Women, Smut Stars, and Other Modern Girls

by E. Jean Carroll ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 1985

Carroll's collected pieces of reportage have shock value. She's out there, on the set of a porn movie, in a locker room during cheerleading tryouts at UCLA, at the rodeo questioning groupies (known as buckle bunnies) as to their lovers' skills, and rodeo wives about their lives. Her reports back from the fringe are both eagle-eyed and very entertaining. She casts something of the same eye on America that Nora Ephron did in Crazy Salad. Both are fiendish reporters who find their subject matter in left field. Carroll, though, is wilder than Ephron, content not just to set a scene but sometimes to steal one, too. For instance, in one piece in which she is determined to nail down a definition of frigidity, she turns an interview with two sex experts, a married couple, into an interrogation as to the degree of passion they feel for each other. The twist is outrageous and funny. Carroll likes writing about sex, about how women evidence their sexuality, how they feel about the other sex, and how they feel during sex. All her pieces, save one, strike a recurring note of sexuality. Back at her old sorority house, to which she pays a visit, they are all just girls in search of boys. The friend who begs not to be taken back to Elaine's because it is do dull is a porn star. In one piece she records the action in a group where men and women actually go so far as to tell each other what they really want. Lost in America, Carroll came back with a funny, racy, readable book.

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1985

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Bantam

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1985

Categories: NONFICTION