An impassioned and engrossing, if narrow, critique of women’s lives in college.
A recent graduate assesses the problems faced by female college students.
In this debut sociology book, Peterson explores the concept of “effortless perfection,” a term that grew out of Duke University’s research into its female students’ needs. The work explains that female college students are constrained by the dual expectations that they will achieve attractiveness, intelligence, and social success without appearing to make any effort toward accomplishing their goals. Drawing on existing research and her own interviews with college women, the author describes the challenges of self-perception, confidence, cultural expectations, beauty standards, hookup culture, and college social dynamics and explains how they contribute to the contemporary version of Betty Friedan’s “problem that has no name.” Throughout the book, Peterson blends her own story with a broader account of the challenges young women face during their college years. The author concludes that by being vulnerable and rejecting the premise of effortless perfection, women can improve their mental health and college experiences. Peterson is a thoughtful writer who is well versed in her subject and skilled at incorporating background information—for instance, her explanation of the research that shows people assign negative value to hard work is particularly informative. But the volume is hampered by its definition of college women. Throughout the book, Peterson makes observations in the first-person plural (“We transform these traits—our intellect, our athleticism, our looks, our social skills—into our full identity and obsessively chase after the approval they garner”) but does not address who her definition of we includes and excludes. A few of the author’s interviewees are women of color, and one short chapter addresses the experiences of LGBTQ+ students—though only in the context of their exclusion from hookup culture. But aside from that, there is little acknowledgement that nearly all the women featured in the book are heterosexual and middle class and attend selective colleges or universities that seem to have significant Greek systems. Like Nell Scovell and Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In, the book offers useful insights and actionable takeaways to its target audience. But Peterson’s volume is of limited relevance to readers outside its conception of us.
An impassioned and engrossing, if narrow, critique of women’s lives in college.Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-63337-667-0
Page Count: 364
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Oct. 24, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
