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Not That Kind of Girl

a Young Woman Tells You What She's "learned"
britprincess1ajax
Aug 04, 2016britprincess1ajax rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
I adore Lena Dunham. She's abrasive and in-your-face and honest as all hell. She's like a coarse Nora Ephron, Jr., emulating the late great in many ways. But, at her age (and I'm younger than her, so this shouldn't sound too condescending), she can't write a genuinely great memoir. Her life is great and can seem grand and wonderful to the onlookers, the fans of GIRLS, the indie film circuit who revelled in her little-known flick TINY FURNITURE. But you can't write 250 pages about your twenty-eight years without starting to sound redundant. In fact, she starts to repeat herself about halfway through. A mere 100 to 150 pages max would have suited her better; her editor needed to show Lena how to kill her darlings, cutting a few essays here and there. What I did like, though, is her prose. Her style speaks to me, a natural flow that is both articulate and conversational, eloquent but not verbose. I enjoyed that. I also liked her structure, grouping essays into work and sex and love and such, breaking them down by subject matter. It worked well for her. What I like best is that, in one essay, she said that she couldn't wait to turn eighty and write a tell-all about all the men who treated her like scum, the famous names who wanted sex in exchange for success. She didn't drink the Kool-Aid; she took the high road instead. And I'm glad. And I can't wait until Lena turns eighty. That's a book I'll want to read. NOT THAT KIND OF GIRL is okay for now, though. For fans of hers, I'd still recommend it.