Women Are Scary


I picked up Women are Scary: The Totally Awkward Adventure of Finding Mom Friends by Melanie Dale because I'm at a stage in my life where I find myself lonely and virtually friend-less after all of my close friends moved away to various locales (I mean, I have acquaintances, but not those real soul friends that you can hang out with, call up whenever, and really have a deep relationship with). I also struggle with social anxiety and have difficulty making friends in the first place, so that definitely exacerbates the problem! Anyhow, I hoped this book would help me out with finding some new friends. The back cover reads:

"Let's see...this is the part where I convince you that you need this book. This book will massage your feet. This book will bring you a fuzzy blanket at the end of a long day of parenting your tiny little insanazoids. I promise to make you snort laugh at least once. After reading this book, you'll rock jazz hands, be able to sing on-key, and never, ever have to fold laundry again.

Okay, they told me I'm actually supposed to tell you a little about the book. Um, right. Look. Here's the thing. Too many of us women are frazzled and lonely, isolated in our minivans while schlepping bags, strollers, and munchkins to and fro across town. It doesn't have to be this way.

In this guide to "momlationships," I use a dating analogy to take us "around the bases" to our home-run friendships, the ones that last a lifetime, not just a soccer season. This is our journey to each other, to finding our people and being other people's people, to learning how to bless each other and not destroy each other.

It's sometimes scary. And always awkward. Let's have some fun."

Overall, this was a good book. It's a very quick read that you can devour in one sitting (or better yet, one afternoon lounging by the pool or evening in a bubble bath). Melanie is a blogger. I've never read her blog before, so I wasn't familiar with her writing style before picking up her book. She's hilarious, irreverent, and easy to read. She divides this book into "bases" of friendship. However, this book isn't really a guide to making mom friends - it's more of a memoir of Melanie's life and her ups and downs in "momlationships". Each chapter is like a short blog post pertaining to a different aspect of friendships. While I didn't pick up a ton of great how-tos for making new friends, I walked away refreshed, with some good laughs, and a renewed desire to do my best to make some new friendships. One downside to this book is that there is some bad language in it, so be forewarned.

I received a copy of this book from BookLook Bloggers in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

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