Four star review, originally published here on January 9th, 2025.
I’m not sure why I’m having a hard time thinking of something to say about this book. It pretty much is exactly what I expected. It is a history of how various branches of medicine have seen and treated women through history. There’s plenty of really interesting content here, most of it enraging yet unsurprising. This book should have been right up my alley, and yet I didn’t find myself getting sucked in to it as much as I would like. I think the main reason why is because it was long and repetitive. A really heavy-handed editor could have chopped a bunch of repetition and made this a more engaging 5 star read. There also were several points where Comen seemed to be complaining about issues, but not offering any sort of explanation as to what she thinks would be the correct approach. I wish I could remember an example, but, as alluded to before, this book didn’t really suck me in, so I’m not remembering the details well.
All that being said, this is still a positive review. It was jam-packed with interesting history, and while it wasn’t a 5 star rollercoaster ride that kept me on the edge of my seat, it was still more engaging and less dry than a straight textbook.
Helga without the H 