Nobody Ever Asked Me About the Girls: Women, Music, and Fame by Lisa Robinson

This book should probably be called “Nobody Ever Asked Me About Joni Mitchell.” I was hoping this would be an in-depth look at women's issues and lives in the music industry but was instead reading about Linda Robinson’s favorite female artists while she simultaneously crapped all over Madonna and Taylor Swift. Clearly Robinson has personal beef with both of these women. She is unable to look at their careers and influence objectively. Her critiques scream of personal grudges, and she finds their ambition to be a problem but doesn’t seem to take issue with other artists who share similar drive. She has obvious favorites with the frontrunner being Joni Mitchell, followed by Adele, Stevie Nicks, Patti Smith, and Bette Midler. Robinson seems to place great value on artists who don’t have elaborate sets, make-up squads and entourage. Her book breaks the chapters down into themes covering things like appearance, having children, sex, and success. Robinson discusses the pressure female artists feel to avoid aging and seems to judge women for spending time in makeup chairs or for choosing to get plastic surgery. It’s odd and disturbing to read so much negativity about successful women from an author and interviewer so successful in her own right. Her snarky commentary is misogynistic and left me feeling disoriented like the victim of a bait and switch. She wrote the book based off interviews from her years as a music journalist, but the overall structure lends shallow insight. The section on abuse and sexual assault in the music industry is borderline irresponsible.