“I would be a horrible girlfriend at this point in my life, because I’m both needy and unavailable.”

Lena Dunham has become a phenomenon, as a successful young woman who has created a hit show whilst also starring in it. I didn’t really know of her before reading but I had heard good things about the book and decided to pick it up while it was on offer. I’m all for giving something a go.

Not That Kind of Girl promises to tell you what a young girl has “learned”, but I really didn’t get that. I’ve watched Lena in interviews and she seems funny and sweet but it just doesn’t come across in her book. If anything, when reading, I just felt like it was a load of first world problems. I was told it would be a great feminist book and I’d feel as empowered as I did when I read Caitlin Moran’s How to be a Woman. 

That said, it wasn’t all bad. There were some parts of the book that were really funny, especially when she’s talking about sex and her college years. The chapter titled Girls and Jerks was quite funny because Dunham injects humor into situations where most of us would facepalm.

Dunham is only eight years older than me but I just felt that I couldn’t connect with her. I couldn’t see myself in her situations, her New York life and just generally her life experience. It’s not that I think she’s spoilt but there are a lot of tedious and self absorbed passages that I just didn’t find interesting.

I wish that I had fallen in love with this book, but unfortunately it wasn’t for me. I ended up giving this only 2 stars **, it’s clear that Lena has a writing talent  (her show is huge after all) but as a person she didn’t come across well through the book. If you are a fan of Girls then this might be the for you but I think I’ll just stick to watching her interviews.