Today for our Strong Girl post, I am going to share a book with you that I think mothers of girls everywhere in the United States should read.
Daughters in Danger by Elayne Bennett is an extremely well-written book that reveals valuable information about a world that devalues girls and places pressure on them to desire the very things that will break their hearts.
Bennett has been an advocate for young women for many years. She writes from this experience and a passion to reveal a different set of priorities and aspirations to girls growing up in a dangerous culture of sex, drugs, bad-body-image expectations and more.
The first half of the book gives the reader a history of her involvement with young women and the culture that young women live in and face today. The second half of the book gives practical guidance to American families, schools, colleges, universities and churches. It also provides a model of the successful mentoring programs, Best Friends and Best Men.
This is not a delicate read. It will take a fair amount of time to read. If you are strapped for time and aren’t interested in the statistics and facts and history of how we got to where we are today in the treatment and molding of our daughters, skip to chapter 10 where the practical helps start.
This book was written, I believe, as a call to action on behalf of our young women. As a grandmother of seven granddaughters, I was extremely interested in what it had to say. I feel it could have been written more succinctly to reach a broader audience. Hopefully, something more handbook size can be written from it. For me, the book was just too much information in one volume. However, that’s not to say it wasn’t an impressively written book. It was. And because of its great depth, and amazing composition, I have a deeper appreciation and respect for Bennett’s work.
I give this book 4 out of 5 stars. The reason it’s not 5 is because I don’t feel this is a book I can hand to parents and get them to read it. It’s written on a more academic level. The parents I work with wouldn’t wade through this much material. All of it’s good and I’m glad it’s written for posterity’s sake. But for parents with a reading level of about fifth-eighth grade level (the average reading level for most Americans), it’s just too much book. However, for pastors and teachers, it’s probably about right. Still, for busy people, again, it’s a lot of book. Set aside some time to read and digest it.
I do recommend this book and have great hope that parents and teachers and anyone working with young women will read it.
Disclosure: I received this free book from Booklook Bloggers.
