The way this was written made me enjoy it less, but I appreciate how honest Brady was about her experiences. It’s good that she wrote this and admirable how much she shared. Strong Female Character was advertised as funny and serious, and only the serious parts landed with me. The dry, sarcastic humor didn’t make me laugh, but sometimes I would nod in agreement or understanding with her observations.

The book is written mostly in chronological order but shifts around a little in a way that made things unclear to me. It starts with her as an adult getting her diagnosis, then it goes back to explore her childhood and experience at university, but then it rewinds a little to explain how she got into stripping during university, and she goes on to talk a little about her career in comedy after that. All throughout, she has multiple partners and the confusing timeline made it hard for me to understand who she was with and when and how she even left certain situations.

She skipped past some things in the beginning of her career because she said it would’ve been repetitive to talk about her stand-up, but I think it might have been nice to get more details on that. I don’t know anything about her outside of this book, so I feel like I don’t understand a lot about the progression of her comedy career. This book does focus on her autism, but I think there could’ve been some more insight into how she made connections and became successful.

Her brutal honestly in describing people comes off as kinda judgmental sometimes, especially when she’s describing their appearance if she doesn’t like them. There were some unaddressed issues with food, body image, and other women, and that’s too bad. She does focus on how she learned with her therapist what triggers her meltdowns, but her disordered eating and fatphobia never seem to get clearly resolved in that way. As an example, she thought her ex-boyfriend was repulsive because he was fat, but the worst thing about him was that he was grooming her, and that didn’t seem to be her biggest concern, even on reflection. It’s made clear that the expectations put on female performers encouraged unhealthy habits and views in her, but I don’t know if she healed from that before writing this.

It’s clear she’s done reasearch on autism and has developed more understanding, but I felt like she hasn’t fully extended that empathy to people with different mental disabilities. Despite being judged for her autistic traits and knowing how bad that feels, she sometimes paints others in a negative light when she seems to think they’re weird or she’s smarter than them.

At one point she says, “The pick-me girl appears to me as just another way to dismiss female autistics.” This is because she relates to some stereotypical pick-me traits like only having male friends and being different from other (allistic) women. And maybe the term could be used to unfairly criticize autistic women for not fitting the mold, but I’ve never considered that before reading this. I’d like to hear more perspectives on it.

Brady does a good job showing how society desperately needs to get better at recognizing and accepting autism. She didn’t get all the support she needed as a child, and she still struggles with masking as an adult. Her experience with autism and womanhood has clearly connected with a lot of people and hopefully, it inspires others to do better. Know going into this that she discusses self harm, suicidal ideation, domestic abuse, grooming, drug abuse, eating disorders, and her ex attempting to kill her in detail.

Strong Female Character - Likewise Book Reviews

1 Reviews