From Product Description:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

I had been wanting this book for a long time and couldn't find it anywhere!it was a huge relief to find it at a great price! Such a great deal and a great book.

This book is a gem that I wish I'd had when I was at that tender age that all girls experience: waiting for (and then getting) my first period. The editor compiled stories of women of all ages, from the 1930s through 2008, recalling their first period. Most of the women come from the United States, but there are also stories from Australia, Canada, China, Ghana, India, Kenya, and Turkey. Some are famous women, like Gloria Steinam, Judy Blume, and Meg Cabot. Some are teens of today. Women around the world and of all ages are very different, but one unifying element is menstruation. It's amazing how this book shows this universal aspect of womanhood. <br /> <br />Do you remember your first period? Many women will never forget. Pride, shame, joy, sadness, confusion... if all women menstruate, why don't we talk about it? I like how that new Kotex ad is making fun of the fact that ads for tampons and pads are so abstract (you know the ad I'm taking about: "Commercials for pads are so helpful, showing that blue liquid... so that's what's supposed to happen!"), but we need to be even more proactive. I hate how when I'm talking about my period with friends, there is almost always someone who says something like, "I'm sorry if this is TMI" or "I know this is gross, but..." Why do we need to preface it like that? Why can't we just accept the fact that we all know what you're saying, and we've probably experienced the same thing ourselves? <br /> <br />The point of this book is to open the doors to communication. It's great for girls who are expecting or experiencing their first periods, because it gives them some idea of what to REALLY expect ("I awoke to a sticky feeling in my pajama bottoms" recalls one woman, page 25; another woman remembers the color: "it was the rust color that confused me. It wasn't red. In books it's always red," page 146-7). It's also a great jumping off point to start a dialog. When I read this book, I immediately got curious about other women in my life. I talked to my mother about the book and we shared our memories of our first periods. <br /> <br />I think it would be amazing for mothers to read My Little Red Book with their daughters so they can field questions and discuss it. Instead of mothers trying to tell their daughters about what it's like for them now, a time in life that the daughters won't reach for many years, the mother's relating her first period brings everything down to her daughter's experience level. This would definitely lead to a more helpful conversation.

The young Ms. Nalebuff should be commended for compiling these stories. It's sad that a book about a very natural condition of women is necessary in the 21st Century. Speaking as a 49-year-old man, I found a few things about period traditions that were interesting. Judy Blume's fictional book "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret?" was the quasi-bible for young girls, the silly slapping-then-hugging custom or having your ears pierced after the "event" were all eye-openers for me. Also the two pages of euphemisms for a period were quite amusing. But ultimately, this really wasn't worth my time. The book is by and for women. It also doesn't include a very broad spectrum of people. Most of contributors are in the arts or academic circles and the stories quickly become repetitive. There's nothing wrong with that, but the book certainly isn't of the caliber of a Studs Terkel collection like "Working" or "Hard Times." Speaking as a guy, I learn more from a Barbara Ehrenreich book.

I couldn't put this book down! As a woman, a feminist, and a historian, I loved reading all of the diverse accounts of menarche, across ages, generations, and cultures. Though many of the stories are from American women (many of them from NYC and Connecticut, as another reviewer pointed out), there are also some stories from India, Turkey, China, Ghana, Kenya, Australia, and New Zealand. Going from 1916 and extending to the Aughts of this century, the stories depict a range of emotions and reactions. I definitely related most to the stories of the girls who didn't know what was going on and the ones who sought to dispose of the evidence in secret because they either didn't know what was happening or because they didn't want their parents to find out. I probably did know I had gotten my period deep down, when I was eleven years old, but I was probably in too much shock or denial, after having dreaded and expected it for at least a year prior, and had also misread or misinterpreted what I'd read in Judy Blume. Like some of the girls, I didn't realise that a period lasts for several days, instead of just seeing some blood and it lasting five minutes! (My shame, secrecy, and embarrassment over my period really only ended when I was eighteen and discovered the beautiful Jewish laws of taharat hamishpacha, family purity, and ever since then I've embraced the monthly bleeding, now a withdrawal bleed instead of a real period due to being on the Pill, as a beautiful, feminist, empowering rite.) Even though their experiences were the cardinal opposite of mine, I did appreciate the perspective of the girls who were excited and told their mothers. One girl, the author's mother, even got her period in the presence of her grandmother, who was extremely happy and excited for her. Another story I related to was "The Invisible Period," where the author got her period while in Kenya and had the evidence discovered by her mother when she got home. Unable to believe she could have gotten her period and never known it, she claimed those were fecal stains! <br /> <br />Contrary to what a few other reviewers thought, I didn't think any of this book to be "inappropriate" for young girls. If a girl is old enough to menstruate (and thus be capable of reproduction, much as one hopes she won't be engaging in such activities till she's much older), or is approaching the time when she will, she's not some little kid who needs to be shielded from anything that's not G-rated. Young girls deserve to be empowered by this knowledge about their bodies instead of kept in the dark or, as I did, badly misinterpret or misunderstand what they might have read on the subject. (I was one of those kids who read too much and understood too little.) I also loved the vintage stories involving belts, and was actually disappointed when I asked my mother, who also read the book, if she still had hers around somewhere and she said no. This is a part of menstrual history, and young women today should know what their mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers went through during that time of the month, both as part of an appreciation of history and to not take for granted how lucky they are today to have modern menstrual products instead of needing a belt. These stories also helped me to understand why my mother is so off-put by how I've chosen to switch to rewashable cloth pads, because for someone of her generation, that must seem like an inconvenience and a step backward. <br /> <br />The book ends with a list of alternate expressions for menstruation (missing my favorite vintage one, "being a lady"!) and information on how to submit one's own story and how to help young women in Africa who literally can't go to school because they lack feminine hygiene products. It also contains an index with the stories categorized by theme (such as disposing of the evidence, believing one was dying, celebrating it, and having menarche while on vacation), decade, and culture. I would highly recommend this book to women and girls of all ages.

I got this for my 11 year old granddaughter. While I am getting a kick out of it- I hope most 11 year olds don't know about masterbation and sex.