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Summary: sad, and awesome
Review: My mom makes a whole lot more sense to me now.
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Summary: Make your daughter read this book!
Review: Pink Think is hysterically funny...but I'm in my mid-40's and I grew up with a lot of the "Pink Think" examples in this book. I urged my 25-year old daughter to read it so she could better understand the environment I grew up in. This book is worth reading just for the entertainment value, but it also serves as a wonderful reminder of how much attitudes about women have changed and improved.
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Summary: Make your daughter read this book!
Review: Pink Think is hysterically funny...but I'm in my mid-40's and I grew up with a lot of the "Pink Think" examples in this book. I urged my 25-year old daughter to read it so she could better understand the environment I grew up in. This book is worth reading just for the entertainment value, but it also serves as a wonderful reminder of how much attitudes about women have changed and improved.
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Summary: a collection of pink propaganda, and nothing more
Review: Pink think, according to Lynn Peril, is the set of notions society holds and has held about the nature of womanhood and appropriate feminine roles. Pink think originated as early as the nineteenth century but enjoyed its most powerful era in the consumerist decades of the 1950's, 1960's, and 1970's. During those years, women were sold personal grooming products, charm courses, kitchen items, and a myriad of other goods and services that purported to make a woman more feminine or to help her attract a mate. Peril's book is a collection of these items: descriptions, ad copy, and pictures fill its pages.But "Pink Think" is little more than the sum of its parts. Its historical treatment of pink think is brief, and it barely even touches on present-day pink consumerism. The book also makes no attempt to analyze its subject matter, instead restricting itself to what amounts to a detailed list, and while the entire book is interesting, it's hard to find an impetus to continue beyond the first few chapters.
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Summary: Should be on every woman's bookshelf
Review: This book is a true gem! It's rare to find a book that tackles such subject matter without hitting you over the head with a heavy dose of feminism. Instead, you can be mortified by some of the ways women were treated and marketed to over the years, but you can also enjoy and remember back to some of those silly games, toys, magazines, etc, you too got caught up in (as did thee author).
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Summary: Wow! This book is a real eye-opener! A must read for women!
Review: This book is fantastic. For anyone interested in gender studies, women's studies, or just 50's/60's culture, this book is just great. I had read Peril's column in Bitch magazine and decided to get her book. (the column is similar to this book) I couldn't believe all of the amazing and frightening tidbits of female life in the 50s... like Lysol being sold as a douching product?? And even more disturbing was the death toll from using Lysol in such a capacity. More upsetting still was the company's reaction to these women's deaths - the women had failed to properly dilute the product and, therfore, caused their own deaths. Most of the book is not so disturbing. In fact, most of it is really charming. The kind of stuff that makes you look at bullet bras, cardigans, saddle shoes, and other icons of 50s femininity and think "wow, I've got it pretty good." A great read if not for academic purposes then for simple head-shaking humor.
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Summary: The Pink Jello Mold of Femininity
Review: This book is genius! It walks a fine line between rationally exploring the history of social expectations for girls and reporting the horror contained within, without ever giving into the temptation to go on one long, humorless feminist rant. In fact, it approaches the topic with remarkable good humor. Well written, informative AND funny!
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Summary: Fascinating, but keep this in mind:
Review: This book is positively brilliant. It is likely that even the most well-educated feminist will learn new and horrifying things from Pink Think. My blood pressure went up several notches.
I would like to point out one thing, however, something which the author herself addressed: things haven't changed. In my opinion the only thing that has clearly changed dramatically are women's career opportunities, but we are still expected to keep a happy, clean home, raise children, and keep hubby sexually satisfied. While reading this book with the TV on, I was struck by the similarity between today's ads and those presented in Pink Think (cleaning products - nuff said.) Rather than coming away from this book thinking that you have it so much better than your baby-boomer mother did, allow it to open your eyes to the hilarious propoganda in the present.
I can't wait to see a book from the same author chronicling current magazine ads, dating advice books, and TV commercials.
Rating: 
Summary: Great for reference, horrible otherwise
Review: This book was witty and a great reference for all things mid-century and female-oriented, but beyond that wasn't much of anything. Homosexuality is never really covered in regards to women and doesn't really analyze or comment on things or even try to understand the why behind it: the book is just sarcastic in a rather juvenile sense. The best part of the whole book is when Peril indicts Betty Friedan for being a part of the pink think problem.
I actually got the impression from the book that if you happen to be a contemporary female who is feminine, you're evil. And that is sad.
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Summary: Fun Read On Womens History...How Far Have Wein Really Come??
Review: When I first saw Pink Think at Barnes and Noble I thought that it was misplaced in the women's studies section as it really did not look like a book with a feminist glance.
BOY WAS I WRONG!!! I wound up actually taking a look at it one day and could not leave the store without it!!!
I have always been intrigued by women's history. I am not into cooking or sewing or cleaning by any means to be honest. However I find that the stuff that dates back in time regarding those issues really shed light into the lives that women of the time would have lead. Its really hard to find that kind of information and Lynn Peril did a really good job at not only compiling the stuff that she found, but presenting it in an easy to read fashion.
I must admit as I read the stuff in the book I really could not help but wonder: how far have we really come?? When I think of womens magazines, women's fiction, ivillage and the stuff that we market towards teen girls.
Lynn Peril has a fun Pink Think website that has links to other fun information on these kind of historical facts. A few other books I would highly recommend if you are into these historical view on women are: The Way We Never Were by Stephanie Coontz as well as From Front Porch to Backseat by Beth Bailey.
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