--- title: Girlhood: 100 Must-Read Books of 2021 description: Find out why "Girlhood" by Melissa Febos is on TIME's list of the must-read books from this year. canonical: https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2021-11-29T13:15:42.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-02T23:58:40.386Z og:title: 'Girlhood' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2021 og:description: Here's why it made the list og:url: https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf80a50f1a988cbe7/6998cd3be1ba008edc98e4bd/time-hi-res.webp?branch=production&width=640&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: 'Girlhood' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2021 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 'Girlhood' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2021 twitter:description: Here's why it made the list twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf80a50f1a988cbe7/6998cd3be1ba008edc98e4bd/time-hi-res.webp?branch=production&width=640&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Nov 29, 2021 # Girlhood by Melissa Febos by [TIME Staff](/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff  Melissa Febos’s 2010 debut memoir _Whip Smart_, about her time spent working as a dominatrix in Manhattan, placed her immediately in the ranks of the women writing best about sex, bodies and power. In this year’s best-selling essay collection _Girlhood_, Febos looks further back, digging into her experience as a girl who’d gone through puberty by the time she was 11, but also broadening her scope with cultural analysis and reporting about the realities of growing up female. In essays exploring childhood teasing, college cuddle parties and a whole spectrum of ambivalent consent, Febos traces the inheritances of womanhood—the meanings and functions ascribed to the female body, and how we defy them. **Buy Now:** _Girlhood_ on [Bookshop](https://bookshop.org/a/4973/9781635572520 "undefined") | [Amazon](https://amzn.to/3kId2Cy "undefined") ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/"},"headline":"Girlhood","datePublished":"2021-11-29T13:15:42.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-02T23:58:40.386Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/","keywords":["Books","list","best books"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf80a50f1a988cbe7/6998cd3be1ba008edc98e4bd/time-hi-res.webp?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf80a50f1a988cbe7/6998cd3be1ba008edc98e4bd/time-hi-res.webp?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-must-read-books-2021/6120629/girlhood/","name":"Girlhood"}}]}] ```