What's Wrong With Me?

What's Wrong with Me? by Daree Allen is a small book that is packed full of advice for young women. Ms Allen covers everything from sex to money management with examples from her own life and easy to follow suggestions and exercises for teen girls to improve their lives. The chapters are short and broken up with quotes and sidebars that make them easy to read and follow. For the most part, this book will appeal to Christian teenage girls and is especially relevant to black Christian teenage girls.

What's Right with this Book?

1. Easy to read. The language is straight forward no matter the topic. Daree doesn't pull any punches and she doesn't sugar coat the mistakes she made as a youth.
2. Lots of quotes that are relevant to the topic and thought provoking.
3. At the end of each chapter there are suggestions for further reading in case the reader would like to more fully study a topic.
4. For the most part, the advice given is solid and clear: what I would want my daughters to think about in a given situation.

What's Wrong with this Book?

1. OK, this is picky, but I don't like the way the chapters are titled. Each one is What's Wrong with ... (my friends, marriage, my money, etc.) I understand the idea, and it's cute, but there is nothing wrong with most of these things. It's your attitude toward them that may be wrong, not the thing itself.
2. Some of the advice was a little contradictory. It bothers me when the gist of the advice is that you are OK. Love yourself and your body, eat healthy, dress in clothing that fits you, make sure your underwear fits properly ... and wear Spanx to smooth things out. (I admit that Spanx, and the like, are a pet peeve of mine.) Dress appropriately, love yourself and no teenage girl needs to wear Spanx!
3. I feel like some of the advice given could be detrimental to girls living in abusive situations. In most cases, it is great to tell teens to obey their parents even if they feel they are being treated badly and to try and understand where there parents are coming from - BUT sometimes it's a better idea to tell another adult that you trust exactly what is going on in your home before you decide to accept what your parents say and do. It is possible that what your parents are doing is actually NOT OK and obeying is a bad idea. Think of the girl in a sexually abusive situation - enough said.

Overall, I think there are many, many teen girls out there who need to hear exactly what Daree Allen is telling them. Hopefully this book finds it's way into their hands.

If you are interested in knowing more about the book or this blog tour, click here and check out Daree's blog.