It’s more than just something to sit on or fill out a pair of jeans. It has become a symbol of so much more. Your butt is a cultural icon. It is the inspiration for fitness trends, clothing styles, fad diets, music, and dance.
In this book, Radke delves into not just the body part, but also the cultural significance it has held for the past 200 years. From 1800s England to modern-day magazines, the butt has been prominently featured while only minimally understood. Radke helps us to realize the way behind our perceptions.
I found this book to be poignant and well-written. Your butt is not something you necessarily think about in the context of culture. Radke helps to give us the backstory of our backside. It is kept from being an overwhelming amount of information by relating past events to present times. She also used personal anecdotes and well-known celebrities to help make the story relatable.
This book is food for thought and will make me take the time to consider just how I feel about butts.

If I had to pick a word to describe how I felt while reading this book, it would be frustrated. Both with the story itself and global events.
I expected this book to essentially be a biography of Jesse Owens that had its climax with his 1936 Olympic victories, where he irrefutably proved to the world that the “master race” was not superior.
What I found was Jesse Owens sprinkled in among the nuances of 1930s politics and their effect on the sporting world.
For me, the victories were almost eclipsed by politicians worldwide that repeatedly passed the buck or shuffled their feet when it came to deciding how to respond to Hitler’s policies.
The hypocrisy of Olympic committee officials who chastised Germany’s exclusion of athletes based on race or creed but continued to support comparable policies abroad that blatantly treated athletes as lesser because of their race, creed, or gender was beyond frustrating.
It was difficult to approach this book with an unbiased mindset because I know what happened beyond 1936. With every concession or blind eye turned toward 1930s German policy, I found myself groaning and cringing. I had to remember that Jesse Owens did not know what was to come. He was just a man representing himself and his country. And in doing so, he effectively proved to the world that value is far more than skin deep.

Would have liked more of Jesse and less politics but it was an informative read. That being said, I definitely think this is a book people should read. It gives a different perspective and helps us learn about the mistakes of the past.

This is my second read of this book. I didn’t remember much, often the curse of an avid read reader. But I did remember liking it the first time around. I was once again drawn in by the subtle appearance of magic among the mundane. It’s one of the reasons that magical realism has been among my favorite genres since high school.

A whimsical tale of a young boy, as told through the point of view of the people he impacts along his travels. Weylyn Gray has always been a bit different. This leads to him living life on the outskirts, literally and figuratively. But to those few that take the time to get to know him, their lives will never be the same.

Lang uses multiple points of view and time hops throughout the book to tell Weylyn’s story. This does not make the narrative hard to follow. I found that it helped keep me engaged, seeing the same scene from different points of view. It also made the book go by quickly.

An beautiful tale sprinkled with magic, love, and acceptance.