She's Such a Geek: Women Write About Science, Technology, and Other Nerdy Stuff
This jubilant if uneven anthology of 24 essays spotlights women who write comic books for a living, get caught up in their favorite role-playing games and win "sexiest geek alive" contests by sporting a corset made out of circuit boards. Though editors Newitz (Pretend We're Dead) and Anders (Choir Boy) celebrate women's technical accomplishments and nerdy hobbies, several contributors also discuss their encounters with sexist discrimination. Programmer Kory Wells remembers the professor who complimented her skills by saying she was "really, really good, for a girl," while Mara Poulsen recalls programming videogames for a company whose female characters were ridiculously underdressed. Ranging from engineers and biophysicists to a high school student, the irrepressible contributors write with varying levels of eloquence, but their passions run equally high, whether they're portraying a Harry Potter character in an online community or gaining early acceptance at MIT.(Jan.)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.