What do you think?
Rate this book
The Return of the Housewife: Why Women are Still Cleaning Up
An illuminating look at the world of cleanfluencers that asks why the burden of housework still falls on women.
Housework is good for you. Housework sparks joy. Housework is beautiful. Housework is glamorous. Housework is key to a happy family. Housework shows that you care. Housework is women’s work.
Social media is flooded with images of the perfect housewife. TikTok and Instagram ‘cleanfluencers’ produce endless photos and videos of women cleaning, tidying and putting things right. Figures such as Marie Kondo and Mrs Hinch have placed housework, with its promise of a life of love and contentment, at the centre of self-care and positive thinking.
And yet housework remains one of the world’s most unequal institutions. Women, especially poorer women and women of colour, do most low-paid and unpaid domestic labour. In The return of the housewife, Emma Casey asks why these inequalities matter and why they persist after a century of dramatic advances in women’s rights. She offers a powerful call to challenge the prevailing myths around housework and the ‘naturally competent’ woman homemaker.
Housework is good for you. Housework sparks joy. Housework is beautiful. Housework is glamorous. Housework is key to a happy family. Housework shows that you care. Housework is women’s work.
Social media is flooded with images of the perfect housewife. TikTok and Instagram ‘cleanfluencers’ produce endless photos and videos of women cleaning, tidying and putting things right. Figures such as Marie Kondo and Mrs Hinch have placed housework, with its promise of a life of love and contentment, at the centre of self-care and positive thinking.
And yet housework remains one of the world’s most unequal institutions. Women, especially poorer women and women of colour, do most low-paid and unpaid domestic labour. In The return of the housewife, Emma Casey asks why these inequalities matter and why they persist after a century of dramatic advances in women’s rights. She offers a powerful call to challenge the prevailing myths around housework and the ‘naturally competent’ woman homemaker.
- GenresNonfictionFeminism
220 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 8, 2025
19 people are currently reading
2842 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 3, 2026
I would give this 0 stars if I could. I picked this one as part of the Goodreads challenge because the subject seems really interesting and the author spent the entire book trying to sound smart and boring me to death.
Every single line in the book sounded like the author used a thesaurus to replace every word and just rambled in order to fill space. Here’s an example of one line in the book:
“Underpinning these discourses of collectivity is, conversely, a highly individualised narrative of optimistic aspiration; of believing in your dreams, of never giving up and of submitting yourself to the life-changing potential of consumerism and, of course, the apparently ‘natural’ logic of unequal domestic labor practices.”
The author spent the entire book talking down to the reader and trying to make the reader feel dumb. I do feel dumb that I spent $29 dollars on this book (because I like to support smaller authors). This was a painful read.
Every single line in the book sounded like the author used a thesaurus to replace every word and just rambled in order to fill space. Here’s an example of one line in the book:
“Underpinning these discourses of collectivity is, conversely, a highly individualised narrative of optimistic aspiration; of believing in your dreams, of never giving up and of submitting yourself to the life-changing potential of consumerism and, of course, the apparently ‘natural’ logic of unequal domestic labor practices.”
The author spent the entire book talking down to the reader and trying to make the reader feel dumb. I do feel dumb that I spent $29 dollars on this book (because I like to support smaller authors). This was a painful read.
April 26, 2025
An extensive study on cleanfluencers and their rise in current society. Casey shows an in-depth knowledge of the history of women’s domestic work; she draws on feminist debates and the dangers that the rise of this new social media trend is producing in regard to patriarchal structures and gender inequalities. I was so impressed by how Casey deconstructs the social media videos and concepts featured in the rising notion of cleanfluencers, connecting them to the latest trends in social media such as self-help influencers, online therapists and Marie Kondo. After having read ‘Pink Pilled’ by Shearing which features the emergence of the tradwife and its reoccurrence on social media, this book was a brilliantly complimentary by exploring another figure, the cleaninfluencer, who is upholding similar values. As Casey said, it should be an image of a woman that concerns us all for the future. Thank you for this study!
July 17, 2025
This book was really interesting. It was a very clear and straight to the point book and the author has done a great job of going straight to the point and explaining things with clear examples.
I didn’t know that there were people called “Cleanfluencers” on social media that promoted products and cleaning hacks to the point of them having a large following and impact.
I took my time reading this book because it was a lot to think about and reflect on. Understanding the ties between cleaning and mental heath for example which primarily developed during the pandemic with the uprise of social media and its influence on people.
It’s a really interesting book when you realise that in many households the wife is still the one doing most of the chores and we (as women) have often been taught this way and to just get on with it. It’s a current battle for the equality of genres and roles which is clearly not aided by social media and other TV programs that carry on forgetting that men can also pick up a hoover and do the washing up.
I enjoyed this book and the fact that it also had interesting mentions of how housework was treated back in the last 20th century.
I didn’t know that there were people called “Cleanfluencers” on social media that promoted products and cleaning hacks to the point of them having a large following and impact.
I took my time reading this book because it was a lot to think about and reflect on. Understanding the ties between cleaning and mental heath for example which primarily developed during the pandemic with the uprise of social media and its influence on people.
It’s a really interesting book when you realise that in many households the wife is still the one doing most of the chores and we (as women) have often been taught this way and to just get on with it. It’s a current battle for the equality of genres and roles which is clearly not aided by social media and other TV programs that carry on forgetting that men can also pick up a hoover and do the washing up.
I enjoyed this book and the fact that it also had interesting mentions of how housework was treated back in the last 20th century.
March 3, 2026
This book made me uncomfortable in the best possible way.
Emma Casey takes something many people see as ordinary and harmless, the idea of the housewife, and gently but firmly pulls it apart. She asks why, after decades of progress, so much domestic labour still falls on women. She asks why unpaid work is still treated as natural rather than political. And she does it without shouting.
What I appreciated most is how grounded the book feels. This is not abstract theory floating above real life. It connects directly to kitchens, childcare, cleaning, money, exhaustion. It looks at how self care culture and lifestyle branding can quietly repackage old expectations in prettier language.
At times I wished for even more lived stories alongside the analysis. The arguments are strong, but I sometimes wanted deeper emotional texture. Still, the clarity of the writing makes the message land. You cannot read this and walk away thinking housework is just personal preference.
This is not an angry book, but it is a firm one. It asks readers to look honestly at their own homes and relationships. It asks who benefits from the arrangement. It asks who is tired.
I finished it feeling thoughtful rather than triumphant. A little unsettled, but aware.
And that feels like the point.
Emma Casey takes something many people see as ordinary and harmless, the idea of the housewife, and gently but firmly pulls it apart. She asks why, after decades of progress, so much domestic labour still falls on women. She asks why unpaid work is still treated as natural rather than political. And she does it without shouting.
What I appreciated most is how grounded the book feels. This is not abstract theory floating above real life. It connects directly to kitchens, childcare, cleaning, money, exhaustion. It looks at how self care culture and lifestyle branding can quietly repackage old expectations in prettier language.
At times I wished for even more lived stories alongside the analysis. The arguments are strong, but I sometimes wanted deeper emotional texture. Still, the clarity of the writing makes the message land. You cannot read this and walk away thinking housework is just personal preference.
This is not an angry book, but it is a firm one. It asks readers to look honestly at their own homes and relationships. It asks who benefits from the arrangement. It asks who is tired.
I finished it feeling thoughtful rather than triumphant. A little unsettled, but aware.
And that feels like the point.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews