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Pretty Good for a Girl: An Athlete's Story
“Just in time for the upsurge in ‘girl power’ books comes this insightful yet disturbing sports memoir of a former Arizona high-school track and cross country star who soars to first place in races but spirals downward in her battle to win acceptance among her male peers, and to avoid eating disorders and exercise compulsion, to overcome an unhappy home life (an alcoholic father) and a destructive, sexual relationship with an unethical coach. This is a well-written account of the pressures teenage athletes face that can lead to self-abuse and destruction.” Booklist
- GenresMemoirNonfictionSports
248 pages, Paperback
First published September 14, 1998
8 people are currently reading
113 people want to read
About the author
Leslie Heywood
15 books6 followersLeslie Heywood is Professor of English and Creative Writing at SUNY-Binghamton, where she was a 2009 recipient of the Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Research and Creative Activities. Interdisciplinary in focus, her areas are creative writing, gender studies, sport studies, science studies, and environmental studies.
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
November 26, 2010
I thought that Pretty Good For A Girl would be right up my alley: a women’s-studies-y memoir about a young, female track star in the 1980s, soon after Title IX changed the landscape of high school/college sports in the US. However, while there are some gems of insight into what it means to be a female athlete, Pretty is too rambling and unstructured to be an enjoyable read.
I think my issues with Leslie Heywood’s prose can be illustrated by this sentence from very early in the book:
The first half of the sentence is actually nicely-phrased: “that hour like held breath” is quite evocative. But then the whole thing just unravels into nonsense. “Mourning doves”…? “Brief space of cool”…? What…? Pretty is filled with “poetic” sentences that have not been checked for actual meaning.
It also doesn’t help that parts of the book are so vague that I wonder if Heywood (writing 15 years after the fact) could actually remember her high school days with any real clarity.
I think a good editor might have been able to rein in Pretty, but it bears no evidence of an editor’s eye. There are multiple typos in the text and ‘Dostoyevsky’ is even misspelled. If you’re going to pretentiously invoke a dead Russian author, you should damn well be able to spell his name!
Disappointing.
I think my issues with Leslie Heywood’s prose can be illustrated by this sentence from very early in the book:
“We get up at four in the morning, that hour like held breath just before the densest blackness starts to shift, just before the mourning doves take over that brief space of cool hanging in front of the sun, before it starts burning so tight you can’t breathe.”
The first half of the sentence is actually nicely-phrased: “that hour like held breath” is quite evocative. But then the whole thing just unravels into nonsense. “Mourning doves”…? “Brief space of cool”…? What…? Pretty is filled with “poetic” sentences that have not been checked for actual meaning.
It also doesn’t help that parts of the book are so vague that I wonder if Heywood (writing 15 years after the fact) could actually remember her high school days with any real clarity.
I think a good editor might have been able to rein in Pretty, but it bears no evidence of an editor’s eye. There are multiple typos in the text and ‘Dostoyevsky’ is even misspelled. If you’re going to pretentiously invoke a dead Russian author, you should damn well be able to spell his name!
Disappointing.
October 3, 2014
Heywood came of age when it was a constant battle for a girl to be taken seriously as an athlete, to not be 'just one of the girls'.
And she wasn't -- Heywood excelled in track and cross-country, regularly smashing records and priding herself on running with the boys' team. Local papers regularly sang her praises, her times were competitive on a national level, and her dreams went beyond high school, beyond college, to the Olympics.
This picture that Heywood paints of herself, though, it's neither flattering nor meant to be. She's talented, and driven, and arrogant; she views boys as worthy of her competition but also as objects to use and discard; she both scorns other girls (for not being so fast, so driven, so sleek) and resents them deeply when they do present a challenge. She is determined that the brilliance of her star will eclipse all those around her—until she burns out. It makes for a fair amount of give and take in her look back at high school. Although she depicts her younger self as not a little bit mean, as so focused on winning that she lost out on other things, she also talks of that time as the peak of not only her running career but also her life. In some ways, at fifteen and sixteen I was most alive, and I've lived expecting my world to turn back to that place where I felt with conviction that I was the sun, some place of magnetic attraction (211). By the time she says that, though, it's already clear to the reader.
I don't mean to come down on Heywood for being a not-always-likeable teenager; I'd only find that problematic if she didn't seem, as a writer, to recognise her younger self's flaws. And if Heywood employed harsh measures in order to succeed, it was because those measures were necessary: she was working against a system that believed female athletes were second-rate, male athletes desperate to cut her down to size, and coaches who perpetrated incredible abuse. With better coaches, a more modern understanding of training (that included things like rest days), an ability to nourish her body as well as simply hone it, I imagine her perseverance could have taken her a long way in the world of running. As it is, following her body's rebellion, Heywood has found a different kind of success -- as a professor, as a bodybuilder. (It does strike me that it is less that she has lost that drive/arrogance/obsession and more that she has translated it to something more sustainable.)
Heywood's academic background is in poetry, which I suspect influences the writing in a big way. It reminds me of Body Story in that respect -- neither works well for me, style too often taking precedence over substance. That's a bit part of my sub-par rating, though I think the story she tells here is important.
And she wasn't -- Heywood excelled in track and cross-country, regularly smashing records and priding herself on running with the boys' team. Local papers regularly sang her praises, her times were competitive on a national level, and her dreams went beyond high school, beyond college, to the Olympics.
This picture that Heywood paints of herself, though, it's neither flattering nor meant to be. She's talented, and driven, and arrogant; she views boys as worthy of her competition but also as objects to use and discard; she both scorns other girls (for not being so fast, so driven, so sleek) and resents them deeply when they do present a challenge. She is determined that the brilliance of her star will eclipse all those around her—until she burns out. It makes for a fair amount of give and take in her look back at high school. Although she depicts her younger self as not a little bit mean, as so focused on winning that she lost out on other things, she also talks of that time as the peak of not only her running career but also her life. In some ways, at fifteen and sixteen I was most alive, and I've lived expecting my world to turn back to that place where I felt with conviction that I was the sun, some place of magnetic attraction (211). By the time she says that, though, it's already clear to the reader.
I don't mean to come down on Heywood for being a not-always-likeable teenager; I'd only find that problematic if she didn't seem, as a writer, to recognise her younger self's flaws. And if Heywood employed harsh measures in order to succeed, it was because those measures were necessary: she was working against a system that believed female athletes were second-rate, male athletes desperate to cut her down to size, and coaches who perpetrated incredible abuse. With better coaches, a more modern understanding of training (that included things like rest days), an ability to nourish her body as well as simply hone it, I imagine her perseverance could have taken her a long way in the world of running. As it is, following her body's rebellion, Heywood has found a different kind of success -- as a professor, as a bodybuilder. (It does strike me that it is less that she has lost that drive/arrogance/obsession and more that she has translated it to something more sustainable.)
Heywood's academic background is in poetry, which I suspect influences the writing in a big way. It reminds me of Body Story in that respect -- neither works well for me, style too often taking precedence over substance. That's a bit part of my sub-par rating, though I think the story she tells here is important.
January 19, 2016
Feeling a lot of feelings. Remembering practices punctuated by crying in my goggles, grateful for the mirrored design so the pain could be private. I read this book quickly and emotionally. I’ve read memoirs by Natalie Coughlin and Amanda Beard and another swimmer escaping my mind right now, but haven’t felt so understood (and less alone) until this book.
Poetic and powerful, Heywood puts prose to the fighting feeling that burns in young female athletes when they constantly feel the need to prove their worth. The book sang when Heywood lets you enter her young mind as a track star. She demonstrates obsession with beautiful syntax, sometimes long and windy, sometimes staccato: “A “girl”: small, quiet, discreet. Mild and meek. Who smiles, who smiles, who smiles, who smiles…Delicate. Effeminate. Week. No way. I’ll be a monster any day.” (5-6)
“If only you could hear the roaring in my dreams, these men spinning all around me who can’t turn away I am so big. Every day I grow bigger, like a flame, burning a black hole across space. So they can’t forget me, erase me, laugh and turn away, so I won’t float alone with nothing whatever to hold. Not feminine. No open airy space to find, a looseness like fucking the void. You’ll slam up against me and smash your head.” (74-75)
She spends some time at the end explaining the female athlete triad and new research (this book was published in the late 90s) surrounding it. This felt like a tag on to me, but I grew up as an athlete after doctors started acknowledging that psychology is a piece of performance. I “knew” about these things—we were talked to, advised to be careful, but in my experience, male coaches still have no idea how to speak with female athletes. Much of Heywood’s experience with coaches and a fractured sense of self resonated.
What you are willing to do to your body when you define your worth through improved performance? There is a huge difference between motivation and psychological damage. Through her own story (a sexually abusive coach, unsupportive family, asshole male athletes, sexism, and training environments that ignore injury), Heywood shows how external factors and internal motivation get twisted and fucked up.
I get really sad for all the talented young women that have been destroyed by their environment. I’ve been around too many similar stories.
Poetic and powerful, Heywood puts prose to the fighting feeling that burns in young female athletes when they constantly feel the need to prove their worth. The book sang when Heywood lets you enter her young mind as a track star. She demonstrates obsession with beautiful syntax, sometimes long and windy, sometimes staccato: “A “girl”: small, quiet, discreet. Mild and meek. Who smiles, who smiles, who smiles, who smiles…Delicate. Effeminate. Week. No way. I’ll be a monster any day.” (5-6)
“If only you could hear the roaring in my dreams, these men spinning all around me who can’t turn away I am so big. Every day I grow bigger, like a flame, burning a black hole across space. So they can’t forget me, erase me, laugh and turn away, so I won’t float alone with nothing whatever to hold. Not feminine. No open airy space to find, a looseness like fucking the void. You’ll slam up against me and smash your head.” (74-75)
She spends some time at the end explaining the female athlete triad and new research (this book was published in the late 90s) surrounding it. This felt like a tag on to me, but I grew up as an athlete after doctors started acknowledging that psychology is a piece of performance. I “knew” about these things—we were talked to, advised to be careful, but in my experience, male coaches still have no idea how to speak with female athletes. Much of Heywood’s experience with coaches and a fractured sense of self resonated.
What you are willing to do to your body when you define your worth through improved performance? There is a huge difference between motivation and psychological damage. Through her own story (a sexually abusive coach, unsupportive family, asshole male athletes, sexism, and training environments that ignore injury), Heywood shows how external factors and internal motivation get twisted and fucked up.
I get really sad for all the talented young women that have been destroyed by their environment. I’ve been around too many similar stories.
December 30, 2018
I didn't know it was possible to write a memoir with so little introspection or self awareness. Its basically a list of events through her high school college years. She never attempts to explain the events or her choices and doesn't appear to learn anything. Except for one high school coach, who doesn't get enough blame for his actions, and her health, all of the conflict is in her head. She talks about having to prove that she's not just a girl, but no one ever says that to her.
The prose is what you would expect from a poet writing a book. Sentences ramble, metaphors go no where, timelines are hard to follow.
There is no talk about title IX until a throw away epilogue that doesn't seem to relate to the rest of the book.
The prose is what you would expect from a poet writing a book. Sentences ramble, metaphors go no where, timelines are hard to follow.
There is no talk about title IX until a throw away epilogue that doesn't seem to relate to the rest of the book.
January 22, 2013
I am torn between two and three stars. The narrative was compelling enough to keep reading. Indeed, I finished in one day...an uncommon thing for me to do. The lyrical prose and beautifully constructed sentences also kept me going. There is an illusion of her digging deep into herself, revealing hard earned truths. However, the message was as shallow as the author admitted to be.
May 19, 2018
Maybe 3-and-a-half stars...
WHY I COULDN'T STAND THIS BOOK (AT FIRST):
-the way Leslie would do anything, even hurt/put-down others, to win. For example: when Martha joins the Cross-Country team and is almost as fast as her, Leslie freaks out. She rants about how slow and ugly Martha is (both behind her back and to her face), ignores her, and gets seriously upset if newspapers even mention her name or if any of the XC guys talk to her.
-Through the beginning-middle of the book, Leslie constantly boasts on how attractive and drop-dead gorgeous she is— including comparing herself to a Barbie about 10 times.
-She's generally very self-centered. "I shine my attention on my fellow runners one at a time, and each basks in that sun until I switch to the next (p. 8)."
WHY I GREW TO TOLERATE (LIKE?) THIS BOOK:
-Nearing the end of the book, Leslie undergoes a big change. She realizes winning ISN'T everything— that you should also enjoy yourself and be a good sport towards other.
-She doesn't condone her previous behavior. In fact, this is a cautionary tale— a good lesson about sports AND life, including: taking rest when you need it, eating disorders AREN'T the answer, and to always be a good teammate and competitor.
FAVORITE (2) SENTENCE(S): "I write this book with hopes that other girls will have some support I didn't have and won't make the same mistakes as I did. So here's to... the women and men who make it possible for every young women to burn bright as the sun without paying the price of self-destruction."
SIDE-NOTE:
Ironically, I finished this book right before the start of Track and Field Regionals. I actually think it inspired me (or at least gave me some handy pointers) before I ran my races.
WHY I COULDN'T STAND THIS BOOK (AT FIRST):
-the way Leslie would do anything, even hurt/put-down others, to win. For example: when Martha joins the Cross-Country team and is almost as fast as her, Leslie freaks out. She rants about how slow and ugly Martha is (both behind her back and to her face), ignores her, and gets seriously upset if newspapers even mention her name or if any of the XC guys talk to her.
-Through the beginning-middle of the book, Leslie constantly boasts on how attractive and drop-dead gorgeous she is— including comparing herself to a Barbie about 10 times.
-She's generally very self-centered. "I shine my attention on my fellow runners one at a time, and each basks in that sun until I switch to the next (p. 8)."
WHY I GREW TO TOLERATE (LIKE?) THIS BOOK:
-Nearing the end of the book, Leslie undergoes a big change. She realizes winning ISN'T everything— that you should also enjoy yourself and be a good sport towards other.
-She doesn't condone her previous behavior. In fact, this is a cautionary tale— a good lesson about sports AND life, including: taking rest when you need it, eating disorders AREN'T the answer, and to always be a good teammate and competitor.
FAVORITE (2) SENTENCE(S): "I write this book with hopes that other girls will have some support I didn't have and won't make the same mistakes as I did. So here's to... the women and men who make it possible for every young women to burn bright as the sun without paying the price of self-destruction."
SIDE-NOTE:
Ironically, I finished this book right before the start of Track and Field Regionals. I actually think it inspired me (or at least gave me some handy pointers) before I ran my races.
May 23, 2017
A vivid glimpse inside the sense of self that comes about from being, and from having been, a girl athlete. Some gorgeous writing and revealing insight into the stakes of sports for young women--beyond winning, how it is about maintaining a fragile sense of self, of protecting yourself from being just another girl, pretty or smart or whatever, but not that special. Sports can feel like a way out of gender, and out of a body construed as primarily sexual. But of course, as Heywood's experience reveals, a girl athlete can never outrun her gender or her sexuality.
As Heywood writes in her 1999 preface, some of this may seem dated after Title IX, but I didn't read it this way, not most of it. The troubling tensions for women athletes between sexuality & gender, and strength/power, what it means for a woman to be good enough, the thin line between being a fierce athlete and self-harm, all of these play out in Heywood's career and continue to play out for women in sports. Missing for me was a sense of others in this book--parents, first of all, who are mentioned in passing, and friends and teammates, who appear largely as quotes from letters and yearbook entries, but ultimately it's only LH herself who emerges as a full person from these pages. And perhaps Coach Luke. Still, apart from whatever flagging of tension or connection in the flow of the narrative, this book is an important contribution to literary nonfiction about sports.
As Heywood writes in her 1999 preface, some of this may seem dated after Title IX, but I didn't read it this way, not most of it. The troubling tensions for women athletes between sexuality & gender, and strength/power, what it means for a woman to be good enough, the thin line between being a fierce athlete and self-harm, all of these play out in Heywood's career and continue to play out for women in sports. Missing for me was a sense of others in this book--parents, first of all, who are mentioned in passing, and friends and teammates, who appear largely as quotes from letters and yearbook entries, but ultimately it's only LH herself who emerges as a full person from these pages. And perhaps Coach Luke. Still, apart from whatever flagging of tension or connection in the flow of the narrative, this book is an important contribution to literary nonfiction about sports.
November 20, 2018
I wouldn't have expected to enjoy a memoir from a woman jock to be this enjoyable, but she had great insights into body image issues and what it means to be a woman in a male-dominated field. I really enjoyed this.
June 5, 2012
Describes the author's life as a conceited and driven high school track star and her running career in college before her body forced her to stop running competitively. The author had some awful things happen to her, though she was not an angel either. As a young woman, she believed that being a girl meant you don't matter, so she trained impossibly hard to prove herself by winning races until her body gave out. The writing, run-on sentences tending towards stream-of-consciousness, is not brilliant but it does work. I think what saves the whole book is the last chapter where she describes how she has moved beyond her ultra-competitive, smash-the-competition mentality by describing her experience at a weight-lifting meet.
It's interesting to compare this book to the Cauliflower Chronicles, and even to Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. All are memoirs of the authors being terrible people; however, only this author has enough self-awareness and distance from the events to describe them fairly. The author of the Cauliflower Chronicles doesn't seem to realize he's describing himself being a jerk to his friends. The author of Tiger Mother knows that other people think she is horrible to her daughters, but she thinks she can tell funny stories about it. Heywood understands that she was awful to her boyfriends in high school. She describes the events without a lot of commentary, without blaming people or justifying herself. Her writing is a refreshing contrast to Jennifer Sey, in Chalked Up, who blames everybody but herself for her problems.
It's interesting to compare this book to the Cauliflower Chronicles, and even to Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. All are memoirs of the authors being terrible people; however, only this author has enough self-awareness and distance from the events to describe them fairly. The author of the Cauliflower Chronicles doesn't seem to realize he's describing himself being a jerk to his friends. The author of Tiger Mother knows that other people think she is horrible to her daughters, but she thinks she can tell funny stories about it. Heywood understands that she was awful to her boyfriends in high school. She describes the events without a lot of commentary, without blaming people or justifying herself. Her writing is a refreshing contrast to Jennifer Sey, in Chalked Up, who blames everybody but herself for her problems.
December 13, 2013
Leslie Heywood is a professional body builder, and recovering from an exercise compulsion. All throughout high school (pre title IX), she was obsessed with being someone. Being the absolute best was her priority, and she wanted to train with the guys. She had the trifecta-food restrictions, over exercise, and the need to be the best. She was so obsessed with being the best, that her body couldn't take it any more, and it started to work against her. For her, the struggle has always been to prove herself, to take up space and to make herself visible. Towards the end of the book, she takes a reflective stance, and talks about her change in outlook. Teamwork, cheering on your teammates and realizing that winning isn't everything are some major lessons she learns later in life.
At some points I found this book to be a bit self-indulgent, but I think it was nothing but honest. She focuses on her high school athletic career, at the first outset on title IX. I realize that the times are different now, with female athletes as prominent as males. But I would argue that the issues facing Heywood in the 1970's are not that different from the issues facing female athletes today. We are so over loaded with the need to be the best, the focus has shifted away from the important stuff-how to work as a team, and enjoy an experience with others.
At some points I found this book to be a bit self-indulgent, but I think it was nothing but honest. She focuses on her high school athletic career, at the first outset on title IX. I realize that the times are different now, with female athletes as prominent as males. But I would argue that the issues facing Heywood in the 1970's are not that different from the issues facing female athletes today. We are so over loaded with the need to be the best, the focus has shifted away from the important stuff-how to work as a team, and enjoy an experience with others.
January 5, 2012
I absolutely loved this book! I encourage any driven female who has ever had the strength to push herself beyond the expectations of others to read this! And, even still, any female who is looking to start pushing herself to find her place in this large world, should read this! It can be highly motivating.
The first few chapters of the book almost made me put it down in search for something else to read. After I made it past the first few, I could not put it down. While I have never been in actual sports, I am a very fit and enjoy the challenge of bringing myself to the next level. In many ways, this book spoke to me on similar circumstances. I'm glad Heywood chose to write it!
<3
The first few chapters of the book almost made me put it down in search for something else to read. After I made it past the first few, I could not put it down. While I have never been in actual sports, I am a very fit and enjoy the challenge of bringing myself to the next level. In many ways, this book spoke to me on similar circumstances. I'm glad Heywood chose to write it!
<3
February 16, 2013
The best book I have ever read, and will continue to read over and over. I'm not sure that everyone can understand or appreciate what it is like to be a female athlete in a "boys world". Anyone who doesn't understand her lines such as the "brief space of cool" has never willingly gone running or training at the crack of dawn when it seems like the whole world is still sleeping, or truly pushed their body until it feels like it just might break.
This book was suggested to me by my high school women's lit teacher. It is a fascinating and sometimes scary story to read, but hands down it's my favorite book.
This book was suggested to me by my high school women's lit teacher. It is a fascinating and sometimes scary story to read, but hands down it's my favorite book.
April 6, 2008
It was o.k. to read through once. I wouldn't read it again, however. It started out good, lost momentum. I didn't particularly care for her writing style. However, the athlete triad syndrome, and eating disorder stuff was somewhat interesting.
July 27, 2013
A quick read and interesting take on the toll of athletics on female self-esteem. The themes in this book show up in other things she's written, so if you read just one book I would suggest this one.
November 28, 2015
Great book! Although I read this book as a teen, it's still relevant today. When your committed to a sport or lifting people give you a hard time for your dedication. When female cross fitters and body builders obtain muscle, people talk negatively. Great book for female fitness lovers.
April 28, 2007
A story that should be told more: the cost of driving yourself to be the ultimate athlete and the ultimate reclaiming of the self that must be done in order to heal.
December 15, 2007
A- Finally! A girl athlete memoir!
February 3, 2011
book about a cross-country runner who finds it difficult to be a serious female athlete in the 70s. intense book, read it in 1 day. sports theme isn't really my thing.
May 29, 2016
I had to read this book for a class and I did in fact read it in a day, but by the end I was shaking my head at how little self-awareness the author had actually developed.
September 28, 2010
Actually didn't finish this, got too bored and un-interested to make it to the end.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews