Literary Woman of the Week: Andrea Towers

At the core of this site, we celebrate women in television, new and old, in a way that allows all of the contributors here (past and present) to connect to them in ways that help us. Together, we tackle how the world works for and against us, and we know that we’re not alone. Empathy creates something so that in these women, we see ourselves.

We were delighted when one of our former contributors, Andrea Towers, announced the publication of her book, Geek Girls Don’t Cry: Real Life Lessons from Fictional Female Characters*! Published earlier this month, Geek Girls Don’t Cry is a collection of essays examining what we can all learn from women in pop culture – not just television, but movies, comics, video games.

In Geek Girls Don’t Cry, Andrea uses her extensive knowledge of women in pop culture to dissect how a few of her favorites have overcome trauma, grief, adversity, depression, and/or isolation. It’s part fannish history and part psychology lesson to help contextualize and explain some of the fictional and real-life women we most love and how they turned seemingly insurmountable obstacles and experiences into something else that made them even more compelling, stronger, and even more resilient and compassionate.

From formative heroine Dana Scully, to hardened doctor lost on an island Dr. Juliet Burke, to Buffy Summer’s stand against all the evil of the Hellmouth, Geek Girls Don’t Cry makes it clear that these women are strong not only because of how they overcame or transformed trauma, isolation, or depression, but also provides some insight for how we can be inspired by them.

Last Saturday I had the pleasure of listening to Andrea talk about her book at Emerald Knights Comics and Games in Burbank, along with Marisha Ray, who wrote the foreword. Andrea shared the book’s origin story, who she had to leave out after the editing process, and some of the difficulties in getting the tone of the book just right.

I might have to fight her over her favorite iteration of Buffy Summers, though. She’ll take Sarah Michelle Gellar and I’ll happily take Kristy Swanson.

If you’re piqued by the idea of some lessons from Buffy, Juliet from Lost or Xena, Andrea’s book has what you’re looking for! If you need to find solace from Princess Leia or Katniss Everdeen, even Hermoine Granger has a lesson we can apply to our lives.

If you love pop culture, strong women, and inspiring messages, check out Geek Girls Don’t Cry, available now in hardback wherever books are sold.

Andrea’s past work for NGTV can be found here.

*DISCLAIMER: THIS POST CONTAINS AFFILIATE LINKS TO AMAZON. COMMISSIONS EARNED VIA AFFILIATE LINKS ARE USED TO KEEP THE LIGHTS ON HERE AT NGTV.