A New York Times Bestseller
NANCY JO SALES is an award-winning journalist and author who has written for Vanity Fair, New York, Harper's Bazaar, and many other publications. She is known for her reporting on youth culture and crime and for her profiles of pop-culture icons. She won a 2011 Front Page Award for "Best Magazine Feature" and a 2010 Mirror Award for "Best Profile, Digital Media." Her 2013 book, The Bling Ring- How a Gang of Fame-Obsessed Teens Ripped Off Hollywood and Shocked the World, tells the true story behind the Sofia Coppola film The Bling Ring, which was based on Sales's 2010 Vanity Fair piece "The Suspects Wore Louboutins." Born in West Palm Beach, Florida, Sales graduated summa cum laude from Yale in 1986. She became a contributing editor at Vanity Fair in 2000. She has a daughter, Zazie, and lives in the East Village in New York City.
"American Girls is probably one of the most urgent
conversation starters I’ve read in some time." —Psychology
Today
“Sales digs into every aspect of girls’ online lives, revealing
myriad disturbing details…If you have a teenage daughter, read
American Girls. Have her read it, too.” —Newsday
“Adult readers will be shocked… [they] might be on Facebook and
Twitter, but they probably haven’t even heard of most of the apps
that teens use, let alone how they use them…What Sales makes clear
is just how prevalent social media is in the life of an American
teenager.” —The New York Post
"Based on interviews with hundreds of teens from 13 to 19, this
exploration of the hypersexualized, social-media-ruled world girls
grow up in today is eye-opening and sobering." —People
“Social media is life; social media destroys life. For “American
Girls,” Ms. Sales spent two and a half years investigating this
paradox…. and she’s exquisitely unobtrusive as she does it.
Conversations that are not safe for adults seem to open like apps
under her fingertips. She has sophisticated methods of
infiltration.” —The Wall Street Journal
"Sales forces us to face a disturbing new reality in a book that
should be required reading for parents, teachers, school
administrators, legislators and the boys’ club of Silicon
Valley.” —The San Francisco Chronicle
"Sales painstakingly draws on scholarly research and numerous
interviews with girls from New Jersey to California to offer a
harrowing glimpse into a world where self-esteem, friendships and
sexuality play out, and are defined by the parameters of social
media." —USA Today
“In her new book American Girls: Social Media and the Secret
Lives of Teenagers, readers are afforded the opportunity to
understand what is really going on in the lives of teenagers,
especially our girls. ..This book stands apart from other books
targeted at understanding the concerns and current plight of
teenage girls… A must read for all parents.” —Examiner
"This book is an ice-cold, important wake-up call." —Kirkus
Reviews
"This is an important book... It’s an essential read if you have
teenagers or tweens in your life...I highly recommend American
Girls for anyone who wants to understand how our ongoing revelation
is playing out for teenagers." —WebInkNow
“This intelligent, history-grounded investigation by journalist
Sales (The Bling Ring) finds dismaying evidence that social media
has fostered a culture "very hostile" to girls in which sexism,
harassment, and cyberbullying have become the "new normal," along
with the "constant chore" of tailoring one's image for public
consumption and approval… Parents, educators, administrators, and
the purveyors of social media platforms should all take note of
this thoughtful, probing, and urgent work.” —Publishers Weekly
*Starred Review*
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