Beauty Pageant Books – Pageants, Parlors, and Pretty Women by Libba Bray

A riotously funny book that takes readers on an island where beauty pageant contestants are forced to work together to survive. The characters are wildly quirky and the plot is just as convoluted and unpredictable. Child labor, illegal arms deals, the price of beauty, diet pills, racy TV shows, presidential candidates and more are all woven into this fast-paced story that will entertain even the most jaded reader. The humor is heightened by the fact that it’s skewed toward absurdist humor, with comments, ads and product placements (of course for Corporation products) sprinkled throughout.

Libba Bray is a master at writing witty, off-the-wall characters and this book is no exception. She keeps the cast manageable by killing off all the other girls right at the beginning. This leaves her to portray a Lesbian Girl, a Deaf Girl, a Trans Girl, a Singing Girl and a Smart Feisty Jewish Feminist Girl among others. Despite the large number of stereotypes, she never veers into trite or obvious territory.

Pageants, Parlors, and Pretty Women explores sectors of southern culture that are rarely discussed in academic literature. The author uses the pursuit of female beauty as a prism to examine both white and black American life in the years leading up to the civil rights movement. She compares the genteel Miss Mississippi of 1971, Lynda Lee Mead, and Anne Moody, who led a sit-in at a Jackson Woolworth’s. Her goal is to broaden our view of beauty pageants as a reflection of both femininity and feminism.