Assessment:
Plot/Idea: The main ideas here are well-executed and insightful. The author uses her own experience, in addition to research and surveys, to capture what friendship means to women. Her words of wisdom will resonate with readers – particularly the section about reasons, seasons, and a lifetime.
Prose: The conversational tone throughout is easy to follow. The ideas are well-organized, and allowing the reader space and opportunity to reflect throughout is helpful.
Originality: The author provides interesting insights about women and friendship, avoiding depicting women at odds and instead indicating that they should find ways to support each other. Including information about social media will draw a younger audience to this piece of work.
Character Development/Execution: Initially it feels like the information shared is repetitive; however, once the author dives into her insights, readers will find themselves in agreement and even rereading and jotting down notes. Readers will stick with this to the end to unearth the wisdom between the pages.
Date Submitted: December 09, 2021
Lady and the Tribe: How to Create Empowering Friendship Circles Brenda Billings Ridgley Whole You Media, 276 pages, (paperback) $16.95, 978-1737289708 (Reviewed: November, 2021) In Lady and the Tribe, Brenda Billings Ridgley celebrates the power of female friendships, sharing insights into the ways they enrich women’s lives and offering strategies for creating, strengthening, and enjoying these relationships to the fullest. Ridgley explores the roots of loneliness in today’s times and the impact of social media, while also sharing stories from her life and others to illustrate personal growth as friendships deepen. Her narrative addresses the distinct types and levels of women’s relationships with one another, including toxic ones. “The Friendship Target” is at the heart of her philosophy. Imagine a center circle titled “You” with five concentric circles around it. The closer the circle to “You,” the deeper the relationship and the smaller the number of people included. From the center out, she labels the circles as: Tribe (”closest to heart-center relationships”); Soul Sisters (important friendships with women you can’t see regularly); Kindred Klan (women you socialize with regularly, perhaps once a month); Friendlies (real friendships, but on a more superficial level); Community (casual friendships, similar to a network). Ridgley does an impressive job merging personal experiences, her unique thoughts on friendship, and anecdotes from other women with research and experts’ opinions. She offers a plethora of useful tips on how to develop, maintain, and enrich friendships, such as encouraging readers to “emphasize joy and kindness over charisma”; enthusiasm for a friendship, she posits, enhances the relationship, as does sharing inside jokes and connecting over the “silly things.” While she acknowledges that life events can prevent friends from getting together, she connects the value and depth of friendship with the amount of time, energy, and support each person provides the other. In other words, quantity equals quality, both in the number of people you connect with and how often you get together with those people. Ultimately, Ridgley’s philosophies will resonate with any woman seeking to analyze and expand friendships, who will find many helpful insights here. Also available as an ebook.
Author Brenda Ridgley hosts a book signing party.
