[Review] #girlboss - Sophia Amoruso

Title of Book: #girlboss
Author: Sophia Amoruso
Publisher: Portfolio
Publication Year: 2014
Language: English
Format: Hardback
Pages: 256

The founder of Nasty Gal offers a sassy and irreverent manifesto for ambitious young women

At seventeen, Sophia Amoruso decided to forgo continuing education to pursue a life of hitchhiking, dumpster diving, and petty thievery. Now, at twenty-nine, she is the Founder, CEO, and Creative Director of Nasty Gal, a $100+ million e-tailer that draws A-list publicity and rabid fans for its leading-edge fashion and provocative online persona. Her story is extraordinary—and only part of the appeal of #GIRLBOSS.

This aspirational book doesn’t patronize young women the way many business experts do. Amoruso shows readers how to channel their passion and hard work, while keeping their insecurities from getting in the way. She offers straight talk about making your voice heard and doing meaningful work.

She’s proof that you can be a huge success without giving up your spirit of adventure or distinctive style. As she writes, "I have three pieces of advice I want you to remember: Don’t ever grow up. Don’t become a bore. Don’t let The Man get to you. OK? Cool. Then let’s do this.”

#girlboss is a memoir by Sophia Amoruso, the founder of Nasty Gal. As we can imply from the title, this memoir’s theme is centered on her business. #girlboss talks about her experience founding the company, her work ethics, and where those come from. Lately, we’ve seen the rise of internet startup companies founded by young people. Sophia Amoruso is one of them. I could have picked any one of those books by young CEOs, but I picked #girlboss because it’s about a woman. I’m a woman. Sophia Amoruso is a young woman who founded ‘the fastest growing retailer’. She’s also a millennial, so I figured she might be more relatable to me.

This book is divided into several chapters which chronicled Sophia’s journey on creating Nasty Gal. She really started from the bottom. After the introduction, this book starts with stories from her childhood. She explained how she doesn’t like being in school and how different she is. She also explained how even at a young age, she’s started working. In between her life story she slips one or two of her work ethics. For example, she explained how important saving money is and she tells her experience working in Nasty Gal that related to that advice. The advices in this book are common actually. I’m pretty sure you could also find those in other business or self-help books. The reason why I prefer this book more is because those advices are backed up by experiences which she willingly explained in the book. So the advices feel more genuine. 

I like that Sophia isn’t afraid to tell her misdemeanor experiences. She blatantly tells her early day as a shoplifter and how she finally wants to have a legitimate job. I appreciate her honesty. She tells the story with a note that it’s her mistake and nobody should do it. She tells it so nobody would make the same mistake as her. Again, coming from her true experience, it feels genuine.

I also like that sometimes at the end of the chapters, she puts short stories of other successful women. More inspiring story, more positivity, I love it. Overall, I love this book. It’s inspiring and sure, Sophia has flaws. She’s a human being. Nobody’s perfect. But at least she’s being honest about it. Her ways of telling her story is also fun, sassy, and beware of curse words because she doesn’t hold back. I recommend this book.