No One Loves an Angry Woman

This is a coming of rage story: the best-selling author of Fed Up deconstructs her Evangelical upbringing and shows how women’s anger can lead us towards change

Gemma Hartley grew up in an Evangelical household where she was raised to become an obedient wife from the time she was a little girl. A sexual assault as a teenager upended her evangelical world, and that coupled with an upbringing steeped in purity culture led her to internalize guilt, silence… and anger.

The good girl conditioning of the church demanded that Hartley seek the narrow path of womanhood that emphasized service to others, to swallow the discomfort and rage that simmered just below the surface – but when political events rewakened her trauma, she began to come apart at the seams. Here she unravels the threads of her upbringing to weave a new story, one where women’s anger is not sinful and dangerous – it is information, and often the most rational response there is.

Whether or not you’ve ever set foot in a church, Christian patriarchal norms have shaped American culture in ways that are far-reaching and insidious. From restrictive legislation that takes away women’s bodily autonomy to cultural norms that expect women to pick up after their husbands and joyfully give up their careers to care for children—these are all standards informed and fed by Christian culture.

Tying together her Christian upbringing together with a feminist examination of society today, Hartley tells her personal story, but it’s bigger than that: No One Loves an Angry Woman is the story of a cultural awakening."Gemma Hartley’s account of unlearning fear, questioning faith, walking away from white patriarchy, and finding freedom on the other side is searing and compelling. Both personal memoir and cultural critique, this book is a courageous example of walking out of the only story you’ve ever been told and, an act of generosity, writing your own." — Soraya Chemaly, author of Rage Becomes Her and The Resilience Myth

"Gemma Hartley has written a memoir that is at once a feminist manifesto and a love letter to her younger self. Not only is this book packed with mic-drop wisdom; its gorgeous prose will demand to be read, reread, and read again. Each essay acts as a North Star to deftly guide the reader through the life of the book’s titular ‘angry woman.’ But what Hartley does by the end is utterly brilliant—not only will you fall in love with this ‘unlovable angry woman’; you will admire her, you will respect her, and you will applaud her." — Reema Zaman, author of I Am Yours

"A brave, bold, timely, and intimate exploration of how Christian patriarchy harms girls and women. No One Loves an Angry Woman probes the intricate process by which our emotions become gendered and constrained as we grow up, as well as the complicated work women must do to save themselves from worldviews that don’t perceive them as fully human and to find their own voices amid so much clamoring about who and what women should be. The honesty and rigor of this book is a gift." — Amanda Montei, author of Touched Out

Gemma Hartley is the author of FED UP: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward. Her work has been featured in outlets including Harper’s Bazaar, Women’s Health, Glamour, The Washington Post, CNBC, Redbook, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Teen Vogue, The Huffington Post, and more. She is an experienced interviewee, speaker, and podcast guest, and has made appearances on shows including Good Morning America and Cheryl Strayed’s Dear Sugars. She lives in Reno, Nevada.