How to Build a Girl cover art

How to Build a Girl

 Preview

Get 30 days of Standard free

£5.99/mo after trial. Cancel monthly.
Try for £0.00
More purchase options

How to Build a Girl

By: Caitlin Moran
Narrated by: Louise Brealey
Try for £0.00

£5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for £8.62

Buy Now for £8.62

LIMITED TIME OFFER

£0.99/mo for 3 months - terms apply. Offer ends 31 August 2026.

Now a film directed by Coky Giedroyc and starring Ladybird's Beanie Feldstein as Johanna Morrigan and Game of Thrones's Alfie Allen as John Kite

My name’s Johanna Morrigan. I’m fourteen, and I’ve just decided to kill myself.

I don’t really want to die, of course! I just need to kill Johanna, and build a new girl. Dolly Wilde will be everything I want to be, and more! But as with all the best coming-of-age stories, it doesn’t exactly go to plan…

A Number One Sunday Times bestseller in hardback and paperback, from the award-winning and Sunday Times bestselling author of How to Be a Woman.

© Caitlin Moran 2014 (P) Penguin Audio 2014

 Coming of Age Genre Fiction Literature & Fiction Movie, TV & Video Game Tie-Ins Funny Comedy Feel-Good Thought-Provoking Witty
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1

Critic reviews

Rude, big-hearted, wise-cracking novel (Christina Patterson)
Brilliantly observed, thrillingly rude and laugh-out-loud funny (Helen Fielding)
An entertaining read, with Moran in fine voice – hilarious, wild, imaginative and highly valuable…Moran is in danger of becoming to female masturbation what Keats was to Nightingales… (Barbara Ellen)
A Portnoy's Complaint for girls… when I see this book described as "laugh-out-loud funny" I feel affronted; it could make you laugh out loud with one hand tied behind its back, while wanking itself off to fantasies of Satan. Laughing out loud is just the start (Zoe Williams)
spirited coming of age novel romps from strength to strength…I’m a Moran fan (Lionel Shriver)
Moran also writes brilliantly about music, and especially about what music can do. She carries Johanna through this novel with incredible verve, extravagant candour, and a lot of heart. Johanna is … a wonderful heroine. A heroine who cares, who bravely sallies forth and makes things happen, who gives of herself, who is refreshingly unashamed. She’s so confident, it’s glorious
there’s so much real feeling too. Johanna’s vulnerability and bravado, as she moves out of her world and falls in love is beautifully done’ or ‘ and running through it all, with a visceral power that most writers should envy, is the shame and grinding anxiety of being poor
This isn’t a sleek, slick novel, but it is a rambunctious, raw-edged, silly-profound and deeply relatable guide to what your worst mistakes can teach you, and it has much to offer teenagers both actual and inner
I have so much love for Caitlin Moran (Lena Dunham)
Binge-read all of #HowToBuildAGirl in one sitting. Even missed supper. A first (Nigella Lawson)
All stars
Most relevant
Very good read the narration was excellent. Only criticism is the fowl language used and the repetitive sex references but l wont be marking it down for that ....maybe lm just more prudish than the average listener but it would have been good to know before hand about the language.

Fly on the wall of a teenagers life.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
As a 44 year old man I consider the time I've spent digesting this book as a strange kind of cultural exchange exercise. Having recently become a dad to 2 daughters the title swung it for me but I have to be honest it's not exactly what I had in mind. On reflection this was even better than what I was expecting and if there's a moral to all this it's that boys and girls aren't so different. We all want to be loved, we all want to make our mark in the world and we all need to masterbate from time to time. Well performed, this is a fun and funny page turner. A real reminder how crap the teenage years actually are.

Cultural eye opener

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
What a wonderful listen. Hilarious and delightful. Exquisitely written. Beautifully narrated. I love Jo-Hannah Morrigan

Hilarious and delightful

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Does exactly what it says on the cover. Brilliant observations from the midlands and the 80s and 90s music scene (the Phil Oakey one is my favourite of them all 😭) fantastically rude and genuinely laugh out loud (while out in public walking my dog 🤪) funny.

Louise Brealy gives so much to the narration, An amazing performance, and it’s great to see its being turned into a film this year.

Brilliant

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Over the top bad language and frequent sex references - but easy to follow and quite moving in places. I enjoyed it overall.

Interesting read.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews