A thrilling and riotous dive into the world of superfandom and the fangirls who shaped the social Internet.
In 2014, on the side of a Los Angeles freeway, a One Direction fan erected a shrine in the spot where, a few hours earlier, Harry Styles had vomited. “It’s interesting for sure,” Styles said later, adding, “a little niche, maybe.” But what seemed niche to Styles was actually an irreverent signpost to an unfathomably large, interconnected, and influential multiverse: stan culture.
In this book, Kaitlyn Tiffany, a staff writer at The Atlantic and proud superfan herself, guides us through the nebulous online world of fans, stans, and boybands. Along the way we meet girls who damage their lungs from screaming too loud, fans rallying together to manipulate streaming numbers using complex digital subversion, and an underworld of inside jokes and shared memories surrounding band members' allergies, Internet typos, and hairstyles.
In the process, Tiffany makes a convincing and often moving argument that fangirls, in their ingenuity and collaboration, created the social Internet we know today, effectively making One Direction the first Internet boyband. “Before most people were using the Internet for anything,” Tiffany writes, “fans were using it for everything.”
With humor, empathy, and an insider’s eye, Everything I Need I Get from You reclaims Internet history for young women, establishing fandom not as the territory of hysterical girls but as an incubator for digital innovation, art, and community.
From dangerous, fandom-splitting conspiracy theories about secret love and fake children to the interplays between high and low culture and capitalism, Tiffany’s book is a riotous chronicle of the movement that changed the Internet forever.
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“[A] nuanced analysis of an often-overlooked force in internet history, one dominated by the kind of young women whom the rest of the world dismissed as little more than brainless teenyboppers.”
— Vox
“Wistful, winning, and unexpectedly funny.”
— New Yorker“[A] wonderfully fresh take on fandom.”
— Chicago Tribune“[A] propulsive, entertaining study of contemporary female fan culture.”
— Glamour“Tiffany traces the shifting status of fangirls in the culture at large…establishing pop music fans as among the internet’s most powerful and feared operators.”
— New York Times“An irresistible read.”
— Pitchfork“Illuminate[s]…the way a fan’s love often ignites during crises of identity.”
— Slate“Doling out droll insights alongside expertly dissected tweets…shedding light on what she argues is the women-led demographic’s bottomless power in the digital age.”
— Publishers Weeky (starred review)“A heartfelt memoir…[that] examines contemporary loneliness and our growing need to feel like we’re a part of something…A finely balanced pop-culture investigation.”
— Kirkus Reviews“Does remarkable justice to the complexity of online culture.”
— Jenny Odell, New York Times bestselling author“A brilliant demonstration of the joy, power, technological innovation, and world-changing shifts that happen when girls turn on their love.”
— Samantha Hunt, author of The Unwritten BookBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Kaitlyn Tiffany is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she covers technology and culture. She was previously on the same beat at Vox’s consumer vertical The Goods, after starting her career writing about pop culture, fandom, and online community at The Verge. She was formerly the host of the popular podcast Why’d You Push That Button, which considered the tiny technology decisions that have an outsized effect on our modern social lives.
Eileen Stevens is a voice-over actress whose voice can be heard on cartoons, promos, programs for English-language learners, and audiobooks. An Earphones Award–winning narrator, she is also an audiobook director and producer.