SOURCE: “Gender Armistice,” in Maclean's, November 1, 1999, p. 70.

In the following review, Wilson-Smith offers a positive assessment of Stiffed, though notes that Faludi's sympathy for brutal men is occasionally too generous.

Susan Faludi likes men. Her affection extends to a willingness to try to understand and explain their opinions, even when they seem offensive. That is not remarkable, except that Faludi is the author of the 1992 feminist best-seller Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women. In it, she argued the need to revive the flagging feminist movement because, she wrote, a combination of male-dominated government, media and conservatives were conducting a “powerful counter-assault on women’s rights.” The book won critical raves—except from conservatives whose views she excoriated.

Now, the 40-year-old Faludi is back with Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man—a book that may annoy some feminist fans of her first book, but one that is...