The Big Bang Theory‘s Mayim Bialik Talks Her Latest Book, Girling Up

If you feel like you’ve known Mayim Bialik your entire life, it’s because you probably have. Since first gracing our screens in the ‘80s, the former child star has become a mom, a successful author and a star on The Big Bang Theory. Bialik has learned a lot about life, health and growing up in the ensuing years, and she explores these topics in her new book, Girling Up: How to Be Strong, Smart and Spectacular.

Paste chatted with Bialik about her book’s origins, fighting for the perfect cover photo and celebrities’ influence on teens.

Paste: Let’s judge your book by it’s cover for a moment, as it’s got this great picture of you dressed as a superhero. Where did that idea come from?

Mayim Bialik: There are a lot of aspects of this book that I think are interesting in terms of what I was trying to do and how it tied into the way the media wants to present this kind of material. The cover is a great example. Originally, it was pitched to me that we do a pretty glamor shot of me, with my hands on my chin, looking very smart with glasses and appropriate sparkly makeup. I rarely put my foot down about things firmly, but I said, “Absolutely not.” I said, “If I’m writing a book about girls feeling empowered and feeling intelligent and embracing their quirky sides, I don’t want to be presented as the pretty girl wearing glasses on the cover of this book.” I actually suggested that we do something comic-y and superhero-y and empowering with me in sneakers, the way I always am. Everybody on our creative team was able to get on board with more of a playful and quirky look for the whole book as opposed to a sleek “Ooh, celebrity scientist” look, which kind of makes me nauseous.

Paste: You’ve written books about parenting, cooking and now about growing up. What goes into your decision-making process as far as when to dive into writing a new book?

Bialik: I’m the first person to say that I think it’s really obnoxious and pretentious when celebrities write books, and it looks like they’re just doing it to make money. I’ve actually been very selective about what I’ve written about. My first book about parenting came about because I was writing about it for kveller.com at that time. There seemed to be a lot of desire to hear my perspective on my style of parenting, what that meant for my family and how it impacted us. My second book, honestly, came out of sharing recipes and people saying, “We want more recipes like that. Can you please put out a book?”

With [Girling Up], I’ve been approached by a lot of different publishing companies to put my face on a shiny, happy science book for girls. That’s not what I wanted to do. It was Jill Santopollo from Penguin who reached out to me. She had read an article I wrote on GrokNation.com about what it was like to be a late bloomer, since I play one on television. She loved the way that I spoke about Amy and Sheldon [from The Big Bang Theory] having coitus for the first time in such modest and humbled tones. And she said, “I think this is a voice that a lot of girls would resonate with, especially because you’re not coming from a conservative or religious perspective about it.”

I proposed that we teach girls about themselves through learning about the cultural experience, or a scientific experience, of being female and how it varies across culture. It’s an entire mini-encyclopedia of being female, and that’s really how this book was born. So it feels like it really has honest beginnings.