Confessional writing has gotten a bad rap in intellectual circles, seen as more suited for the diary than the bookshelf. Melissa Febos is the queen of the confessional, or rather a literary and political offshoot. Her last book, “Girlhood,” about the experience and expectations of living in a precociously developing female body, is currently up for a National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism. In “Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative,” Febos hopes to revamp the genre’s reputation.