Sponsored by Under the Magnolias by T. I. Lowe.
Magnolia, South Carolina, 1980. Austin Foster is barely a teenager when her mama dies, leaving her to care for her six siblings and try to stop her daddy from retreating into his personal darkness. As Austin finds herself relying upon some of Magnolia’s most colorful citizens to ease the Fosters’ hardships, her father makes a choice that will crack the family’s secrets wide-open. T. I. Lowe’s gritty yet tender tale reminds us that a great story can break your heart . . . then heal it in the best possible way.
Welcome to Read This Book, a newsletter where I recommend one book that should absolutely be put at the top of your TBR pile. Recommended books will vary across genre and age category and include shiny new books, older books you may have missed, and some classics I suggest finally getting around to. Make space for another pile of books on your floor because here we go!
Today’s pick is another must-read, especially for women of all types, and extra-especially if you consider yourself a feminist. This book is a powerful manifesto by one of my favorite contemporary voices in intersectional feminism.
The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls by Mona Eltahawy
Content warnings: frequent use of the word “fuck,” advocating for violence, discussions of sexual assault, violence against women, genital mutilation, and lots of misogyny.
This book is incredibly intense as is clear from the first line, “I wrote this book with enough rage to fuel a rocket.” The author did not come to play nor coddle. She has zero tolerance for the patriarchy, including the women who uphold it who she refers to as “the foot soldiers of the patriarchy.”
Mona Eltahawy is known for starting the hashtags #MosqueMeToo and #IBeatMyAssaulter. She is also known for making a bunch of folks in Australia clutch their pearls, when, on Australian national television she asked, “How many rapists do we have to kill to get men to stop raping?” If you are the kind of person who thinks that violence is never the answer, then this book is maybe not for you.
As titled, this manifesto goes through the seven necessary sins that we must embrace to destroy the patriarchy. Not fight nor combat but destroy. Mona Eltahawy wants our feminist tagline to be “fucking fear me!” The sins are Anger, Attention, Profanity, Ambition, Power, Violence, and Lust. After the introduction, she goes through each sin and tells us how each is integral to our tearing it all down and moving forward.
This is not nice, neat, clean feminism. It’s also not centered on Americans, as so much tends to be. It is a global view of feminism focusing on all women. There is so much going on in countries outside of the U.S. with regards to feminism and the fight for human rights that I learned about in this book.
This is another book that I read annually and encourage everyone to give a try.
That’s it for now, book-lovers!
Patricia
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