SUMMER BOOKS: WHAT WE ARE READING RIGHT NOW

REVIEWS

Books by our dear friends, Janet Mock, Roxane Gay and Margaret Atwood!
“For me as a young person, books were my very first escape,” Janet Mock told Girls Write Now last spring when she was writing Surpassing Certainty. “They were the spaces of refuge that allowed me to leave harsh realities in poverty stricken communities, realities that offered little hope for a young multiracial transgender girl like myself.” Surpassing Certainty is courageous, thoughtful, and will directly benefit anyone who reads it.
—Molly MacDermot, Senior Communications Advisor & Editor
Watch Janet Mock’s speech and Q&A as our 2016 Girls Write Now Awards honoree.
Roxane Gay’s Hunger is an unflinchingly honest work that is at once both an exploration of tragedy and longing and a commentary on the American obsession with the body. From start to finish, each page turned in Hunger feels like another wall being pulled down, another glimpse into what it means to be a person who suffered trauma in this world, and furthermore what it means to be overweight in America. From discussing her experience of sexual violation as a young girl and how it led to an incessant hunger — both physically and psychologically — Gay provides a startlingly raw portrayal of womanhood and desire — and the consequences of wanting to disappear, both from yourself and from the world. Hunger is a story of loss and longing, but it is also so much more: a tale of desperation, a study into our obsessions with our bodies, and a reminder that no matter who or where we are, we are all always wanting for something.
—Spencer George, Communications Intern
Watch Roxane Gay’s speech and Q&A as our May 2015 CHAPTERS keynote speaker.
Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale remains as shockingly relevant today as it was when it was first published in 1986. It is both a condemnation of society’s treatment of women and an in-depth psychological portrait of a woman whose entire life has been upended. The protagonist Offred’s story is told with sensitivity and grace, but it is not an easy book to read. For every moment of beauty, there are moments of brutality, of chilling disregard for human life, of violent misogyny. Yet this is precisely what makes The Handmaid’s Tale so important. In this day and age, Atwood’s novel illustrates the dangers of becoming complicit. Atwood also offers a powerful portrayal of resistance, celebrating the resilience of women. Offred’s narrative is searing, unexpectedly funny, and filled with insights that illuminate both the world of Gilead, and our present reality.
—Emily Henning, Development Intern
In her essay, “What Art Under Trump?”, Margaret Atwood argues that artists “play a profound role in speaking truth to power and expressing what it means to be human.” The Nation highlights Girls Write Now as an organization that helps girls do that and more.

STAFF PICKS

We’ve asked our staff for their best summer reading recommendations, and as always, the suggestions offer a little something for everyone. Check out our 2017 Girls Write Now Summer Reading Guide!
Journeys that transcend time and place:

• Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi (recommended by Isabel Abrams, Senior Program Coordinator)
  • I’m reading Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi (I know, a little late to the party). It is such a beautiful and moving book about the descendants of an Asante woman, Maame, starting with her two daughters.

• Witches Of America by Alex Mar (recommended by Spencer G.)
  • Witches Of America, by Alex Mar, tells the story of Alex Mar as she immerses herself in the American Pagan movement, attracted to its followers’ complete devotion to their cause. Mar documents her own journey of beginning to study witchcraft, from first an insatiable curiosity about her subjects’ lives to her own longing to have something to believe in. And ultimately, as Mar realizes, what we all crave is something to believe in, to long for, and to devote ourselves to completely– to have a guiding force in a world as tumultuous and strange as ours.

• The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy (recommended by Caitlyn Pang, Special Assistant to the Executive Director): 
  • I love Roy’s The God of Small Things for its beautiful writing and for the way Roy grappled with themes of colonialism, love, and politics in India. It has been nearly two decades since Roy published her one and only novel, so I’ve been hoping for this day for years.

• Exit West by Mohsin Hamid (recommended by Kirsten, Girls Write Now Alum & Associate Editor, Kenyon Review)
  • Anyone would feel changed by this story about love and exile, about leaving your home when it disappears, and how we are changed as we move through new doors and grow into new spaces. It’s told in humble language with profound empathy and wisdom.

Satisfy your love of history and fiction:

• Under the Undala Trees by Chinelo Okparanta (recommended by Emily H.)
  • I’m excited to read Under the Udala Trees, by Chinelo Okparanta, which tells the story of Ijeoma, an 11 year old girl sent away during Nigeria’s brutal civil war in the late 1960s. Ijeoma meets another displaced girl, and they fall in love. A novel that combines an LGBTQ+ main character with a setting most Americans know little to nothing about is a rare treat, and I’m excited to read about the history of Nigeria and how the LGBTQ+ experience there is different from the canonical American LGBTQ+ story.

• Magdalene by Marie Howe (recommended by Victoria Sanchez, Programs Intern)
  • This is the fourth poetry collection by Lowe, and the first to focus her characteristically insightful meditations on sacredness and loss exclusively on the female existence. Here she uproots the biblical figure of Mary Magdalene and sets her free in modern times, re-envisioning Mary Magdalene and having her act as an everywoman to tackle the problems modern women face today.
    

Think outside of the box:

• Men Explain Things to Me by Rebecca Solnit (recommended by Naomi Solomon, Program Manager)
  • Men Explain Things to Me is a collection of essays by the great Rebecca Solnit. Incredibly well-researched, Solnit intersperses data with personal anecdotes to present a picture of the current state of affairs for women and feminism in America, touching on everything from professional slights to domestic violence. It’s an intense read, but so well-written and the content is so timely and important that I have to recommend it.

• You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine by Alexandra Kleeman (recommended by Spencer G.)
  • Alexandra Kleeman’s debut You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine is at once both an exploitation of consumerist culture and a missing person story told from the point of view of the missing person, character A, who lives with her roommate B, who is obsessed with A and A’s boyfriend, C. Smart, funny, and just strange enough, You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine zeroes in on our incessant repetitions of one another, our endless consumption of goods and media, and our hopeless hunger to have some sort of meaning in our lives.

• HEN & GOD by former Girls Write Now staffer, Amber West
  • HEN & GOD explores the world where poetry is God, where God’s “cock crows lightning,” and the poem itself declares, “I am God and my ears / are the wings of the world.” Again and again she reminds us that consciousness — art — is larger than suffering, is our redemption. In persona poems from a dizzying array of characters, West’s collection becomes a portrait of life in America now, unflinching and loving and bold.

For everyone:

• Rise Speak Change: The 2017 Girls Write Now Anthology