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kyatic's Reviews (974)
I'm so confused as to why this is a. so controversial and b. so lauded. It says literally nothing new. It's like basic white girl feminism 101. It makes no attempt at intersectionality, the arguments are basically 'men oppress women as a group and that's bad' (i.e. the idea that was quite controversial in Simone de Beauvoir's era, but less so now) and the author is a middle class white woman who's married to a man. Revolutionary, this ain't.
It's probably fine if you're just getting into feminist ideology, but for anyone who's read literally more than two other feminist texts, it just retreads the same old ground as most Dua Lipa lyrics.
Lads, if you think this one's controversial, you'll absolutely burst a vein at polemics with more meat on the bones of their thesis. Try Vivek Shraya's 'I'm Afraid of Men' as a follow-up to this one; it's equally short and has a very similar cover, but might actually make you think.
It's probably fine if you're just getting into feminist ideology, but for anyone who's read literally more than two other feminist texts, it just retreads the same old ground as most Dua Lipa lyrics.
Lads, if you think this one's controversial, you'll absolutely burst a vein at polemics with more meat on the bones of their thesis. Try Vivek Shraya's 'I'm Afraid of Men' as a follow-up to this one; it's equally short and has a very similar cover, but might actually make you think.
ARC received via the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
I didn't know very much about the massacre at École Polytechnique de Montréal before reading this, and now, having read it, I'm slightly mad that the few things I did know were wrong. I'd always been fed the 'lone gunman with mental health issues' line, and yet, with even the smallest bit of context, it's clearly a mass femicide. I can't help but view the public image of this attack as the work of anyone other than a raging misogynist as further continuation of violence against women; if we don't name it, then we can pretend it doesn't happen. It does.
In this relatively short book, Boileau outlines the events of the massacre itself, giving just enough detail that the horrors of what happened are made clear but not dwelt on in a morbid fashion, and then goes back to give some context of the women's rights movement in Quebec in the preceding 30 or so years. Again, I didn't realise how quickly the feminist movement was galvanised in the late '60s to the late '70s, and how fast (and late!) changes happened to give women some of the rights men had always taken for granted. With this historical context, the motives of the shooter become undeniable. I did find that this section was a little dry, and an awful lot of it seemed to consist of lists - lists of women 'firsts', lists of how the Polytechnique femicide was commemorated in successive years, lists of laws passed - but I suppose there was a lot of information to pack in, and this was as good a way as any to do it. I would also have liked more focus on the issues that specifically face indigenous women, as they seemed to take a back seat, only really appearing in asides here and there about specific laws passed.
Sometimes the writing seemed quite detached in these sections, probably because of the volume of information conveyed, and I would have appreciated a bit more depth and analysis of some of the things presented as fact. There's also a real clanger when Boileau states that intimate partner violence perpetrated by women against men is never in the form of coercive control or sustained emotional or physical abuse, but rather takes the form of them lashing out in heightened emotional states; this is simply untrue. Those of us in the UK might remember the case of Alex Skeel, who was systematically and nearly fatally abused by his girlfriend over the course of a year. I don't think Boileau does her argument any favours by claiming that women are not capable of this sort of abuse; it certainly seems true that women perpetrate it less often, but it's not an impossibility.
The second half of the book, by far the strongest half, consists of chapters about each of the women who were killed in the femicide. These chapters were really sensitively written and had a real warmth about them; it felt like Boileau really respected and admired the women she was writing about. Conversely, she spends hardly any time on the perpetrator of the femicide, which I think was the right call. The women are allowed to exist as fully fledged human beings before they encountered him on that day, and he's barely even an aside in their narratives. He doesn't loom large over the book. He's just one misogynist who had access to a gun, and there's nothing particularly interesting about him, whereas the women are all enormously accomplished, and frankly you could fill a book with all that they achieved in their short lives. This part of the book reminded me a little of The Five, Hallie Rubenhold's book about the victims of Jack the Ripper, and it's a direction I'd like to see much more writing about true crime take. The victims are too often reduced to nothing but the day they were killed, becoming dehumanised, and Boileau refutes that entirely and effectively.
This is a book I would recommend to those with an interest in understanding the history of violence against women, and it serves as a respectful, informative tribute to the 14 women who were killed in its name.
I didn't know very much about the massacre at École Polytechnique de Montréal before reading this, and now, having read it, I'm slightly mad that the few things I did know were wrong. I'd always been fed the 'lone gunman with mental health issues' line, and yet, with even the smallest bit of context, it's clearly a mass femicide. I can't help but view the public image of this attack as the work of anyone other than a raging misogynist as further continuation of violence against women; if we don't name it, then we can pretend it doesn't happen. It does.
In this relatively short book, Boileau outlines the events of the massacre itself, giving just enough detail that the horrors of what happened are made clear but not dwelt on in a morbid fashion, and then goes back to give some context of the women's rights movement in Quebec in the preceding 30 or so years. Again, I didn't realise how quickly the feminist movement was galvanised in the late '60s to the late '70s, and how fast (and late!) changes happened to give women some of the rights men had always taken for granted. With this historical context, the motives of the shooter become undeniable. I did find that this section was a little dry, and an awful lot of it seemed to consist of lists - lists of women 'firsts', lists of how the Polytechnique femicide was commemorated in successive years, lists of laws passed - but I suppose there was a lot of information to pack in, and this was as good a way as any to do it. I would also have liked more focus on the issues that specifically face indigenous women, as they seemed to take a back seat, only really appearing in asides here and there about specific laws passed.
Sometimes the writing seemed quite detached in these sections, probably because of the volume of information conveyed, and I would have appreciated a bit more depth and analysis of some of the things presented as fact. There's also a real clanger when Boileau states that intimate partner violence perpetrated by women against men is never in the form of coercive control or sustained emotional or physical abuse, but rather takes the form of them lashing out in heightened emotional states; this is simply untrue. Those of us in the UK might remember the case of Alex Skeel, who was systematically and nearly fatally abused by his girlfriend over the course of a year. I don't think Boileau does her argument any favours by claiming that women are not capable of this sort of abuse; it certainly seems true that women perpetrate it less often, but it's not an impossibility.
The second half of the book, by far the strongest half, consists of chapters about each of the women who were killed in the femicide. These chapters were really sensitively written and had a real warmth about them; it felt like Boileau really respected and admired the women she was writing about. Conversely, she spends hardly any time on the perpetrator of the femicide, which I think was the right call. The women are allowed to exist as fully fledged human beings before they encountered him on that day, and he's barely even an aside in their narratives. He doesn't loom large over the book. He's just one misogynist who had access to a gun, and there's nothing particularly interesting about him, whereas the women are all enormously accomplished, and frankly you could fill a book with all that they achieved in their short lives. This part of the book reminded me a little of The Five, Hallie Rubenhold's book about the victims of Jack the Ripper, and it's a direction I'd like to see much more writing about true crime take. The victims are too often reduced to nothing but the day they were killed, becoming dehumanised, and Boileau refutes that entirely and effectively.
This is a book I would recommend to those with an interest in understanding the history of violence against women, and it serves as a respectful, informative tribute to the 14 women who were killed in its name.
ARC received via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
There's something very odd about reading a book about living through a momentous occasion in history when that occasion is still very much underway. As different as things feel now, in November 2020, to the way they did back in March, coronavirus is still in every headline. We're still living under lockdown rules, and although there are some signs of light at the end of the tunnel, it's still a very, very long tunnel.
This was a hard book to make sense of. I understand that it's timely; that reading this book when Covid is still a threat adds to its impact, because it serves as a warning of how much work there still is to be done, and how bad things can get. I do, however, think that getting this book out quickly means that it feels somewhat rushed. Morgan writes very matter-of-factly and we never really get much insight into how she's feeling or what she's thinking; only what's happening to her. She sees people die and yet there's very little interiority or depth to those scenes. Sometimes, this sparse and unfeeling prose works very well, such as when she's describing the actions of the NHS staff. She doesn't dwell on sentimentality there, and just explains how hard they're working and how they're being run ragged, and I think this is the right call. In other instances, it comes across as almost cold. That said, none of us knows how we'll respond to living through such traumatic events, and Morgan's reaction is completely valid; it just doesn't always make for very compelling reading.
As a testament to the year that was 2020, this book is invaluable. Morgan includes a lot of the details that, to anyone in 2019, would seem ridiculous. Being afraid to walk too close to your neighbours in the street. Queuing outside to buy your groceries. The suspicion when you hear that anyone you've ever been in contact with might be ill; the worry that your sniffle is a deadly virus. She also astutely compares the whole thing to her mother's experience with the Blitz, the last time that the UK was undergoing such a rapid sea change in its way of life. There's a real sense in this book of living through history and of being part of it, and, of course, of how many people don't survive that history at all.
Throughout, Morgan includes related excerpts from Defoe's 'A Journal of the Plague Year', a book that Defoe wrote purportedly based on his uncle's experiences with the plague in 1665. Sometimes, these excerpts work - I had a little chuckle at her comparison to Trump's notorious bleach-injecting gaffe with the charlatans who peddle snake oil and herbs in the streets of Defoe's world. There are times that these comparisons are a little more tenuous - as haunting and unfathomable as the makeshift mortuaries of 2020 are, they don't quite compare to the plague pits and body collectors of the 1600s.
I wonder what sort of book this could have been if, like Defoe's work, this had been released after the crisis had eased, and been allowed to stand as a sort of historical document. If Morgan had been able to write with some of the benefit of reflection, I think it could have been an emotionally stronger piece. None of this is to say that I didn't enjoy it, because I did; or perhaps 'enjoy' isn't quite the right word. 'Appreciated', maybe. Morgan is a very competent writer, and reading this was one of the most - to use a horrible buzzword - relatable experiences I've had in a very long time. Coronavirus might affect everyone differently, but it does affect everyone, and Morgan's testimony is a stark reminder of that. I can absolutely see myself rereading this book in years to come, when the New Normal, as Morgan puts it, is hopefully in full swing, and being transported back to this year when everything changed.
There's something very odd about reading a book about living through a momentous occasion in history when that occasion is still very much underway. As different as things feel now, in November 2020, to the way they did back in March, coronavirus is still in every headline. We're still living under lockdown rules, and although there are some signs of light at the end of the tunnel, it's still a very, very long tunnel.
This was a hard book to make sense of. I understand that it's timely; that reading this book when Covid is still a threat adds to its impact, because it serves as a warning of how much work there still is to be done, and how bad things can get. I do, however, think that getting this book out quickly means that it feels somewhat rushed. Morgan writes very matter-of-factly and we never really get much insight into how she's feeling or what she's thinking; only what's happening to her. She sees people die and yet there's very little interiority or depth to those scenes. Sometimes, this sparse and unfeeling prose works very well, such as when she's describing the actions of the NHS staff. She doesn't dwell on sentimentality there, and just explains how hard they're working and how they're being run ragged, and I think this is the right call. In other instances, it comes across as almost cold. That said, none of us knows how we'll respond to living through such traumatic events, and Morgan's reaction is completely valid; it just doesn't always make for very compelling reading.
As a testament to the year that was 2020, this book is invaluable. Morgan includes a lot of the details that, to anyone in 2019, would seem ridiculous. Being afraid to walk too close to your neighbours in the street. Queuing outside to buy your groceries. The suspicion when you hear that anyone you've ever been in contact with might be ill; the worry that your sniffle is a deadly virus. She also astutely compares the whole thing to her mother's experience with the Blitz, the last time that the UK was undergoing such a rapid sea change in its way of life. There's a real sense in this book of living through history and of being part of it, and, of course, of how many people don't survive that history at all.
Throughout, Morgan includes related excerpts from Defoe's 'A Journal of the Plague Year', a book that Defoe wrote purportedly based on his uncle's experiences with the plague in 1665. Sometimes, these excerpts work - I had a little chuckle at her comparison to Trump's notorious bleach-injecting gaffe with the charlatans who peddle snake oil and herbs in the streets of Defoe's world. There are times that these comparisons are a little more tenuous - as haunting and unfathomable as the makeshift mortuaries of 2020 are, they don't quite compare to the plague pits and body collectors of the 1600s.
I wonder what sort of book this could have been if, like Defoe's work, this had been released after the crisis had eased, and been allowed to stand as a sort of historical document. If Morgan had been able to write with some of the benefit of reflection, I think it could have been an emotionally stronger piece. None of this is to say that I didn't enjoy it, because I did; or perhaps 'enjoy' isn't quite the right word. 'Appreciated', maybe. Morgan is a very competent writer, and reading this was one of the most - to use a horrible buzzword - relatable experiences I've had in a very long time. Coronavirus might affect everyone differently, but it does affect everyone, and Morgan's testimony is a stark reminder of that. I can absolutely see myself rereading this book in years to come, when the New Normal, as Morgan puts it, is hopefully in full swing, and being transported back to this year when everything changed.
I initially gave this one 4 stars, but then, on my habitual walk to work the next day, I found myself musing on this book so much that I inexplicably took a wrong turning - a wrong turning, even though I've done that same walk every day for 3 months! - and ended up in a graveyard, and not even the sort of graveyard which doubles up as a through-road, but the sort of graveyard which is nothing but a complete dead end, if you'll pardon the pun, and that, to my mind, is the mark of a very very good book indeed. Not the graveyard bit; that's rather inconsequential, although it was also quite a good metaphor, and I do remember thinking that at the time, but the bit where this entire book is about a man whose daily routine is thrown off kilter by an apparently small occurrence - in his case, the appearance of a pigeon - which then has a domino effect, his whole day falling apart around him in a spiralling fractal, and ultimately casts his whole life in a new meaning. And although I wouldn't say that accidentally ending up in a graveyard at quarter to eight in the morning actually had the effect of casting my whole life in a new meaning, it did make me late for work and I missed breakfast. So, for that reason, I feel like this book probably deserves 5 stars.
I bought this book way back before Nimko Ali revealed herself to be, quite bizarrely, a big fan of the Conservative Party, who I hate with my entire heart and soul, but I'm not one to read books solely by people I 100% agree with all the time. At no point when I was reading this did my existing opinions of Ali affect my determination to fully engage with it; she's a good writer and has a lot of value to say, and my disagreeing with her on a few issues won't and shouldn't negate that. That said:
The Good:
- Nimko Ali is a witty and engaging writer, and I did laugh out loud at a lot of her turns of phrase. She obviously has a way with people too, to be able to get these women to open up to her in the ways that they did. It's a very personal book, both in terms of what it clearly means to Ali and in terms of how sensitive many of the narratives are, and that gives it a very raw and emotional resonance. This book is 250 pages long and I read it in two sittings, only interrupted so that I could make a cup of tea. It's well-written and thoroughly readable, and, given the weight of the topics at hand, that's no small feat.
- It's refreshing to at last be able to read books which are marketed as feminist and don't consist entirely of the musings of rich white women. The majority of the voices featured in this book are those of women of colour, and there are many intersecting marginalisations, such as homelessness and Blackness. That said, it could have been more diverse in terms of contributions, as the majority of narratives definitely fit into the 'woman is married at a very young age and suffers accordingly' convention, but these stories obviously do need to be heard, so I wasn't disappointed in the lack of variety, per se. It's just not quite what the book's marketing leads one to expect.
- Although I don't personally agree with Ali's definition of what makes a woman, which I found to be very bioessentialist, I did very much appreciate the frank discussion of issues that have certainly affected me and many other women (and people who aren't women) I know. I fully agree that it's time to start talking about periods and menopause and abortions; I just don't think I entirely agree that it's necessary to conflate that with milestones specifically of womanhood, even if they commonly are. On the same positive note, it was actually great to see so many women be frank about their own bodily functions; there's quite a lot of literal shit-talk in here, and you know what? I'm here for it. We all shit.
The Bad:
- A very unimportant point really, but I was a little surprised that this was a release by a major publishing imprint, given the number of editing mistakes. There are quite a few instances of sentences where one word is missing. The book's structure is also very odd, consisting of 4 chapters, some of which are over 100 pages long and one of which is only about 20, which feels patchy and inconsistent. Additionally, after every woman's contribution, Ali writes her own thoughts about a topic related to the contribution, and the way in which this transition from contributor to commentary is done is also inconsistent; sometimes Ali's thoughts are placed under a new heading under the contribution, and sometimes the narrative just switches randomly into third person without warning, at which point it eventually becomes clear that Ali is now speaking, not the contributor. It feels very much like a first draft in a lot of ways. I don't know if the book was perhaps rushed out; it very much seemed like it may have been.
- I think that, ultimately, when one of the splash quotes on the book's inside cover is from proto-Tory and privileged feminist extraordinaire Zoe Sugg, it's probably not going to be a book which engages rigorously with feminist theory. I would have really liked to have seen more analysis in this book and discussions of why women (meaning, as this book uses the word, anyone assigned female at birth) are treated and received in the ways that they are, cross-culturally. In many ways, it just seemed at times like a litany of suffering, without any attempts to engage with the systemic causes of that suffering, and it means that I finished this book feeling a bit hollow. Again, I think this is possibly because the book was rushed, although I'm just theorising there.
The Ugly:
- This book is incredibly cissexist and heterocentric. There isn't a single contribution in here from a queer woman, either in terms of sexuality or gender. The book consistently conflates womanhood with 'fannies', and, as a cis woman myself, I have to be honest and say that I think that's a bit reductive. Not everyone with a 'fanny' is a woman, and not all women have a 'fanny'. I think it tries to universalise the experience of being 'female' too far, and in doing so it reduces it to a series of biological functions, like having periods, getting pregnant, and entering menopause.
- There was one moment in particular which struck me as hypocritical. I'm treading lightly here, as a white woman with absolutely no experience of the subject at hand, but much of the book is dedicated to (bravely and importantly) telling the horrific experienes of women who have undergone FGM, and then later one woman, who hasn't undergone FGM herself, speaks of how she prefers having sex with men who have been circumcised because she finds it more pleasurable. Now, I'm not someone who thinks that FGM and male circumcision are directly comparable; my general ethos is pretty much 'let's just not mutilate babies' genitals at all ever, but FGM is clearly a very different entity and should be discussed as such,' but it struck me as ill-advised at the very least, because there was absolutely no engagement with why this might be different, or the ways in which it isn't.
I do think that I would recommend this book to people, because it's incredibly readable and it has a lot to say about experiences from some of the most marginalised women globally; I would just be sure to specify that it's not the wide-reaching commentary on womanhood that it's marketed as being.
The Good:
- Nimko Ali is a witty and engaging writer, and I did laugh out loud at a lot of her turns of phrase. She obviously has a way with people too, to be able to get these women to open up to her in the ways that they did. It's a very personal book, both in terms of what it clearly means to Ali and in terms of how sensitive many of the narratives are, and that gives it a very raw and emotional resonance. This book is 250 pages long and I read it in two sittings, only interrupted so that I could make a cup of tea. It's well-written and thoroughly readable, and, given the weight of the topics at hand, that's no small feat.
- It's refreshing to at last be able to read books which are marketed as feminist and don't consist entirely of the musings of rich white women. The majority of the voices featured in this book are those of women of colour, and there are many intersecting marginalisations, such as homelessness and Blackness. That said, it could have been more diverse in terms of contributions, as the majority of narratives definitely fit into the 'woman is married at a very young age and suffers accordingly' convention, but these stories obviously do need to be heard, so I wasn't disappointed in the lack of variety, per se. It's just not quite what the book's marketing leads one to expect.
- Although I don't personally agree with Ali's definition of what makes a woman, which I found to be very bioessentialist, I did very much appreciate the frank discussion of issues that have certainly affected me and many other women (and people who aren't women) I know. I fully agree that it's time to start talking about periods and menopause and abortions; I just don't think I entirely agree that it's necessary to conflate that with milestones specifically of womanhood, even if they commonly are. On the same positive note, it was actually great to see so many women be frank about their own bodily functions; there's quite a lot of literal shit-talk in here, and you know what? I'm here for it. We all shit.
The Bad:
- A very unimportant point really, but I was a little surprised that this was a release by a major publishing imprint, given the number of editing mistakes. There are quite a few instances of sentences where one word is missing. The book's structure is also very odd, consisting of 4 chapters, some of which are over 100 pages long and one of which is only about 20, which feels patchy and inconsistent. Additionally, after every woman's contribution, Ali writes her own thoughts about a topic related to the contribution, and the way in which this transition from contributor to commentary is done is also inconsistent; sometimes Ali's thoughts are placed under a new heading under the contribution, and sometimes the narrative just switches randomly into third person without warning, at which point it eventually becomes clear that Ali is now speaking, not the contributor. It feels very much like a first draft in a lot of ways. I don't know if the book was perhaps rushed out; it very much seemed like it may have been.
- I think that, ultimately, when one of the splash quotes on the book's inside cover is from proto-Tory and privileged feminist extraordinaire Zoe Sugg, it's probably not going to be a book which engages rigorously with feminist theory. I would have really liked to have seen more analysis in this book and discussions of why women (meaning, as this book uses the word, anyone assigned female at birth) are treated and received in the ways that they are, cross-culturally. In many ways, it just seemed at times like a litany of suffering, without any attempts to engage with the systemic causes of that suffering, and it means that I finished this book feeling a bit hollow. Again, I think this is possibly because the book was rushed, although I'm just theorising there.
The Ugly:
- This book is incredibly cissexist and heterocentric. There isn't a single contribution in here from a queer woman, either in terms of sexuality or gender. The book consistently conflates womanhood with 'fannies', and, as a cis woman myself, I have to be honest and say that I think that's a bit reductive. Not everyone with a 'fanny' is a woman, and not all women have a 'fanny'. I think it tries to universalise the experience of being 'female' too far, and in doing so it reduces it to a series of biological functions, like having periods, getting pregnant, and entering menopause.
- There was one moment in particular which struck me as hypocritical. I'm treading lightly here, as a white woman with absolutely no experience of the subject at hand, but much of the book is dedicated to (bravely and importantly) telling the horrific experienes of women who have undergone FGM, and then later one woman, who hasn't undergone FGM herself, speaks of how she prefers having sex with men who have been circumcised because she finds it more pleasurable. Now, I'm not someone who thinks that FGM and male circumcision are directly comparable; my general ethos is pretty much 'let's just not mutilate babies' genitals at all ever, but FGM is clearly a very different entity and should be discussed as such,' but it struck me as ill-advised at the very least, because there was absolutely no engagement with why this might be different, or the ways in which it isn't.
I do think that I would recommend this book to people, because it's incredibly readable and it has a lot to say about experiences from some of the most marginalised women globally; I would just be sure to specify that it's not the wide-reaching commentary on womanhood that it's marketed as being.
