On this edition, our favourite writer with sass and substance. The bold and unwavering Mercy Eni Wandera takes control of the Afroway Reads to review two novels from her favourite writers
Book written by: Laura Bates
Everyday Sexism is a book that was born as a social media project by a British feminist activist, Laura Bates. She gathered together testimonies from women worldwide about gender-based degradation suffered in both private and public spheres. The online project that metamorphosed into a book painted the most grim picture of what it is to be a woman in the 21st century. This was witnessed by the victims who came out by the dozens.
The author touches on how early the brainwashing of girlhood starts, with totally unsolicited sexual advances often with familiar faces around. The young girls are belittled, silenced and shut down. After all, maybe she asked for it. She should have known better. And when girls graduate high school, they have college – complete with toxic lad culture – to look forward to, if they’re lucky enough to attend university.
It takes Bates experiencing her tipping point to realise how the plight of said abused women— which included everything from male leering to outright physical assault—had been dealt with almost every day, transcending rank, race and culture. She finally fully understood the deeply rooted nature of gender inequality. In this book, she shares her experiences alongside those of women who had written on Bates’ website about their experiences of ‘little pinpricks’ of sexist intrusion.
It’s almost like there is an unwritten law that women’s radar is always supposed to be on. No matter what. Yet whenever she thinks she has checked all boxes, the goal posts shift. While ladies should not walk alone in the dark, take a taxi alone, dress inappropriately, be friendly with the doorman, not consume alcohol or worse still, not fun enough to take a joke, the young lads are just ‘being boys’. So much for individual accountability.
Additionally, Bates peppers the narrative with statistics as well as project entries. The former helps to provide some broader context, while women’s singular stories really drive Bates’s arguments home. This provides for quite the little gem quotes littered with humorous and heartbreaking, infuriating and (occasionally) unbelievable real-life examples. But the ultimate value of Everyday Sexism lies in the user submissions. These are our sisters, mothers, and friends; our co-workers and daughters and leaders of tomorrow. They are us. We tell stories of being discouraged, belittled, victim-blamed, harassed, and assaulted, all because of our gender.
I found it to be a very thorough and incredibly sad read. Every woman worldwide should get to read Everyday Sexism at least once in their lifetime.
Everyday Sexism deserves a place (though hopefully not permanent!) in every school and public library. This is a conversation starter and a must-read for would-be, budding, and seasoned feminists from all walks of life.
The page is still active with their Twitter handle @ EverydaySexism, still receiving stories from women tackling sexual deviants. A potent reminder of how far feminism has come and how far it has to go.
In my Australian accent, what bloody happened at The Barbecue?
Liane Moriarty’s Truly Madly Guilty is a fictional piece infused with dark humour and covers the complexities of everyday relationships among friends, married couples, parents and their kids. Set against the backdrop
of the suburbia in Sydney’s Australia, and centred around 6 adults, the book could be easily labelled a psychological thriller, likening it to her previous masterpiece Big Little Lies. So successful was the book that it was adapted for the big screen (HBO) by Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman.
Similar to Big Little Lies, where we only get to find out why and who ended up dead at the very end, the author likewise hints at a life-changing incident at The Barbecue, which is the focal point of the novel. Clem- entine, a classical cellist gearing up for a big audition, and her affable husband Sam, are parents to two small daughters, Holly and Ruby. Obsessively compulsive Eri- ka, Clementine’s childhood friend, and her by-the-book husband Oliver are childless perfectionists, and Oliver and Erika’s neighbours Vid and Tiffany, the hosts of The Barbecue, are the outgoing, successful parents to 10-year-old moody Dakota.
Right off the very start of the book, we get a glimpse into the tortured relationship dynamics that exist between Clementine and Erika. Erika’s mean and humorous running commentaries parallel to Clemen tine’s public talk form the foundation of the story, with both women chafing with frustration and irritation, sometimes both, at each other. It becomes even juicier when we learn that they have been best friends since their childhood. Erika had a difficult childhood, and Clementine’s mother more or less forced her daughter to befriend Erika, an obligation that still weighs heavily in their adulthood.
Liane weaves her storytelling with shifting time swaps that encompass flashbacks and fast forwards of The Day Of The Barbecue. What exactly that incident is isn’t revealed until well within the novel, but what we learn about each of these characters both pre- and post-barbecue is the life force of Ms Moriarty’s masterpiece. Also interesting is how the past intertwines with the present and goes on to affect their future relationships.
The common thread visible from well-drawn cast showcases that we are not as different as we would imagine – people die, families argue, neighbours meddle dle and children push boundaries. Reading this book, I experienced mixed feelings of elation, confusion, sympathy, selfishness, rage, regret, complacency and frustration at the characters. Specifically intriguing is how I could hate a character in one chapter and pity her in the next and champion her by the end of the book. Such is the magic of Liane Moriarty. I am definitely on the lookout for more of her published work. It truly is a maddening guilty pleasure.
Reviewed by: Mercy Eni Wandera
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