Reading Fuel for Feminine Rage
reviewing 2 horror and 1 nonfiction that made me angry in a ~womanly~ way
I don’t know about y’all, but I’ve been angry since this election. There’s a lot of things that are wrong about how things went down, but one of them is how pervasive misogyny is, that America would re-elect a (confirmed in court) sexual abuser who overturned abortion rights. And that some of his first decisions are to elect fellow alleged rapists to high positions in government.
….yeah.
Here’s some books that have helped me channel that anger in productive, or at least satisfying ways. But anger isn’t the only emotion in these books.
Hysteria: Lolly and Lady Vanity by Ali Seay
The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls by Mona Eltahawy
Not All Monsters edited by Sara Tantlinger
Hysteria: Lolly and Lady Vanity (2023) by Ali Seay
(splatterpunk horror fiction)
This book contains 2 novellas, 70 pages each, about women losing their sanity (or, arguably, coming to their senses about what must be done).
The first woman, Lolly, is a 21-year-old woman who's sick with the flu. Ten years prior, her sister was abducted, and she has never been the same. This flu and the medications she's prescribed end up offering her redemption on behalf of her sister. A rare side effect of antivirals is psychosis, and now she sees dirty halos above the heads of child predators. She uses this information, and her youthful appearance, to lure them in and take out the trash.
Brutally killing pedophiles? Sign me up! I loved the action, and riding along with Lolly's escalating rage. The whole time she is sick with the flu, coughing out her lungs, shitting her guts out, in between dragging her aching muscles around to murder people.
This was super satisfying to read. This feels (in theory) like a valid response to the trauma of losing a sibling to a child predator, and being someone who still lives as a target. I think Seay did a good job of including different types of predators and giving examples of their approaches. She does this while also dishing out Lolly's funny inner thoughts and dialogue. Lolly is a bit goofy, and she finds satisfaction out of killing these lowlifes. Vigilante serial murder as community service.
Has Lolly been given a divine mission to avenge her sister, or are the antivirals making her psychotic? Maybe both? Who cares? because at least the world is a little less filthy than it was before.
The second story features Frankie - a woman in the beginning of menopause who's struggling with body dysmorphia. She can't afford plastic surgery, and she rejects seeing a new doctor or taking people's advice - instead she finds the tool of her dreams at the thrift store. A vintage electric knife, to saw off the new fat that she feels so angry at.
This one definitely felt more discomforting because it involves extreme self-mutilation. I felt way more squeamish getting through the pages. Where Lolly feels self-assured and externally destructive, Frankie is insecure and self-destructive. Lolly's violence is impulsive, and Frankie's is methodical.
When she's not self-hating or cutting herself up, she's dealing with a boss who treats her like she's replaceable. I think there's something in here about feeling out of control of your body - from the demands of work to her menopausal changes, Frankie is just trying to assert some dominance over her life. Come hell or high water.
Lolly's story was satisfying, and I found Frankie's story mostly sad and hard to watch. Self-harm makes me extra squeamish. Both were brutal splatterpunk stories centering women. Would definitely be interested in seeing more from Ali Seay.
The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls (2019) by Mona Eltahawy
(feminist political nonfiction)
Reading this made me want to fight a man. Any man. Throw an entitled idiot in front of me and I'll show him what I got.
I've been following Mona Eltahawy's blog FEMINIST GIANT for a few years now, and I've finally read a full-length book of hers. She is an Egyptian-American journalist, and this is what she calls her own manifesto on global feminism. She dives into seven "sins" or traits that society encourages in men but punishes in women: Anger, Attention, Profanity, Ambition, Power, Violence, and Lust.
She makes the case that embodying these traits is necessary to resisting gendered oppression and carrying agency in a patriarchal world. With each sin, she asks what purpose does it serve for women to avoid this? What purpose does it serve for women to be punished for having these traits? How do systems of power benefit from squashing these traits in women, and what does it look like when you resist?
This was written during Trump's first term as President and she observes the rise of right-wing populist leaders across the globe. She uses examples from around the world in her piece, both of patriarchal oppression and the women who resist it by living out these sins. Examples come from Uganda, Egypt, Brazil, Iraq, Russia, Germany, the United States, and many other places. She includes feminist icons from art, media, and politics.
She shows appreciation for social media as a tool that has given a voice and a platform to marginalized people. It's also enabled the spread of information and exposed people to ways of living they didn't think were possible before. Women's rights and queer rights have been able to advance more quickly than ever because people have been able to validate their desire for more freedom online.
It makes sense there would be reactionary backlash with how quickly the movement for human rights has been advancing via the internet. The threat of violence against women and marginalized identities is growing in many countries, but Eltahawy doesn't want us to back down or accept compromises. We must fight harder than ever for a freer world, because we are closer than ever, and that's why people in power are scared.
Her messaging in this book felt repetitive to me at times, but that might just be because I've been following Eltahawy's blog for so long. Regardless I think it serves well to hammer her points home. It may feel best to read this in chunks, maybe one sin at a time.
I want to show this book to many women in my life. This manifesto was strongly voiced, with facts, pride, and ferocity, and her message could be delivered in no softer way. This is a gem.
Not All Monsters edited by Sara Tantlinger
Authors include: Joanna Roye, G. G. Silverman, Stacey Bell, Amy Eason, K. P. Kulski, S. M. Ketcham, E. E. Florence, Briana McGuckin, Annie Neugebauer, Kayleigh Barber, Sam Fleming, Hailey Piper, J. H. Moncrieff, Jessica McHugh, Jennifer Loring, Joanna Koch, Angela Sylvaine, J. C. Raye, Christa Carmen, Juliana Spink Mills, Leslie Wibberley
(horror fiction anthology)
I thought this was all hits, no misses. This anthology covers a variety of monsters that are mythical, paranormal, realistic, and human.
A few of my favorites: "The Miraculous Ones", the story of conjoined twin sisters who want to have agency to live as they choose, in spite of their medieval town's expectations and accusations of witchcraft. I found "Pretty Little Vampires" to be a clever story about a hopeful beginner witch who must find out for herself how dangerous fae creatures can be.
We've got women being forced into unjust positions, and other women taking advantage of social systems to advance their own horrors. Some of these women have to face their own monsterhood. They become monsters to survive, or to save the ones they love, or out of revenge. We've got a lot of characters who underestimate the power and violence that women are capable of, and their error is grave enough to kill them.
The story "Leather" was great at flipping the predator/prey dynamic, with an aggressively flirty man getting more than he bargained for. "Wasted" was another flipped story about roofies, and I found it fascinating for its violence - metaphorical, gruesome, and satisfying.
Some of these stories didn't feel like scary, tense horror, and were more like the tender aftermath of something brutal. These were still enjoyable within the context of a horror collection, and I think it brought a lot of emotional depth to the book.
One of those stories, "The Good Will" follows a woman navigating an afterlife that's set up like a thrift store, and she has to unravel how she died in order to move on. That one made me cry. Another story - "And Sweetest in the Gale is Heard" was devastating. It followed the inner monologue of a woman held captive, who wishes to reunite with her sister. Again, tenderness coupled with brutality, and it wrenched my heart.
I thought each of these stories were iconic in their own way, and this is an amazing collection. There wasn't a style in here that I didn't like, and there's a lot of authors I don't know. There's a wide variety of topics and settings, with passion and rage woven throughout. Great anthology organized by Sara Tantlinger... She might be one of those writers who I want to read everything she's associated with.
That’s all I’ve got for now. I still feel angry. It’s okay to be an angry person, and it’s better for your nervous system to express it! I hope at least one of these books appealed to you, and if not, I wish you good luck in finding outlets for your own rage.
Honorable Mentions:
Split Tooth by Tanya Tagaq