041BOOKS columnist Lauren Hewitt honours female writers this Women’s Month by looking into books that tackle some often glossed-over topics like menopause and infertility.
I am woman hear me roar! I am roaring because I’m feeling so much. Everything is overwhelming and too much. I feel helpless, I feel vulnerable, I feel scared, angry and unheard. It’s Women’s Month here in South Africa so I thought I’d honour female writers, but also bring up some very important topics. Topics that resonate with me as a woman. The books all feature strong, powerful women who find their voices and themselves. May we as women in our reality do the same.
Menopause is a topic seen as taboo, forbidden and embarrassing to talk about or admit that you’re going through it.
Queen Bee
Ciara Geraghty
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This book made me angry in the best possible way. Let me explain.
Why is menopause or anything to do with the lower half of the female anatomy (except for sex) totally taboo? Why is it considered shameful or a stigma, or a huge secret?
And those are exactly the questions Agatha Doyle is asking.
Despite not being menopausal myself (maybe pre-menopause), I could relate to her. Loved her brilliant and seemingly unintentional humour and her recorded diary entries (very Bridget Jones). Every entry starts off with her mood/symptoms, and those emotions are raw and real!
I love how Agatha accidentally becomes a worldwide heroine, that she gives women a voice, that because of her women aren’t afraid to speak out anymore. How she just stops giving a f*** and accepts herself as she is.
Her inner voice/ conscience is her mother, who passed away quite recently, and that’s touching and funny how in her mind her mom still ‘mothers’ her.
I really love the Irish sense of humour! There’s really no humour like it.
And lastly, Agatha also both have a son named Aidan. And have bee’s in our yards.
This definitely has a spot in my top 5 reads of the year.
A topic that I can’t mention to avoid any spoilers, but relationships with sisters by blood or sisters by heart is also a hot topic.
A sister’s promise
Caroline Finnerty
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
What exactly makes you a woman? Is it your heart? Your body? Your spirit? This book still has me pondering this question. Would I still feel like a woman if something physical changed?
Penny and her little girl Willow live in Australia and when something happens she returns to Ireland to see if her sister Laura remembers a promise they made to each other as kids.
Laura has problems of her own to deal with and seeing her estranged sister is a bit of a shock. At first, Laura comes across as cold and almost heartless, but quickly steps up and becomes one of the favourite characters.
The characters were so well developed and even the unlikeable ones at the beginning grew and developed into loveable, unforgettable characters by the end.
Lots of pieces hit hard and so close to home and it was an absolutely heartbreaking book that had me sobbing into my tea and aching for all the characters in it. So keep your tissues close by!
Infertility, while it doesn’t only affect women alone, is a story of heartbreak in a few forms and choices that make and break you.
Our stolen child
Melissa Wiesner
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
When Quinn and James discover that their very last viable embryo was mislabelled and implanted into someone else and they have a biological daughter their world is turned upside down! They decide to fight for custody. Nora is fighting to keep the child she carried and birthed and has mothered the last 4 years.
My heart is bursting and breaking all at the same time. I did not want to pick a side, I saw each woman’s perspective and ached for both of them. Then a devastating discovery changes everything! The ending could not have been more perfect and I loved it, I cried happy tears! I loved most of the characters and disliked one for reasons that will be obvious when you read this book. This was heart-wrenching, gripping with some tense suspension and I couldn’t put it down. It was the first book I have read by this author and it definitely won’t be the last. It’s been on my mind since I finished it on Thursday.
Sexism. A topic covered here in lessons in chemistry is set in the late 1950’s and shockingly much of the topics covered are still prevalent today!
Lessons in Chemistry
Bonnie Garmus
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This book evoked many emotions, anger, resentment, awe and compassion. And it’s definitely one of my top reads for the year.
To put it plainly. It sucks that women are still thought of as less than in this day and age, that there’s still a pay discrepancy, that we’re not taken seriously, that we’re simply ‘just sexual objects’ to be manhandled. Man is the operative word.
I felt awe and compassion that despite the above, Elizabeth Zott still conquered that she still had the guts to pursue her dreams and make something of what was meant to be just a cooking show. I love how she enabled people to be seen. The example she set for not only her daughter but all women. And even some men.
Some quotes:
While we may be born into families, it doesn’t mean we belong to them
And in my own words.
Why fit in when you’re born to stand out
Leave a Reply