Book Excerpt

Book excerpts from the works of prominent feminist authors.

How Abortion Bans Could Make Your IUD Insertion More Painful (And Other Far-Reaching Consequences)

PUBLISHED 10/29/2026 by

In the fall of 2024, Louisiana implemented the nation’s first-ever law designating mifepristone and misoprostol as controlled substances. That put the pills in the same category as opioids and anxiety medi­cations that have a high risk of­ dependency and abuse, even though mifepristone and misoprostol have no recreational use, ­aren’t stimulants or sedatives, and are not addictive.

“They do not meet the definition or intent of what a controlled substance is, and categorizing them as such can lead to harm,” warned the American College of Medical Toxicology. “Additionally, it sets a dangerous ­precedent of politicizing phar­maceu­ti­cal regulation.”

The state targeted the two drugs ­because they are used in combination in most abortions. But mifepristone and misoprostol have a broad range of other medical uses beyond abortion—from inducing­ labor, to assisting in the removal of uterine polyps.

Dr. Emily Holt, a family medicine physician in New Orleans, had regularly prescribed both drugs to help patients manage miscarriages, and had offered just misoprostol to those with a stenotic cervix, in which the entrance to the uterus closes up. But she most frequently used misoprostol for IUD insertions.

You Deserve Better Menopause Care. Here’s How to Demand It.

PUBLISHED 10/5/2026 by

“As women we have become way too comfortable with suffering,” said menopause expert Dr. Sharon Malone, MD, at a New York City book launch event for Jennifer Weiss-Wolf’s When in Menopause. “Menopause is just the last on the long train of suffering stops we’ve had.”

Weiss-Wolf’s new book makes the case for changing that, from demanding better care in the doctor’s office to fighting for policies that take women’s health seriously. As she put it during the conversation: “We’re saying we demand to be seen. We demand to be heard.”

In the following excerpt, Weiss-Wolf offers practical guidance for becoming your own best champion and receiving informed, respectful midlife healthcare.

When in Menopause: A User’s Manual and Citizen’s Guide is out Tuesday, Oct. 6, from Sheldon Press.

Whitney Houston Was Always the Artist Behind Her Own Stardom

PUBLISHED 9/29/2026 by

In 1983, Whitney Houston appeared on The Merv Griffin Show to sing “Home.” The performance reveals the bright, complex selfhood Whitney sought to express even in spaces that were framed for her, not by her.

Whereas hosts today speak with artists themselves, not their male chaperones, the segment begins with Merv introducing not Whitney but Clive Davis, the head of her label, Arista, whom he praises as “a giant of a man, probably the most knowledgeable man the record business has ever known.”

The gesture was likely meant to secure the gentleman’s agreement, whereby Clive would break new Arista artists on the show.

Their exchange was as good a point of origin as any for the mythology always ready to spring up around the female artist: She is the raw material, the spark of gold, that the great man discovers and shapes.

Black women are often commandeered in this way, their rise attributed to some power beyond themselves, and to the men who recount their own crucial role to whomever will listen.

‘The Headspace Gap’: The Mental Load of Living in a World Designed for Men

PUBLISHED 7/2/2026 by

There is a reality we seldom notice: the physical contortion constantly required and tolerated by women to get through the day.

It’s everywhere if you pay attention: the woman struggling to reach and hold on to the strap on the moving subway car; the corporate attorney changing her gait to avoid blisters from her heels; any woman choreographing her every move inside a public restroom stall, accommodating a space designed to be barely sufficient.

The distraction caused by an ill-fitting built world has a tangible consequence: Headspace that would otherwise be focused on a goal or fulfilling one’s potential is wasted on silly workarounds. (And we know these workarounds cost money too.) This is headspace that our male counterparts have available to them.

It is no longer the case that our labor market is predominantly male, and design should reflect that. In a century characterized by the emergence of some of the most frivolous comforts, to ignore gender bias in design is to convey indifference toward the health, safety, performance and comfort of our women.

I call this the headspace gap. It perpetuates patriarchy, operating as a product by design.

(Adapted from the new book Man-Made: How We Designed a World That Leaves Women Out, and How We Can Make It Right.)

Revisiting the Speech That Made America See Farmworkers: Dolores Huerta and the Power of Saying, ‘We Exist’

PUBLISHED 7/2/2026 by

In 1965, the National Farm Workers Association announced their decision to join the striking Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee on Sept. 16—Mexican Independence Day. The choice of date reflected the hybrid identity of Chicanos: straddling Mexican and American cultures, Spanish and English, rooted in the old country but with branches fully extended into the new one.

This was the identity Huerta embodied.

Huerta maintained a heavy bilingual speaking schedule to keep up mo­rale. In addition to the typical challenges of organizing, the farmworkers were standing up against bigotry and asserting their American identity—attaching their cause to the Civil Rights Movement.

“Abajo con racism! Down with rac­ism!” Huerta sometimes ended her speeches. “Viva la union! Viva la causa!”

The people in power, the ones who owned the companies that sold the food or wrote laws in the statehouse, had been able to ignore people like the farmworkers—the people who toiled out of sight to keep the system going.

Now, a crowd of people had walked across the state to watch Huerta declare: “We are here and we embody our needs for you.”

(Excerpted from the book ALL WE SAY: The Battle for American Identity: A History in 15 Speeches by Ben Rhodes.)

What Do Most Female Prisoners Have in Common? They Are Actually Victims.

PUBLISHED 6/8/2026 by

When I first began reporting on incarcerated women, I was fascinated by studies that showed that showed that upwards of 70 percent of women in jails and prisons were subjected to intimate partner violence before they were incarcerated.

But as I covered more stories on the topic, I started to see that, more disturbingly, many women I interviewed had been incarcerated because they responded to violence perpetuated against them.

Again and again in my research, I came upon cases in which a woman claimed that she had acted in self-defense, or had followed orders from an abuser because she didn’t want to die, or had protected a loved one — and she was subsequently charged with murder, convicted, and locked away, sometimes for life. This is the little-known phenomenon termed “criminalized survival.” I wanted to understand how common it was.

Black Women Political Candidates Are Expected to Be ‘Likable,’ Qualified and Tireless. Men Aren’t.

PUBLISHED 5/28/2026 by

What I experienced during my 2014 run for office wasn’t entirely unfamiliar to me.

The year before, I had run for president of the Young Democrats of America (YDA), a national political party office role, against a popular opponent. The opponent was a Black man, so race wasn’t a factor in the election; however, gender was.

Before my campaign, I was vice president of YDA and had heard only good things about my service: my fundraising efforts, the partnerships I had engineered with progressive organizations, and programming coordination for the membership. However, when I decided to run for president, I instantly became ‘difficult to work with’ and ‘mean.’

Research on women candidates confirms that voters are less likely to vote for a woman if they don’t like her; by comparison, voters don’t need to like men to elect them. But when I was running as the Black woman candidate in a seven-candidate primary for public office, with two other women in the race, I noticed almost nothing about my being ‘difficult’ and more about my ability and work ethic.

My experience running for public office reflected the systemic bias and double standards not just for women candidates, but Black women candidates who dare to aspire to any sort of political leadership—and that needed to change.

We need more progressive Black women in public office for a myriad reasons, but we also specifically need the younger generation of Instigators in office, candidates who understand the times in which we live currently.

Electing more Black women will take real investment in changing the biases and attitudes (conscious and unconscious) of mostly white donors, media, campaign staff, consultants and institutional leaders to help shift the culture and systems. But this support needs to be substantively increased so that we can rebuild an inclusive, multiracial democracy with the leaders we want and need.

(Excerpted from The Instigators: How Black Women Have Been Essential to American Democracy by Atima Omara.)

A Reparations Blueprint for a New Era of Civil Rights Rollbacks

PUBLISHED 5/12/2026 by

For more than a century, the survivors and descendants of the Tulsa Race Massacre have carried not only the trauma of racial violence, but the burden of fighting to prove that what was stolen from Greenwood was never fully repaired.

Civil rights attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons reflects on the organizing, coalition-building and collective determination behind the modern reparations movement in Tulsa—and why local movements rooted in community power may offer the clearest path toward justice.

Solomon-Simmons introduces “ThinkGreenwood,” a framework for reparatory justice grounded in self-determination, collective economics, mutual care and resilience.

“ThinkGreenwood is my gift to every Black town, neighborhood and community in this country where people seek to repair past harms and give themselves and their children a fair chance at a better life. It’s a blueprint for Black Power in the modern era that any group can use to build the same indomitable foundation that’s enabled Tulsa’s community to stay strong and united through decades of setbacks and disappointments.”

(Excerpted from Redeem a Nation: The Century-Long Battle to Restore the Soul of America by Damario Solomon-Simmons, out May 12, 2026.)

How Personal Loss Drove Rep. Lauren Underwood to Take On the Black Maternal Health Crisis

PUBLISHED 4/3/2026 by

Excerpted from Stuck: How Money, Media and Violence Prevent Change in Congress by Maya L. Kornberg (published March 10):

Black women are about three times as likely as white women to die of pregnancy-related health conditions.

One of the Black mothers to die tragically was Shalon Irving, Rep. Lauren Underwood (D-Ill.)’s friend. Irving was a successful scientist, who had befriended Underwood when they were both students at Johns Hopkins University.

Underwood remembered going to the funeral: “It was … unimaginable. Her baby was there, her mom was there, the director of the CDC was there. All of these other uniformed public health officials were there, and everybody was stunned. How could this happen?”

Underwood sponsored the 2021 Black Maternal Health Momnibus Act, which addresses inequities in housing, nutrition and transportation that shape maternal health outcomes, and which contains plans to improve maternal mental health resources and data collection and to combat racial bias in prenatal care.

Underwood’s advocacy is a direct result of her personal experience.

Sinead O’Connor Was Right: It’s Time to Revisit Some of Pop Culture’s Most Maligned Women

PUBLISHED 3/24/2026 by

An excerpt from Allison T. Butler’s The Judgment of Gender: How Women Are Centered and Silenced in Pop Culture, published March 8, 2026:

While Sinead O’Connor was roundly criticized for ripping up the picture of the pope, the passage of time has revealed: She was right.

O’Connor was labeled a pop star, but she never saw herself that way. From Rememberings: “Everyone wants a pop star, see? But I’m a protest singer. I just had stuff to get off my chest. I had no desire for fame.”