Book Review

Skye Perryman on How We Turn ‘Anger and Sorrow’ Into ‘Action’

PUBLISHED 8/14/2026 by

“I know how you feel—because I’ve been there there too. On a bad day, and there are many bad days, our nation’s backslide from democracy into autocracy accelerates … Untrained, masked federal agents are running roughshod in our streets, terrorizing communities. Peaceful protesters have been killed. The government has been weaponized, and the Supreme Court feels stacked … It’s almost impossible to keep up; even harder to know what to do.”

So begins Skye Perryman’s sobering but hopeful and practical new book, Ordinary People, Extraordinary Times. Though this handbook for hard times is elevated by a we’re-all-in-it-together spirit, Perryman, an attorney and president and CEO of Democracy Forward, doesn’t sugarcoat what we’re all facing.

“We have to acknowledge that there is no cavalry coming to protect us,” she writes. “No knight in shining armor to save us from the situation we are in. It’s up to us. We are the people who decide what happens next.” And while daunting, she says “it can also be empowering to know how essential we are in the fight for freedom and our democracy.”

Perryman fervently believes that action is antidote. By “reclaiming our collective power,” and by using the “tools that ordinary people have used in extraordinary times before us,” she insists that together we can “fight for freedom today, build for a better tomorrow.”

August 2026 Reads for the Rest of Us

PUBLISHED 7/31/2026 by

Each month, Ms. rounds up some of the most exciting new books by writers from historically marginalized communities—authors whose work too often gets overlooked in a publishing landscape still dominated by white, cisgender, heterosexual men. The hope is not only to amplify these voices and the independent presses championing them, but also to encourage readers to seek them out, whether by buying, borrowing or recommending them.

This August’s list grew beyond the usual 10 selections because there were simply too many remarkable books to leave behind. From novels in translation and groundbreaking histories to feminist resistance, gender, incarceration and contemporary fiction, these 15 titles offer fresh perspectives, unforgettable storytelling and urgent ideas.

Whether you’re looking for literary fiction, political analysis or thought-provoking nonfiction, there’s something here to add to your late-summer reading stack.

Poems Wherein the Bullet Speaks: A Review of Heidi Kasa’s ‘The Bullet Takes Forever’

PUBLISHED 7/11/2026 by

Consider the title of Heidi Kasa’s first book of poetry, published by Mouthfeel Press: The Bullet Takes Forever. In seven syllables, Kasa’s title conjures a wide swath of loss, both vertical and horizontal, the catastrophic consequences of gun violence, robbing us of time and life itself.

The way the title lands is a fine indicator of the way Kasa’s poems will strike the courageous reader, the reader willing to dwell for a time in this space dedicated to examining violence, often delivered upon the most vulnerable among us.

Reading these poems, I realized how little narrative Kasa actually needs to provide. We already know the story. We have lived it, watched it unfold again and again in schools and communities across this country. At a moment when the Trump administration is rolling back gun regulations, Kasa’s poems remind me that policy debates can never capture what violence leaves behind: grief, fear and lives forever altered. Her collection asks us not simply to read, but to remember.

“Back to School Shopping List

“1. backpack (big enough to hide behind)
“2. notebook (for reunification records)”
“7. spelling test (words: tourniquet, instructions, wound, direct, manual, pressure).”

Feminist Must-Reads: Our Favorite Books, Essays and Multimedia Projects for America at 250

PUBLISHED 7/2/2026 by

We’ve made it to July—another eighth of the Trump administration’s days behind us, halfway through a hell of a long year, and the eve of a long weekend to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

President Donald Trump’s apparent glee that women were absent from his recent White House UFC Fight was just the shot of inspiration I needed to collect and curate some of the best feminist takes on democracy to carry us through the national holiday.

July 2026 Reads for the Rest of Us

PUBLISHED 7/1/2026 by

Each month, Ms. provides readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups.

Dear feminist reader friends, I don’t ask you for much. But now, I want to hear from you. 

Do you prefer more titles with less descriptive summaries? Or fewer titles with more thoughtful annotations? Is there anything else I can do to improve the columns? 

If I don’t hear from you, I will just keep on keepin’ on, but I’d prefer to give you what you want. So, go to my website and use my contact form to send me some feedback, please!

And until next month, I hope you enjoy these 10 titles as much as I did.

What if Women Really Went Back? Viral Thriller ‘Yesteryear’ Deconstructs the Dark Side of Tradwife Culture

PUBLISHED 6/5/2026 by

What if women really went back? That question sits at the center of Caro Claire Burke’s 2026 debut novel and viral summer read Yesteryear.

At a moment when tradwife influencers are building massive audiences by romanticizing domesticity, submission and “traditional” gender roles, Burke asks readers to imagine what life inside those arrangements actually looks like for the women who lived them—and what rights and freedoms were sacrificed along the way.

Yesteryear follows wealthy, polished (at least on the outside) tradwife influencer Natalie Heller Mills, who has built a carefully curated online brand around nostalgic femininity. But as the fantasy unravels, Burke exposes the gap between aestheticized womanhood and women’s lived experience.

June 2026 Reads for the Rest of Us

PUBLISHED 6/1/2026 by

Each month, Ms. provides readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups.

Happy June! Happy Pride! Happy Caribbean-American Heritage Month! Happy summer!

Wherever you are and however you spend your month, I hope you are able to slow down, rest and enjoy life with a good book. 

Reads for the Rest of Us: The Best Poetry of 2025 and 2026

PUBLISHED 4/24/2026 by and

Happy April, and Happy National Poetry Month. Since my dormant love of poetry was reignited, I’ve found it so refreshing and inspiring to read beautiful collections each year and share them with you.

In 2021, I tried something a bit different with the poetry list: Instead of the usual blurb, I focused my thoughts about each collection into three words. Readers responded so well to it that I decided to keep doing it. Sometimes the words are nouns, sometimes verbs, sometimes adjectives—and I may have just made up some words too. The words I choose are always inspired by the collection and often taken directly from it. Sometimes I try to be clever, other times straightforward and you can tell I love my alliteration. Since I find it challenging to be succinct, this is a valuable exercise in imagination, reflection and, well, restraint. 

I hope you find some collections that will have you reflecting on how poetry moves you, challenges you and represents you.  

No Pockets, No Power? The Feminist History of the Purse

PUBLISHED 4/23/2026 by

With a global market worth of over $56 billion, handbags are one of the main drivers of the fashion industry.

However, as Kathleen B. Casey shows in her latest book, The Things She Carried: The Social History of the Purse in America, they are more than just a fashionable accessory: Women’s purses are an important marker of identity and social status. They are a statement of power, of resilience, of defiance and even protection. Indeed, you can tell a lot about a person from their handbag and what’s in it.

While both women and men have carried bags in the past, it was the evolution of pockets (and lack thereof in women’s clothes) that led to the purse being specifically marked as a feminine accessory, often associated with the female body and particularly the womb. 

With pockets becoming a symbol of functionality and masculinity, it is not a coincidence that utilitarian pockets became a feminist demand. Feminists have long argued for their right to free hands and movement, while keeping their possessions secure and concealed. Pockets were often equated to votes during the suffrage campaign, as activists criticized the lack of both in hindering women’s independence.

Despite being a conspicuous item, one that could be snatched or stolen, Casey is careful to show the power of the purse (pun intended) in offering women the ability to gain visibility in public as equal to men. Women could not only carry with them money, sanitary pads and birth control pills that allowed them freedom of movement and independence, but their bags enabled them to do it while maintaining their respectability and status. At times when women had little control over their bodies, the privacy of their purse offered them an autonomy they could not otherwise gain.