More Than A Magazine, A Movement
Spotlighting books that tell important feminist stories.
Each month, we provide Ms. readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups. And each year, we review our monthly Reads for the Rest of Us lists and choose our favorite books of the year.
You’ve read the other “Best of” lists—now read the other one. You know, for the rest of us. Here they are, my top 40+ feminist books, in alphabetical order.
It’s time to rethink how we talk about abortion. Gabrielle Blair, a Mormon woman and mother of six, argues that the onus of preventing unwanted pregnancies should fall to those who cause them: men.
Diane Rosenfeld’s new book The Bonobo Sisterhood: Revolution Through Female Alliance is a call to action, a way forward and societal shift that can free us from the grips of patriarchy.
“The bonobos are peaceful, loving, food sharing, freely sexual and xenophilic, meaning they love strangers, they do not fear them,” because “they have nothing to fear,” she writes. In the bonobos, Rosenfeld finds proof positive that “patriarchy is not inevitable.”
National Youth Poet Laureate Finalist Jessica Kim wasn’t always a writer—in fact, she did not start writing until three years ago, when the pandemic seemed to shear all facets of normalcy.
Founder and editor-in-chief of The Lumiere Review and author of L(eye)ght, Kim never thought of poetry as something that could exist anywhere except in her own headspace. “Finding something that clicks with you and only you and not someone who would judge or review your work is extremely important in viewing yourself not only as a writer but as a very being.”
An excerpt from Finding My Voice: On Grieving My Father, Eric Garner, and Pushing for Justice by Emerald Garner, Monet Dunham and Etan Thomas:
“While you haven’t even fully grieved, you’re now linked to other cases, and you only have the bond that your loved one was also murdered by the police. … We didn’t choose for my father to be murdered, but we were left to pick up the pieces after, and that just wasn’t fair.”
Writer, disability-justice activist and performance artist Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha knows that it’s possible for society to become more equitable. Piepzna-Samarasinha’s latest book, The Future Is Disabled: Prophesies, Love Notes and Mourning Songs, lays out a bare-bones agenda for what is needed to make the U.S. more socially just.
Piepzna-Samarasinha and Ms. contributor Eleanor J. Bader communicated about the book, the disability justice movement and the ways that activists can support each other in the fight for a more ecologically sustainable and humane social order.
Title IX created much support for survivors of sexual harassment and sexual assault on the basis of sex discrimination, requiring institutions to address such harms in the workplace and in schools.
Ms. spoke with Alexandra Brodsky, civil rights lawyer and co-founder of Know Your IX, about the new backlash survivors still face coming forward, and the new ways activists are fighting for change and survivor-informed support.
Colleen Hoover’s best-selling novel, It Ends With Us, was the sixth best-selling book of 2021, BookTok is going nuts over it and USA Today called it “the kind of book that gets handed down.” The novel centers on the relationship between Lily and Ryle, a young newlywed couple who live in Boston.
Hoover’s writing is being touted as part of a resurgence of romance writing, but It Ends With Us is not a romance novel; it’s a celebration of toxic masculinity.
Demystifying Cybersecurity highlights the experiences of Black practitioners, driving a critical conversation on race in the cybersecurity industry, and shining a light on Black experts in their fields.
This month, we spoke with Hope Goins, the majority staff director of the U.S. Committee on Homeland Security, about how cybersecurity affects everyone. “We need to find ways to make people realize the practical application of cybersecurity to their lives—from ensuring that children consume information via secure platforms to understanding how utilities like water and energy can be impacted by poor security.”
During the 45 years that award-winning author Nikki Grimes has been publishing children’s and young adult novels, she’s seen massive changes in the industry. Protagonists today are far more diverse, featuring more protagonists of color and characters who are disabled, non-binary, questioning or LGBTQIA+.
Right-wing organizations think many children’s books are offensive and have launched a campaign to squelch this progressive turn.
“The right is wrong. A more inclusive, accepting and humane world is possible.”