The Books I'm Reading Now
I'm reading a historical fiction story set just before the Civil War, about a young enslaved woman haunted by her sister's ghost, Junie; I'm listening to middle-grade historical fiction from Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin, set during World War II in the heart of British codebreaking, The Bletchley Riddle; and I'm reading feminist activist Mona Eltahawy's nonfiction work The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls, which encourages women to be loud, strong, and free of shame and self-doubt in order to create a more appropriately prominent and autonomous space for themselves in this patriarchally driven world.
What are you reading, bookworms?
01 Junie by Erin Crosby Eckstine
The Civil War is looming, and Junie is a sixteen-year-old who has spent her whole life enslaved on an Alabama plantation. She works alongside her family, also caring for the plantation owners' daughter Violet and gaining cursory exposure to Violet's studies of poetry and knowledge.
But Junie wanders restlessly at night, haunted by her sister Minnie's sudden death and by Minnie's ghost.
When there is talk of Violet's engagement and pending marriage, Junie realizes that this shift would throw her own position into jeopardy. She desperately wakes her sister's ghost, and she must determine how far she's willing to go to try to find freedom and autonomy in her life.
I received a prepublication edition of Junie courtesy of Random House-Ballantine Books and NetGalley. Junie is slated for publication on February 4.
02 The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin
I love a World War II story, and in this middle-grade collaborative work by Ruta Sepetys (Salt to the Sea) and Steve Sheinkin (Bomb), the young protagonist of Lizzie Novis becomes an unlikely asset to the British wartime codebreaking center of Bletchley Park.
Nineteen-year-old Jakob Novis is engaged in top-secret work alongside other bright minds, trying to crack the Nazi Enigma code. But after his younger sister Lizzie evades her grandmother's attempts to send her from England to the United States to avoid the Nazis' nearing destruction, there's nowhere for Lizzie to stay but with her big brother.
Their father died long ago, and Lizzie just couldn't stand to leave the last country where they saw their mother a year prior. She's sure she'll turn up again, despite the fact that she disappeared into what quickly thereafter become Nazi territory. When Lizzie finds a secret notebook of her mother's, she becomes more determined than ever to solve the mystery of her disappearance.
I'm listening to The Bletchley Riddle as an audiobook.
You can find my reviews of other World War II-focused books here, and you can also check out my review of Kate Quinn's great codebreaking historical fiction The Rose Code.
03 The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls by Mona Eltahawy
Feminist activist Mona Eltahawy encourages women and girls to practice an out-loud version of owning their power, by committing the seven taboo "sins" for women: being angry, ambitious, profane, violent, attention-seeking, lustful, and powerful.
Eltahawy points to examples of her own life that illustrate the broken system of patriarchy women exist within--stories many women will easily relate to--and also includes inspiring stories from women of all walks of life around the globe who are speaking up against a destructive power structure.
By illustrating her points with facts about racism, misogyny, capitalism, and homophobia, Eltahawy urges readers to abandon shame and self-doubt in favor of embracing truth and speaking out in a fierce call to action and an effort to dismantle the patriarchy.
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