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A Good Read: Check out post-Women’s Day good reads

The #metoo movement has been in the headlines the last few months.
f bomb

The #metoo movement has been in the headlines the last few months and has sparked many interesting conversations online, in the media and among friends and colleagues about consent, equality and using the power you do have to raise up others.

With International Women’s Day just last week, this is an excellent time to highlight books that will keep this discussion going.

In Zoe Whittal’s novel The Best Kind of People, the author places us right in the middle of sex scandal. The family and community of Avalon Hills must deal with the fallout when a popular teacher at a private high school is accused of sexual misconduct on a ski trip. This excellent book offers no easy answers. The reader, like the citizens of this small town, is subject to rumours and opinions without actually knowing what happened. What is revealed is the social impact on this family, their status in a community that has rolled in on itself and the cruelty that is born from fear. All pretences to civility are dropped as the community brings down their judgments about who is guilty and who will pay for those crimes.

F Bomb: Dispatches from the War on Feminism by Lauren McKeon. While feminism is experiencing a moment right now, those against feminism — men and women alike — are still working hard to discredit this movement. In this book, McKeon unpacks those arguments and gets inside the issues that are leading to divisiveness within the feminist movement. She calls for a broader representation of voices that brings everyone forward and asks those with a voice to create opportunities for marginalized groups to be heard.

We Should All Be Feminists and Dear Ijeawele: A Feminist Manifesto in 15 Suggestions are two small and easy-to-read volumes by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. These two short books offer passionate suggestions for why our world needs to embrace feminism and equality. In each, she argues that we need to celebrate women and girls in all of their talents but that we do boys and men a disservice by not teaching them to embrace equality and a more open world view. Dear Ijeawele would be a great starting point for young people.

What Does Consent Really Mean? by Pete Wallis and Thalia Wallis is a graphic novel that explains consent through conversations amongst a group of teens. The reader explores with the characters what consent looks and feels like, with examples that range from tickling to being coerced into watching porn. The book also covers depictions of sexuality in the media and online, and how these depictions influence society’s ideas about sexuality for both men and women. Aimed at teens, this book covers many of the issues dealing with consent and is a great starting point for conversations about this topic.

Globe and Mail columnist Elizabeth Renzetti raises many questions about feminism in Shrewed, a collection of essays. She tackles everything from why there are so few women in politics to the future of feminism, and she does it all with wit and intelligence. While this book may make you cry, it will certainly make you laugh.

Within this list of well-written books, you are sure to find a great read about these important topics.

A Good Read is a column by Tri-City librarians that is published on Wednesdays. Kathy Johnson works at Coquitlam Public Library.