Fem Book Club is an introduction to a diverse range of texts by women about women. Through informal conversation about each text we will focus on the manifold experiences of being a woman through different moments in history and across varying communities. It is an opportunity to think about and challenge what it means to be a woman and perhaps undermine any assumed universal experience by looking at how people of colour, transgender and non-binary identifying writers, or those who suffer with mental health issues have vastly different experiences of ‘feminism’ or what it is to be a ‘woman’.
This is a welcoming and safe space. We encourage participation from LGBTI women, men, trans and gender diverse persons and non-binary persons.
During this session of Fem Book Club, we’ll be discussing Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi.
An extraordinary debut novel, Freshwater explores the surreal experience of having a fractured self. It centres around a young Nigerian woman, Ada, who develops separate selves within her as a result of being born “with one foot on the other side.” Unsettling, heartwrenching, dark, and powerful, Freshwater is a sharp evocation of a rare way of experiencing the world, one that illuminates how we all construct our identities.
The full text list for Fem Book Club 2021 is as follows:
17 March – Foreign Soil by Maxine Beneba Clarke
19 May – Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi
21 July – The Color Purple by Alice Walker
15 September – Noughts & Crosses by Malorie Blackman
17 November – The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
