Amazing and frustrating in equal measure. ( )

3.5 stars ( )

Weaving together personal experience and careful research, Solnit examines and exposes the patterns and outcomes that arise from the imbalance of patriarchy and living in a man's world. Without bashing all men, she makes it clear that all women live with a degree of fear that they will experience violence at the hands of men for being women. Sobering and salient, the essays eschew despair with intelligent word-smithing and wry chapter images by the artist Ana Teresa Fernandez.

"Sexual assault, like torture, is an attack on a vicim's rights to bodily integrity, to self-determination and self-expression. It's annihilatory, silencing. It intends to rub out the voice and the rights of the victim, who must rise up out of that annihilation to speak. To tell a story and have it and the teller recognized and respected is still one of the best methods we have of overcoming trauma." 106

"And by many measures, including injustice, insatiable greed, and ecological destruction, madness, like meanness, is central to our society, not simply at its edges." 122

"You can use the power of words to bury meaning or to excavate it. If you lack words for a phenomenon, an emotion, a situation, you can't talk about it, which means that you can't come together to address it, let alone change it." 129

"Male fury at not having emotional and sexual needs met is far too common, as is the idea that you can rape or punish one woman to get even for what other women have done or not done." 131

( )

Infinitely depressing and yet we keep fighting on. We must keep fighting. ( )

This was a short but meaty collection of feminist essays. The writing was stirring and gave me a lot to think about. I originally thought I was picking up a satirical book, judging by the title. If I were more familiar with the author, I might have known it would be a more serious collection.
There were two quotes in this book that I really liked; the first is from the author.

You can use the power of words to bury meaning or to excavate it.

The second is from the publisher's note at the end, which quotes August Spies, speaking at the trial after the Haymarket Square riot. This quote is in keeping with the spirit of this book, particularly the last essay, Pandora's Box and the Volunteer Police Force.

If you think that by hanging us you can stamp out the labor movement, then hang us. Here you will tread on a spark, but here, and there, and behind you, and in front of you, and everywhere, the flames will blaze up. It is a subterranean fire. You cannot put it out. The ground is on fire upon which you stand.

Although I'm positive the author and I don't see eye to eye on all issues, particularly abortion, I think she had a lot of important observations and assertions here, and I'm glad I read it. ( )