In the Media, April 2017, Part Two

In the media is a fortnightly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous fortnight and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

Photograph by Pari Dukovic

The Handmaid’s Tale is having a moment due to the television serial airing this coming week and the current political situation in America (and beyond).

• Madeleine Davies, ‘The Misogynist Future of Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale Feels Terrifyingly Within Reach‘ on Jezebel
• Rebecca Mead, ‘Margaret Atwood, the Prophet of Dystopia‘ in The New Yorker
• Rebecca Mead, ‘Margaret Atwood’s Grimly Relevant Additions to “The Handmaid’s Tale” Audiobook‘ in The New Yorker
• Katrina Onstad, ‘The Handmaid’s Tale: A Newly Resonant Dystopia Comes to TV‘ in The New York Times
• Willa Paskin reviews the show on Slate
• Anne Helen Peterson, ‘The Radical Feminist Aesthetic Of “The Handmaid’s Tale”‘ on Buzzfeed
• Emily Temple, ‘The Handmaid’s Tale Adapts More than the Novel: Here Is America‘ on Literary Hub

As one series begins, another ended this week:

• Emma Gannon, ‘It’s time to move on from ‘Girls’…but I’ll always love Lena‘ in Glamour
• Sophie Gilbert, ‘What Was Missing From the Girls Finale‘ on The Atlantic
• Erica Jong, ‘Why Do Female Characters Have to Be “Likeable”‘ on the BBC
• Anna Leszkiewicz, ‘The final episode of Girls revealed Hannah Horvath’s two most important relationships‘ in the New Statesman
• Halima Marcus, ‘The Very Best Episodes of Girls Are Perfect Short Stories‘ on Electric Literature
• Jia Tolentino, ‘On Finally Watching “Girls”, A Different and Better Show than I’d Been Led to Imagine‘ in The New Yorker
• Elizabeth Wurtzel, ‘Of course ‘Girls’ spoke to my life. Its brilliance is that it could speak to everyone’s‘ in The Washington Post

And in women win prizes, ‘Heather Rose wins the Stella Prize for a novel that wouldn’t ‘let her go’‘ as reported by The Sydney Morning Herald.

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers/language:

• Negar Azimi, ‘The Extravagant Jane Bowles: Always on the Edge of Something‘ in The New York Times
• Megan Mayhew Bergman, ‘The Feminine Heroic‘ on The Paris Review
• Joanna Cannon, ‘Breaking and Mending‘ on her blog
• Sarah Churchwell, ‘Sylvia Plath, a voice that can’t be silenced‘ in The Guardian
• Paula Cocozza, ‘21st-century fox: how nature’s favourite outsider seduced the suburbs‘ in The Guardian
• Deidre Coyle, ‘Men Recommend David Foster Wallace to Me‘ on Electric literature
• Meghan Daum, ‘The Quality of Life Report, 2017‘ on VQR
• Adyita Desi, ‘Woman with Power Is Woman Unchecked: Reading Narratives of Indian Women‘ on The Millions
• Lissa Evans, ‘How my novel about film-making was turned into a film‘ in The Guardian
• Merve Fejzula, ‘Zadie Smith and Multiculturalism after Brexit‘ on Black Perspectives
• Elizabeth Fremantle, ‘“Cringing” Historical Novelists: on Mantel at the Oxford Lit Fest‘ on The History Girls
• Sarah Gerard, ‘Mourning My Grandfather Through The Velveteen Rabbit‘ on Literary Hub
• Louise Glück, ‘On Realism and Fantasy‘ on Literary Hub
• Sophie Hopesmith, ‘Women Who Shock‘ on Dead Ink Books
• Terry Huang, ‘Gender Gap in Non-Professional Writer Submissions‘ on The Black List
• Danielle Jackson, ‘Life in North Memphis, and the Women Who Taught Me to Read‘ on Literary Hub
• Lucy Mangan, ‘This way to the ginger pop shop! The day I stepped into the pages of the Famous Five‘ in The Guardian
• Edie Meidav, ‘Discovering the Power of Storytelling in a Tattered Old Pulp Paperback‘ on Literary Hub
• Jennifer Mills, ‘The beauty regimen of a woman writer‘ on Overland
• Eilis O’Hanlon, ‘“She’s a thief who steals others’ hard-won words” – on the plagiarist who stole her novel‘ in The Irish Independent
• Sarah Paretsky, ‘From Joan of Arc to Little Women, A History of Heroes‘ on Literary Hub
• Pamela Paul, ‘Why You Should Read Books You Hate‘ in The New York Times
• Grace Payley, ‘Of Poetry and Women and the World‘ on FSG Work in Progress
• Ella Risbridger, ‘The letters Sylvia Plath wrote to her therapist are not ours to see‘ on The Pool
• Michèle Roberts, ‘The fallen woman: prostitution in literature‘ in The Guardian
• Lucy Scholes, ‘The Sisters Who Are Secretly Evil‘ on the BBC
• Doree Shafrir, ‘Not Everyone Is Meant To Have A Book Club‘ on Buzzfeed
• Kathryn Schultz, ‘Literature’s Arctic Obsession‘ in The New Yorker
• Rebecca Solnit, ‘Get That Life: How I Became a Writer, Historian, and Activist‘ in Cosmopolitan
• Sarah K. Stephens, ‘What Edith Wharton Taught Me about Marriage‘ on The Millions
• Beth Underdown, ‘Not From Around There: finding a place in historical fiction‘ on Northern Soul
• Saskia Vogel, ‘The Swedish Gangster’s Wife’s Bag‘ on The Paris Review
• Kyle Winkler, ‘Gertrude Stein: Unlikely Comp Teacher‘ on The Millions

Personal essays/memoir:

• Pearl Abraham, ‘Dreams of My Mother for One Last Passover‘ on Literary Hub
• Kerri Arsenault, ‘Growing Up in Maine’s “Cancer Valley”‘ on Literary Hub
• Jami Attenberg, ‘How Sicily Cemented an Unlikely Friendship‘ in The New York Times
• DeMisty D. Bellinger, ‘Tell Me Something Good‘ on The Rumpus
• Katie Booth, ‘The Bathrobe: On Quilting and Memory‘ on Catapult
• Rebecca Buckwalter-Poza, ‘The Law of Historical Memory​’ on Catapult
• Elizabeth Crain, ‘On Girls, Trump, and Everyone I Ever Dated Before My Husband‘ on Literary Hub
• Elizabeth Ellen, ‘Messages for a Balloon: On Relocation and Families‘ on Catapult
• Jennifer Epperson, ‘When Good Hair Is Natural Hair‘ on Lenny
• Megan Galbraith, ‘Sin Will Find You Out‘ on Catapult
• Deepti Kapoor, ‘I Come from a Place on Your Bucket List‘ in Granta
• Maris Kreizman, ‘My “Sick” Body‘ on Medium
• Andrea Lauren, ‘Don’t Think Twice and the Power of Improvising Through the Unknown‘ on The Rumpus
• Vivien Lee, ‘The Loneliness Recipe‘ on Hazlitt
• Kimberly Melton, ‘Good Hair‘ on Oregon Humanities
• Grace Prassad, ‘Feathers from Home, and Other Family Heirlooms‘ on Catapult
• Elisabeth Sherman, ‘Am I Asian Enough?‘ on Catapult
• Tasha Kerry Smith, ‘Not Everything Legal is Clean‘ on Catapult
• Madeleine Thien, ‘The Land in Winter‘ on Granta
• Lidia Yuknavitch, ‘Civic Memory, Feminist Future‘ on Electric Literature
• Lidia Yuknavitch, ‘I Will Always Inhabit the Waters‘ on Literary Hub
• Iza Wojciechowska, ‘Family Trees‘ on Vela
• Laura Zera, ‘Waiting to Go Home: On Being a Traveler in Trinidad‘ on Catapult

Feminism:

• Laura Bates, ‘What I have learned from five years of Everyday Sexism‘ in The Guardian
• Sady Doyle, ‘Women Don’t Need to Apologize Less—Men Need to Learn How to Apologize‘ in Elle
• Petula Dvorak, ‘On Easter, Mary Magdalene will be maligned as a prostitute. Except she wasn’t‘ in The Washington Post
• Jean Hannah Edelstein, ‘It feels almost impossible to escape the desire to make my body smaller‘ on The Pool
• Ashley C. Ford, ‘Millennial Women Are Conflicted About Being Breadwinners‘ on Refinery29
• Hadley Freeman, ‘Successful, lairy, scary – what does a vulnerable woman look like?‘ in The Guardian
• Ann Friedman, ‘When Women Pursue Sex, Even Men Don’t Get It‘ on The Cut
• Maya Harris, ‘Equal Pay Day Isn’t a Holiday. It’s a Call to Fight.‘ on Lenny
• Maddie Holden, ‘Why the Sentiment Behind Cosmopolitan’s Appalling Diet Tweet Is Not Unusual‘ on HighSnobiety
• Rachel Holmes, ‘A new feminist statue is a great idea. Shame they picked the wrong feminist‘ in The Guardian
• Brionne Janae, ‘No One Looks for Black Girls‘ on Bitch Media
• Jennifer McShane, ‘Why We’re Done With The Idea Of “Likeable” Women‘ on Image
• Vonny Moyes, ‘Why sex for rent is not a deal like any other‘ in The National
• Leslie Nguyen-Okwu, ‘The Forgotten Language that Only Women Once Knew‘ on Ozy
• Emer O’Toole, ‘The Sisters of Charity presided over abuse. They must not run a maternity hospital‘ in The Guardian
• Kate Ristow, ‘Why Didn’t I Get Help for Postpartum Depression Sooner?‘ on The Cut
• Sophie Walker, ‘Brexit will be disastrous for women unless we fight the rollback of our rights‘ in The Guardian

Photograph by Adrienne Mathiowetz

Society and Politics:

• Eula Biss, ‘Murder Mystery‘ in The TLS
• Caren Chesler, ‘The Blood of the Crab‘ on Popular Mechanics
• Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett, ‘My generation has to choose between a child or a career. We can’t afford both‘ in The Guardian
• Caitlin Flanagan, ‘How Late-Night Comedy Fueled the Rise of Trump‘ on The Atlantic
• Elisa Gabbert, ‘Earth Is Not Vengeful—It’s Just Indifferent‘ on Pacific Standard
• Erika Hayasaki, ‘How a Single Gene Could Become a Volume Knob for Human Suffering‘ on Wired
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘The viral image of Saffiyah Khan is an antidote to an era of escalating male rage‘ on The Pool
• Kate Imbach, ‘Fairytale Prisoner by Choice: The Photographic Eye of Melania Trump‘ on Medium
• Sarah Kendzior, ‘Trump craves praise. We praise him for bombings. What possibly could go wrong?‘ in The Globe and the Mail
• Sarah Lyall, ‘Will London Fall?‘ in The New York Times
• Eimear McBride, ‘in the West Bank: “All that is human in me recoils from this”‘ in The Irish Times
• Rachel Monroe, ‘#Vanlife, the Bohemian Social-Media Movement‘ in The New Yorker
• Suzanne Moore, ‘In dark times, this image has a glorious message – resistance is not futile‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Nicole Prickett, ‘Free the Roses‘ on Hazlitt
• Jana G. Pruden, ‘A Radical Grief‘ in The Globe and the Mail
• Sarah Scholes, ‘Brain-Altering Science and the Search for a New Normal‘ on Pacific Standard
• Elif Shafak, ‘Turkey could be about to leap from division to despotism‘ in The Guardian
• Sonia Weiser, ‘Do Women Actually Wear Men’s Dress Shirts After Sex?‘ on Racked

Film, Television, Music, Art, Fashion and Sport:

• Sarah Barker, ‘The Brutality of the Barkley Marathons‘ on Deadspin
• Angelica Jade Bastíen, ‘What the Debate Around Black American and British Actors Gets Wrong‘ on Vulture
• Francine Prose, ‘“Sex and the City” in Hell‘ in The New York Review of Books
• Fariha Róisín, ‘Kids Like Us‘ on Hazlitt
• Donna Seaman, ‘Surrealist Gertrude Abercrombie, Queen of the Bohemian Artists‘ on Literary Hub

The interviews/profiles:

• Sara Ahmed on Literary Hub
• Diana Athill on Lenny Letter
• Jennifer Finney Boylan on Vice
• Durga Chew-Bose in The Guardian and on Literary Hub
• Patty Yumi Cottrell in The Paris Review and on Electric Literature
• Jessa Crispin in The Observer and on Vox
• Rachel Dolezal (interviewed by Ijeoma Oluo) on The Stranger
• Sarah Gerard on Electric Literature
• Zoe Gilbert on The Word Factory
• Camilla Grudova on Minor Literature[s]
• Paula Hawkins on Northern Soul
• L.S. Hilton on The Pool
• Donna Leon in The Guardian
• Deborah Levy in The TLS
• Alia Malek in Gurenica
• Helen McClory on The Skinny
• Lisa McInerney in The Guardian and on TSS Publishing
• Dorthe Nors on The Man Booker Prize and Words Without Borders
• Hanna Nowinski on Teen Vogue
• Sarah Perry in The Radio Times
• Claudia Rankine in The Paris Review
• Emma Ramadan on Conversational Reading
• Samantha Schweblin on Words Without Borders
• Shanthi Sekaran on The Rumpus
• Olivia Sudjic on Flavorwire
• Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan on The Rumpus
• Angie Thomas on The Rumpus
• Mónica de la Torre on Literary Hub
• Laura Waddell on Nothing in the Rule Book
• Joanna Walsh on Review 31
• Lidia Yuknavitch on Electric Literature

The regular columnists:

• Ijeoma Oluo on The Establishment
• Lucy Mangan in Stylist
• Roxane Gay in The Guardian US
• Caitlin Moran in The Times
• Ella Risbridger in The Pool
• Sali Hughes in The Pool
• Bim Adewunmi in The Guardian
• Sophie Heawood in The Guardian
• Eva Wiseman in The Observer
• Tracey Thorn in The New Statesman
• Chimene Suleyman and Maya Goodfellow on Media Diversified
• Josie Pickens on Ebony
• Lizzy Kremer on Publishing for Humans
• Juno Dawson in Glamour
• Louise O’Neill in the Irish Examiner
• Jendella Benson on Media Diversified
• Lola Okolosie in The Guardian
• Sarah Gerard, ‘Mouthful‘ on Hazlitt
• Books by Women We’d Love to See in English on Literary Hub

In the Media: 25th January & 1st February 2015

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.

Thanks to everyone who said such lovely things last week after I lost the In the Media post and to everyone who offered suggestions to stop it happening again. I think I have a solution and it seems to have worked well this week.

The morning after last week’s last minute loss, I realised that all was not entirely lost; all the articles I’d linked to that hadn’t saved were in my laptop history, so I recovered the remainder of last week’s post (apologies if you received an email with a half-done post in it, it posted when I retrieved it) and relinked all the articles, then added this weeks. The result of that is this bumper issue. Enjoy!

This week saw the death of Colleen McCullough, author of The Thorn Birds, as well as 23 other books, and a neuroscientist. Steve Dow remembers her in The Guardian; Alison Flood gave her tribute with ‘Colleen McCullough’s The Thorn Birds helped me get over heartbreak‘ also in The Guardian, and in response to that obituary (I’m not linking to it) Rebecca Shaw wrote ‘We’ll celebrate a woman for anything, as long as it’s not her talent‘ in The Guardian while Liz Kearney responded with ‘You may be a best-selling writer, but never forget that you’re still fat and ugly‘ in The Irish Independent.

It’s been a fortnight filled with awards. Last week, Claudia Rankine became the first person ever to be nominated for two National Critics Circle Awards in the poetry and criticism categories; her editor tells The Washington post why she’s a ‘genius’ and Jonathon Sturgeon tells us why the double nomination is ‘the correct decision’ on Flavorwire;  While Jhumpa Lahiri won the DSC Prize. Here’s ‘Six things you should know about Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Lowland’ on Scroll.in

This week, it’s been the turn of the Costa Awards. Helen Macdonald won the overall award for the fantastic H is for Hawk. Here’s an interview she gave to The Times last week; you can watch her talking about the book here; you can listen to an audio excerpt and read her piece ‘On Ringing Wild Goshawks’ on Vintage Books, and discover the six books that made her in The Guardian. You can also watch the short films made of the other finalists: Emma Healey; Kate Saunders; Ali Smith. Zoe Gilbert won the Short Story Award with Fishskin, Hareskin. With Joanne Meek, Lucy Ribchester, Jane Healey and Paula Cunningham also shortlisted. You can read all the shortlisted stories here (scroll to the bottom of the page).

Other exciting news for female writers is the launch of #ReviewWomen2015, following the success of the #ReadWomen2014 campaign. Hannah Beckerman explains why she wants more books by female writers, especially commercial fiction, to be reviewed in the broadsheets in the Huffington Post. Anne Enright became the first Laureate for Irish Fiction in a unanimous decision and in China came the discovery of a new poet, ‘dubbed China’s Emily Dickinson‘, Want China Times reports on Yu Xihua.

There’s been a wave of feminist articles this fortnight, partly thanks to The Sun newspaper appearing to stop publishing pictures of topless women on p3 and then declaring it a joke by the middle of the week. Sarah Ditum wrote, ‘The “return” of Page 3: the Sun revels in the chance to make women with opinions look stupid‘ in the New Statesman; Marina Hyde responded with, ‘No more t*ts in the Sun – a campaign we can all get behind‘ in The Guardian. Elsewhere, Sophie Heawood wrote, ‘If Björk can’t stop a man stealing the limelight, what hope is there for the rest of us?‘ in The Guardian; Eleanor Catton wrote a statement on her website following a media furore in New Zealand about comments she made about the government; Louise O’Neill related, ‘My journey to feminism‘ in The Guardian; Elisabeth Camp asked ‘Should I let my daughter wear pink?‘ in Aeon; Jami Attenberg recounted her time passing as a man, ‘Track Changes‘ in The New York Times; Bayan Perazzo wrote ‘The Burden of Being Female in Saudi Arabia‘ on Muftah; Rose George declared, ‘My period may hurt: but not talking about menstruation hurts more‘ in The Guardian; Arabelle Sicadi wrote, ‘A Bridge Between Love And Lipstick: Queering the beauty industry‘ on Buzzfeed; Jeanne de Montbaston responded to an Alison Wolf article (link in the piece) with ‘What the Hell kinds of Feminists are you Reading, Alison Wolf‘ on Reading Medieval Books; Lucy Magan says, ‘Let’s Silence the Voice That Tells Us We Can’t‘ in Stylist; Marina Sofia looked at the new Barbie Princess Power on her blog; Rebecca Carroll wrote, ‘I was six when a man first touched me. I didn’t speak up until I was an adult‘ in The Guardian; Jia Tolentino wrote, ‘Rush After ‘A Rape On Campus’: A UVA Alum Goes Back to Rugby Road‘ on Jezebel; Homa Mojtabai listed ‘Reasons You Were Not Promoted That Are Totally Unrelated to Gender‘ on McSweeney’s; C M Meadows-Haworth, ‘Reading Audre Lorde Is Changing My Life‘ on A Room of Our Own; Chika Unigwe wrote, ‘Why Nigeria is failing its citizens over Boko Haram attacks‘ in Litro; Maddie Crum told us ‘Why Virginia Woolf Should Be Your Feminist Role Model‘ on Huffington Post; Brandi Bailey selected ‘The Best Feminist Picture Books‘ on Book Riot, Monique Wilson said, ‘Critics of the Vagina Monologues must acknowledge its transformative powers‘ in The Guardian, Alison Flood told us ‘Why I hate the Little Miss books‘ in The Guardian, Sarah Ditum also told us, ‘I ain’t afraid of no girls: why the all-female Ghostbusters will be good for Hollywood‘ in the New Statesman; Max Cairnduff wrote, ‘Looking back on #readwomen2014 and my favourite reads of the year‘ on his blog; Hannah Renowden shares, ‘2015 – When I got angered by a reading list so read it. Also, crochet.‘ on her blog, and Isabel Rogers read and took down Mike Buchanan’s Justice for Men and Boys (and the women who love them) Party Election Manifesto on her blog.

And a number about class following James Blunt’s open letter to Chris Bryant. Sarah Perry responded with, ‘James Blunt has misunderstood the relationship between privilege and success‘ in The Independent and Suzanne Moore with, ‘What James Blunt doesn’t understand about the politics of envy‘ in The Guardian. Other issues surrounding class were covered by Lisa McKenzie, ‘The estate we’re in: how working class people became the ‘problem’‘ in The Guardian; Lucy Mangan, ‘If you don’t understand how people fall into poverty, you’re probably a sociopath‘ also in The Guardian; Nicola Morgan asked, ‘Why fund libraries when it’s all online?‘ on An Awfully Big Blog Adventure; Harriet Williamson said, ‘Every time I visit the job centre, the staff treat me like a subhuman‘ in the New Statesman; Grace Dent said, ‘When rents are so high that you have to share a bed with a stranger, surely the revolution can’t be far off‘ in The Independent, and Kathryn Hughes wrote, ‘Yes, Kirstie Allsopp, littering’s bad. But then so is self-righteousness‘ in The Guardian

The best of the rest articles/essays:

• Zoe Williams, ‘Wolf Hall: A Lesson in the triumph of low birth over hierarchy‘ in The Guardian
• Rachel Cooke, ‘Oscars 2015: All about Eve? In today’s films, it’s more like All About Adam‘ in The Guardian
• Kim Kankiewicz, ‘The Watcher and the Watched‘ in the Los Angeles Review of Books
• Beluah Maud Devaney, ‘Three thousand reasons to choose your reading carefully‘ in The Guardian
• Tiffany Midge, ‘Part One: Redeeming the English Language (Acquisition) Series‘ in The Butter
• Rene Steinke celebrates the profound influence of independent bookstores on Read Her Like an Open Book
• Mary Wollstonecraft, ‘On Poetry, and Our Relish for the Beauties of Nature‘ on Berfrois
• Judith Lennox, ‘Loneliness and the Long-Distant Granparent‘ in The Guardian
• Laura Sook Duncombe, ‘Literary Ladies Cage Fight: Clash of the Titans‘ in The Butter
• Sasha Dugdale, ‘The Necessity of Translation‘ on Commonwealth Writers
• Priscilla Ward, ‘I’m tired of suppressing myself to get along with white people‘ on Salon
• Susanna Basso (tr. Mati Colarossi), ‘On translation‘ on Parallel Texts
• Elizabeth Haynes, ‘Closer Than You Think‘ on her blog
• Diane Mehta, “And She Went On Her Way Rejoicing” (On Muriel Spark) on The Rumpus
• Leesa Cross-Smith, ‘Anxiety & Comfort‘ on Real Pants
• Brittany Wilmes, ‘Growing Up‘ in The Butter
• Rosie Gray, ‘France’s Far-Right Party Seizes the Moment – And the Youth‘ on Buzzfeed
• Dan Piepenbring, ‘A Dissatisfaction with Life‘ (on Patricia Highsmith) in The Paris Review
• Trisha Ready, ‘How Listening to Music and Fighting with Susan Sontag Helped Me Cope with Chemo‘ on The Stranger
• Dinah Jeffries, ‘The Hidden Psychology of a Writer‘ on her blog
• Eva Wiseman, ‘Questions to Make You Fall in Love‘ in The Guardian
• Nina Martyris, ‘Auden, Rabelais, and “Charlie Hebdo” in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Zoe Heller, ‘Rape on the Campus‘ in The New York Review of Books
• Amanda Foreman, ‘Why Footbinding Persisted in China for a Millennium‘ in Smithsonian
• Sophie Heawood, ‘A little bit of hatred can take you a long way‘ in The Guardian
• Kat Brown, ‘Depression made me feel ‘appalling — I couldn’t bear my own company’ in The Times
• Catherine Taylor on Elena Ferrante on Open Book
• Suzanne Moore, ‘Eventually, I took a driving test. But Mister Much didn’t think much of my motoring skills‘ in the New Statesman
• Paula McLain, ‘I Was Always, Always Looking for More‘ in Good Housekeeping
• Virginia Woolf on E.M. Forster in Berfrois
• Ijeoma Oluo, ‘I understand why people believe sexual predators before victims. I did‘ in The Guardian
• Sybil Baker, ‘The History of the Wanderer‘ in The Critical Flame
• Lauren Westerfeld, ‘Mother Maps‘ on The Butter
• Ruth Graham, ‘Chandler Bing Is the Worst Thing About Watching Friends in 2015‘ on Slate
• Anne Helen Peterson, ‘The Trouble with “It Girls”‘ on Buzzfeed

• Shelley Harris, ‘Writing a hero from the inside‘ on Isobel Costello’s Literary Sofa
• Shruti Ravindran, ‘A circus of the senses‘ in Aeon
• Sadie Stein, ‘More things in heaven and earth‘ in The Paris Review
• Tracy Borman, ‘Big bad Wolf: Why have we fallen for Thomas Cromwell?‘ on BBC Arts
• Rene Denfeld, ‘The Other Side of Loss‘ on The Manifest-Station
• Soo Na Pak, ‘Woman‘ in The Butter
• Jonathan Gibbs, ‘The Art of the Novella challenge 11: The Awakening‘ on Melville House
• E.B. Bartels, ‘Freedom, My Dear‘ in The Butter
• Evan McMurry, ‘The stunning weirdness of Ayn Rand: Why her newfound popularity makes no sense‘ on Salon
• Susanna Daniel, ‘What took you so long? The quiet hell of 10 years of novel writing‘ on Slate
• Randon Billings Noble, ‘The Heart as a Torn Muscle‘ in Brevity
• Heather Sellers, ‘Fun for Everyone Involved‘ in Brevity
• Jennifer Sinor, ‘One Hundred Days in India‘ in Brevity
• Fleda Brown, ‘Home Bodily Repair Kit‘ in Brevity
• Jenny Boully, ‘I Remain Very Sorry For What I Did to the Little Black Kitten‘ in Brevity
• Sarah Freligh, ‘Lessons of the Body‘ in Brevity
• Anna Journey, ‘For Great-Aunt Jeannette, Who Donated Her Body to Science‘ in Brevity
• Anna B. Sutton, ‘Carolina/Tennessee‘ in Brevity
• Ginny MacDonald, ‘Go, Jim Dandy‘ in Brevity
• Jen Palmares Meadows, ‘Imprint‘ in Brevity
• Lisa Nikolidakis, ‘Landlines‘ in Brevity
• Margo Barnes, ‘Falling‘ in Brevity
• Lessa Cross-Smith, ‘Other Boys & High School Hearts‘ on Real Pants
• Elisa Gabbert, ‘Some Notes on Packing‘ on Real Pants
• Stassa Edwards, ‘From Aesop to doge‘ in Aeon
• Sadie Stein, ‘Common Colds‘ in The Paris Review
• Samantha Lyon, ‘Gender Inequality in the World of Children’s Books‘ on The Inflectionist
• Alex Clark, ‘TV books programmes: if nobody watches them, make better ones‘ in The Guardian
• Jonathan Diaz, ‘Hello, Cruel World: Silvina Ocampo Is Argentina’s Literary Middle Child‘ on Flavorwire
• S.L. Huang, ‘On the Subject of Unlikeable Woman Protagonists‘ on Chuck Wendig’s blog
• Gemma Todd, ‘The Life of a Mobile Librarian‘ on the Picador Blog
• Wiam El-Tamami, ‘Cairo: September 2014‘ in Granta
• Elizabeth Kolbert, ‘Such a Stoic‘ in The New Yorker
• Dan Piepenbring, ‘Speaking Bluntly‘ (A letter from Colette) in The Paris Review
• Jill Dawson ‘The Life You Save May be Your Very Own‘ on Fat Is a Feminist Issue on Platform 505
• Jessica Levine, ‘On Writing About Sex: Is It Necessary‘ on Read Her Like an Open Book

• Lizzy Kremer, ‘The Stories Writers Tell‘ on her blog
• Suzanne Moore, ‘Single parents don’t need anonymous generosity but public respect‘ in The Guardian
• Corrine Duyvis, ‘Why Strong Characters Aren’t All That‘ on For Books’ Sake
• Ann Bauer, ‘“Sponsored” by my husband: Why it’s a problem that writers never talk about where their money comes from‘ on Salon
• Becca Rose, ‘The Third Generation‘ in The Butter
• Lydia Kiesling, ‘I Would Do This for You: The Narrative Possibilities of Leaked Emails‘ on The Millions
• Sarah Hollowell, ‘This is an Essay About a Fat Woman Being Loved and Getting Laid‘ in The Butter
• Margo Rabb, ‘In My Cat’s Death, a Human Comfort‘ in The New York Times
• Antonia Honeywell, ‘The Book That Changed My Life‘ on Novelicious
• Christopher Fowler, ‘Invisible ink no 259: Female short story writers‘ in The Independent
• Nicole Wolverton, ‘Mourning New York: Cari Luna and The Revolution of Every Day‘ on Bloom
• Rachel Aviv, ‘Your Son Is Deceased‘ in The New Yorker
• Vanessa Curtis, ‘On the 30,000 lost Jews of Riga‘ in The Guardian
• Nicolette Jones, ‘The renaissance of Beatrix Potter’s great rival‘ in The Telegraph
• Hermione Lee, ‘Alice Munroe’s Magic‘ in The New York Review of Books
• Helen Oyeyemi, ‘Born Out of Rapt Distraction: On Silvina Ocampo’s “Thus Were Their Faces”‘ on The Millions
• Roxane Gay, ‘Living with my parents in Florida, it’s difficult to feel like an adult‘ in The Guardian
• Samantha Tucker, ‘Kitchen Remodel‘ in Guernica
• Lucy Mangan, ‘There Are No Life Hacks for Love‘ in Stylist
• Claudia Smith, ‘Basic. Bitch‘ in The Butter
• Pallavi Aiyar, ‘The Foreign Correspondent‘ in Granta
• Sara Majka, ‘Cities I’ve Never Lived In‘ in Guernica
• Sara Gerard, ‘On Helen Keller Really Lived and The Wallcreeper:
  How Should a Woman Behave?‘ in the Los Angeles Review of Books
• Dana Stevens, ‘Tumbling into the Screen‘ on Slate
• Emily Gould, ‘How Being Pregnant Ruined Shopping For Me‘ on Fast Company
• Vanessa M. Gezari, ‘Why it pays to work the fringes‘ on Lynsey Addario in the Columbia Journalism Review
• Roger Tagholm, ‘Why “Gone Girl?” Why Not “Gone Woman?”‘ on Publishing Perspectives
• Charlotte Higgins, ‘Leonora Carrington: wild at heart‘ in The Guardian
• Beth Miller, ‘There’s a difference in living and living well‘ on her blog
• Joan Didion, ‘on Writing and Revising‘ on The New York Public Library Podcast
• Helen Brocklebank, ‘The Books that Built Samantha Ellis‘ on Mrs Trefusis Takes a Taxi
• Kavita Bhanot, ‘Too Asian, Not Asian Enough‘ on Media Diversified
• Angela Köckritz, ‘They Have Miao‘ on Zeit Online
• Sarah B. Boyle, ‘Reports from the Field: A Textbook Case of Diversity: How Educational Publishing Skims the Surface‘ on VIDA
• Anna Maxymiw, ‘Making Gains‘ in Masionneuve
• Megan Mayhew Bergman, ‘Bring In the Old: The Writer as Collector‘ on Ploughshare
• Maya Jaggi, ‘Literature has Liberated Africa’s Authors‘ in The Financial Times

The interviews:

• Katie Coyle on Flavorwire
• Eula Bliss on Salon
• Mary Gaitskill in BOMB Magazine
• Vanessa Lafaye on Bookaholic Confessions
• Gurinder Chadha in The Guardian
• Kate Bernheimer on The Brooklyn Rail
• Mary Kay Zuravleff on Fiction Writers Review
• Paula Hawkins on Writer’s Bone and in The New York Times
• Sarah Gerard in Interview Magazine and in Vice
• Danielle Steele in T Magazine
• Chelsea Hodson and Juliet Escoria on Emily Books
• Tiphanie Yanique on Publishers Weekly
• Emma Hooper on Open Book
• Samantha Harvey on Salon
• Janet Mock on Queer of Gender and Bitch Media
• Peyton Marshall on Annethology
• Molly Peacock on Maisonneuve
• Miranda July on Longreads and The Millions and in The Cut
• Polly Coles and Liz Jensen on Something Rhymed
• Cari Luna on Bloom
• Shelley Harris on Novelicious
• Muriel Spark on Toby Litt’s blog twice
• Joyce Carol Oates in The Independent
• Kelly Link in The New York Times
• Jenny Ashcroft on Rebecca Mascull’s blog
• Jennifer Niven in The Guardian
• Wendy Ortiz in Mutha Magazine
• Dylan Landis on Electric Literature
• Mindy Kaling in Stylist
• Lena Dunham in the Los Angeles Review of Books
• Celeste Ng on Radio Gorgeous and Novelicious
• Lucy Ribchester, Elisabeth Gifford and Lucy Hughes-Hallett on Book Talk
• Frances Vick in Shiny New Books
• Sophia Tobin in Shiny New Books
• Adèle Geras in Shiny New Books
• Lynn Sloan on Bloom
• Lynne Segal in The Observer

If you want some fiction/poetry to read:

• ‘Olikoye‘ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in Matter
• ‘Idaho‘ by Isabel Rogers on her blog
• ‘Hummers‘ by Amy Gottfried in Blunderbuss
• ‘The Garden Party‘ by Katherine Mansfield on The Centre for Fiction
• ‘Body as Device‘ by Brandi Wells in The Butter
• ‘Ellen Says No‘ by Vanessa Vitiello Urquhart in The Butter
• An extract from The Serpent Papers by Jessica Cornwell
• Five stories from Carys Bray’s Sweet Home on BBC Radio 4 Extra
• ‘Blood and Water‘ by Elizabeth Muchemwa on Brittle Paper
• ‘Alt Vices‘ by Michelle Dove in Guernica
• ‘Alice‘ by Elizabeth Harrower in The New Yorker and she discusses the story here
• ‘steph n deaf‘ by Jay Merrill in 3:am magazine
• An extract from The Undertaking by Audrey Magee in the Irish Times
• ‘Performance Art‘ by Manjula Padmanabhan in Granta
• An excerpt from Principles of Navigation by Lynn Sloan on Bloom
• ‘Miss Havisham’s Disability Application Is Denied‘ by Olga Oksman on McSweeney’s
• Three Poems by Yvonne Green on And Other Poems
• ‘The Moth Mother‘ by Joanne Harris on her blog
• An extract from Campari for Breakfast by Sara Crowe on Novel Kicks
• ‘For the Love of Squirrels‘ by Claire Fuller on her blog
• ‘Tell Us a Story, Grandma‘ by Natalie Wise in The New Yorker
• ‘The Secret Lives of Shoes‘ by Atoke on Brittle Paper
• ‘t.w. gore‘ by Helen McClory on Litro
• ‘My Son Is a Good Man‘ by Rosanna Boscawen on Litro
• ‘And So It Begins‘ by Lara Williams on Litro
• ‘An Unsolved Mystery Of Quantum Mechanics‘ by Beatrice Garland on Visual Verse
• ‘Heel Drags‘ by Susan Gray on Visual Verse
• ‘Please Come‘ by Jennifer Falkner on Visual Verse
• ‘The Last Leg‘ by Hazel Mason on Visual Verse
• ‘Crossing the Line‘ by Avalina Kreska on Visual Verse
• ‘Stuck‘ by Samantha Newbury on Visual Verse
• ‘In a Rush‘ by Catherine Lødøen on Visual Verse
• ‘Sketch of an Abandoned Journey‘ by Linda Ashok on Visual Verse
• ‘Parallels of Time‘ by Pauline Suett Barbieri on Visual Verse
• ‘Poem for Isaac‘ by Freya Dean on Visual Verse
• ‘Towards the Penal Colony‘ by Corrine Lawrence on Visual Verse
• ‘Limbs Anonymous‘ by Judith A. Daniel on Visual Verse
• ‘The Rainforest‘ by Olive Lowena on Visual Verse
• ‘Coney Island Cap‘ by Jennifer Albon Burns on Visual Verse
• ‘What Happened in the Hold‘ by Lindsey Grundnicki on Visual Verse
• ‘Over the Limit‘ by Sue Ellis on Visual Verse
• ‘Moonlit Road‘ by Sarah Doughty on Visual Verse
• ‘Colgate‘ by Isadora Vibes on Visual Verse
• ‘Circles and Lines‘ by Sarah Salway on Visual Verse
• ‘Crossing the Line‘ by Birgita Orel on Visual Verse
• ‘Yarn‘ by Shirley Anne Cook on Visual Verse
• ‘Bad Habit‘ by Wendy Choi on Visual Verse
• ‘Arrival‘ by Georgina Joss on Visual Verse
• ‘No Overtaking‘ by Sally Hepplewhite on Visual Verse
• ‘Blinders‘ by Grace Black on Visual Verse
• ‘Found‘ by Luciana Francis on Visual Verse
• ‘Gateway‘ by Olivia Sprinkled on Visual Verse
• ‘Return‘ by Elizabeth Rogers on Visual Verse
• ‘Love‘ by Jennifer Harvey on Visual Verse
• ‘Shadows of the Showgirl‘ by Clare Archibald on Visual Verse
• Three Stories by Chiara Barzini in BOMB Magazine

Or some non-fiction:

• Feminist Radical Thinkers: A Sampler from Verso Books
• An extract from Girl in a Band: A Memoir by Kim Gordon in Vogue
• An extract from The Fish Ladder by Katharine Norbury in The Observer

The lists:

• The Seven Ages of Women in Virago Modern Classics and Persephone titles on heavenali’s blog
• Novelicious Picks…Books that Are Creating a Buzz (Part 1) on Novelicious
• 10 Great Psychological Thrillers That Are As Good As Gone Girl on Buzzfeed
• Miranda July’s Bookshelf on Strand Books
• 25 Books By Women To Help Diversify Your Bookshelves And Expand Your Horizons, Because #WeNeedDiverseBooks on Bustle
• A sonnet of Canadian women writers on Lynn Kanter’s blog
• 11 Books on Inspiring Women to Read This Year That’ll Completely Energize You to Hit Your Goals on Bustle
• 50 Essential Literary Biographies on Flavorwire
• Bleak Books to Read in January in Vanity Fair
• Diverse voices: the 50 best culturally diverse children’s books in The Guardian
• These Female Contemporaries Weren’t Afraid of Virginia Woolf on The Daily Beast
• 21 Scottish Novels to Look Forward to in 2015 on Scottish Book Trust
• 15 YA Writers on Their Favorite Book for Adults on Flavorwire
• 30 Legendary Literary Mean Girls We Love to Hate on Flavorwire
• Ten Classic ‘Chick-Lit’ Novels All Romantic Fiction Fans Should Read in Stylist
• Girl Canon: 50 Essential Books About the Female Experience
• 14 Novels About Muslim Life That Shouldn’t Be Missed on Buzzfeed
• 10 beautiful quotes from The Diary of a Young Girl in The Guardian
• Female Writers Who Won Nobel Prizes on Galley Cat
• Best Snow Day Reads: 19 Page-Turners To Enjoy While Snowed In in the Huffington Post
• Vivian French’s Top Ten Evil Characters on My Book Corner
• 50 Books Guaranteed to Make You More Interesting on Flavorwire
• 10 Must Read Female Writers From the Middle East on The Culture Trip
• 30 Women Novelists You Should Know – #21 Wendy Lee on Lynn Kanter’s blog
• 12 Books To Read If You Loved ‘The Girl On The Train’ (That Aren’t ‘Gone Girl’) in Bustle

and Diane Watt is spending February recommending LGBT reads on her Twitter account using the hashtag #mylgbtbooks

In the Media: 11th January 2015

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.

(Photograph by Pedro Koechlin)

As it’s the first In the Media of the year, I’m going to begin by looking back at 2014 for a moment with pieces that appeared between Christmas and New Year. Katherine Angel’s brilliant piece, ‘Gender, blah, blah, blah‘ in The Los Angeles Review of Books; Jessie Burton, ‘Eggshells, Luck, Hope and Thanks‘ on her blog reflects on what a year it’s been for The Miniaturist; Emma Claire Sweeney and Emily Midorikawa ‘A Year of Hidden Friendships‘ on Something Rhymed; Rebecca Solnit, ‘Listen up, women are telling their story now‘ in The Guardian; Jia Tolentino, ‘The Promise in Elena Ferrante‘ on Jezebel; Charles Finch, also on Elena Ferrante for ‘A Year in Reading‘ for The Millions;  Ali Colluccio covers ‘The Best of Women in Comics 2014‘ on Panels, and  Elena Adler on ‘Why #ReadWomen 2014 has changed things, and why #ReadWomen matters‘ on her blog.

Looking forwards, there’s been a spotlight on diversity again this week with Celeste Ng writing about a male professor telling her there were few Asian-American women writers. There’s a fantastic list of writers at the bottom of the article. Nalo Hopkinson wrote ‘To anthology editors‘ on how to go about creating anthologies with a diversity of voices on her website; Alexis Teyie wrote this great piece, ‘Invoking the women in early African writing‘ on This Is Africa, while Lyn Gardner declared ‘Diversity is key to Creativity – and British Theatre’s Challenge for 2015‘ in The Guardian and Stella Duffy wrote, ‘Making Arts for All for ALL‘ on her blog.

While The White Review has kicked off the year with an all translation issue. You can read online pieces by Herta Müller (tr. Philip Boehm); poetry by Alejandra Pizarnik (tr. Yvette Seigert) and Angélica Freitas (tr. Hilary Kaplan); a short story by Tove Jansson (tr.  Thomas Teal); extracts from novels by Minae Mizumuru (tr. Juliet Winters Carpenter) and Han Kang (tr. Deborah Smith), and an interview with Magdalena Tulli (tr. Bill Johnston).

(Photograph by Kuba Kolinski)

The best of the rest articles/essays:

• Guilaine Kinouani, “Hatred breeds hatred”: Charlie Hebdo, marginalisation and terrorism on Media Diversified
• Harriet Evans, ‘I was living in a house where babies had been murdered‘ in The Guardian
• Margaret Talbot, ‘The Talking Cure‘ in The New Yorker
• Marta Maretich, ‘Landfill‘ in Boom
• Samantha Ellis, ‘How To Be a New Year Heroine‘ on Vintage Books and ‘Baddies in Books: Bertha Rochester, the madwoman in the attic‘ in The Guardian
• Antonia Honeywell on the writing of The Ship on the Curtis Brown blog
• Jenny Colgan, ‘What Makes Me Happy‘ in The Guardian
• Rivka Galchen and Leslie Jamison, ‘Why Do We Hate Cliché?‘ in The New York Times
• Maev Kennedy, ‘Families in Literature: The Clocks in The Borrowers by Mary Norton‘ in The Guardian
• Lindesay Irvine, ‘Families in Literature: the Tulls in Dinner at the Homesick restaurant by Anne Tyler‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Crown, ‘Families in Literature: the Bagthorpes in The Bagthorpe Saga by Helen Cresswell‘ in The Guardian
• Meg Wolitzer, ‘My Debt to Sylvia Plath‘ in Time
• Naomi Skwarna, ‘How to Be a Woman: Lorrie Moore as the mother you never had‘ in Hazlitt
• Maureen Younger on why Simone de Beauvoir is still important in Standard Issue
• Shelley Harris, ‘Timey-Wimey: A Letter to My (Former) Self‘ on her blog
• Rebecca Makkai, ‘Second Time’s the Charm‘ on The Ploughshares’ Blog
• Elisa Gabbert, ‘Notes on a Trend‘ on Real Pants
• Hannah Marriott, ‘Joan Didion and Céline: why old age is having a fashion moment‘ in The Guardian
• Kevin Fitzpatrick, ‘Six Women You Didn’t Know Were Members of the Algonquin Round Table‘ on Huffington Post
• Alice Popplewell, “What’s This Issue All About” Five Dials and @ReadWomen2014 on Cloudbanks and Shimbleshanks
• Lizzy Dening, ‘A Year of Reading Women‘ in Grazia
• Jess Connett, ‘Transphobic Parents: The Problem Is You, Not Your Kids‘ on Rife
• Victoria Law, ‘Against Carceral Feminism‘ in Jacobin
• Qaisra Shahraz, ‘Researching a Novel in Morocco‘ on Women Writers, Women’s Books
• Amy Klein, ‘Fertility Fog‘ on Aeon
• Chloe Angyal, ‘The Paradoxical Rise of the Viral Marriage Proposal‘ on Buzzfeed
• Glynnis MacNicol, ‘Growing Up Meant Learning to Wear Red Lipstick‘ on The Cut
• Mallory Ortberg, ‘I’d Love to Help My Wife, But I’m Trapped Under Something Heavy‘ in The Toast
• Van Badham, ‘It’s time to open your eyes, Rusty. Female actors want better roles because none exist‘ in The Guardian
• Sinéad Gleeson, ‘Nollaig na mBan and the (gendered) horror of housework‘ on her blog
• Claire Fuller, ‘Dear Jane: A letter to my husband’s dead first wife‘ on her blog
• Claire Furniss on sick lit in The Guardian and ‘No matter how much research you do, it’s the story that matters‘ on the Waterstone Blog
• Laura Lippman, ‘A Detective and a Mother‘ on Publishers Weekly
• Caitlin Horrocks, ‘Live Demonstrations of Love‘ on AGNI Online
• Fatima Bhutto, ‘My Other Thing‘ in Granta
• Leesa Cross-Smith, ‘Bro Country and Tiny Littles‘ on Real Pants
• Elaine Blair, ‘All Told: Rachel Cusk’s autobiographical fiction‘ in The New Yorker
• Sarah Hughes, ‘The Gone Girl effect sparks year of flawed women behaving badly‘ in The Guardian
• Lucy Ribchester, ‘I vote we honour those brave Scottish suffragettes‘ in The Sunday Times (£)
• Cathy Rentzenbrink, ‘Elizabeth Jane Howard Remembered‘ on BBC Radio 4 Extra
• Lynn Shepherd, ‘Frankenstein: Mystery – Monster – Myth‘ on Wordsworth Trust Blog
• Emma Claire Sweeney, ‘Mary Lamb and Dorothy Wordsworth‘ on Something Rhymed
• Claire King on not being the most anticipated on her blog
• Vanessa Lafaye, ‘The Beast in Residence: Writing After Cancer‘ on her blog
• Yiyun Li, ‘Listening Is Believing‘ in The New Yorker
• Carlina Duan, ‘How an English Major Found Her (Chinese American) Voice on Campus‘ in Mochi Mag
• Jenny Diski, ‘Doris and Me‘ in the LRB
• Tess Vigeland, ‘Authors are now judged by their Twitter followers, and it’s a world gone mad‘ in The Guardian
• Paris Lees, ‘Honour Leelah Alcorn’s memory by banning conversion therapy‘ in Attitude
• Hilary Mantel on Grief in The Guardian

The interviews:

• Emily Woolf in The Guardian
• Seni Glaister on the 4th Estate site
• Megan Mayhew Bergman on Electric Literature and on Bookslut
• In Conversation: Barbara Ras and Matthew Dickman in Granta
• Emma Healey in The Guardian
• Priya Parmar on Huffington Post
• Lindsey Kelk on BBM Live
• Meghan McNamara of Stillhouse Press on Wendi Kaufman on Bloom
• Miranda July in The New York Times
• Edwidge Danticat in Guernica
• Harriet Lane on One Book Lane
• Wendy C. Ortiz on Electric Literature
• Megham Daum in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Leesa Cross-Smith on Cari Luna’s blog
• Jodi Picoult and Helen Macdonald on Scottish Book Trust’s Book Talk
• Lucy Ribchester on Scottish Book Trust
• Kate Saunders in The Telegraph
• Nell Zink in The Guardian
• Vanessa Lafaye in The Guardian
• Alexandra Heminsley in The Telegraph
• Ann Patchett on The Hairpin
• Katharine Norbury in The Guardian
• Gayatri Spivak on Dawn
• Mary Costello on Annethology
• Carys Bray on Sara Crowley’s blog

If you want some fiction/poetry to read:

• An extract from Wake by Anna Hope
• ‘Sufferance’ and other poems by Rebecca Foust
• Invasive Species by Marie Gethins in Litro
• Orion’s Belt and Who it Fell On by Emily Ilett in Litro
• An extract from The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
• An extract from Five Children on the Western Front by Kate Saunders
• Birdie by Ann DeWitt
• State of the Art Flesh Cleanser by Rahawa Haile
• Betty Came by to Say Goodbye by Claire Fuller
• An extract from Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey
• An extract from Year of the Rat by Clare Furniss
• An excerpt from La signora Rosetta by Tiziana Sferruggia (tr. Mati Colarossi) on Parallel Texts
• A Photograph of Her Showering by Elizabeth Langemak on AGNI Online
• The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher by Hilary Mantel is Radio 4’s Book at Bedtime
• An extract from La Femme De Gilles by Madeleine Bourdouxhe (tr. Faith Evans)
• ‘Encounters with a Hare’ and other poems by Aoife Reilly

And the lists:

• The Best Books this Year Are All Written by Women: A Guide for 2015 on Gawker
• The Best 10 Books Shorter Than 150 Pages on Publishers Weekly
• 13 Books to Keep Up Your Post Holiday Spirits, Especially Now That the Cold Weather Has Really Set In on Bustle
• 27 of the Most Exciting Books of 2015 on Buzzfeed
• Keren David’s top 10 books about adopted and fostered children in The Guardian
• Lucy Ribchester’s Top 10 Books About the Suffragettes in The Guardian
• Lynn Kanter’s 30 Women Novelists You Should Know #20 Mary Doris Russell on her blog
• 16 of the Most Anticipated YA Debuts Due Out in the First Half of 2015 on Huffington Post
• The Best New Books of 2015 in Stylist
• 10 Underrated Novels by Women You Should Resolve to Read in 2015 on Bustle
• 10 Must Read Female Writers from the Middle East on The Culture Trip
• The Books to Look Forward to in 2015 in Marie Claire
• The TIA 100 – Best Books, 2010 – 2014 on This Is Africa
• 6 Books We’re Most Looking Forward to Reading in 2015 in Good Housekeeping
• 15 Feminist Books to Read in 2015 to Help You Stay Passionate All Year in Bustle