Feminist Pub IX. Newbies and regulars welcome - pop your cognitive dissonance down outside and have a gin.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Right, thought I'd better start a new pub. I warn you, my knowledge of Roman numerals conks out shortly after this one, so either buffy will have to start the next thread, or we'll have to go Arabic.

Everyone is welcome in - if you want to chat, or just jump in with a question/link/gin, please do. Especially if it's too small for a thread or you don't feel up to thread-starting.

The old thread has, at my count, about 9 posts to go, and it was here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/2126791-Feminist-Pub-VIII-not-as-prolific-as-the-Swaggerers-but-there-are-cushions-and-consciousness?

We were just chatting about feministy light reading, and will doubtless meander onto other topics shortly.

Ha! I'm here first!

Working though, so better make it a

Yeah, but I did the last post. Hah!

I'm going to reread Diana Wynne Jones' Charmed Life. Her books ooze kindness.

is also available.

And thanks for your post on the last thread, too.

I was wondering, relating to feministy reading, if people think women authors 'talk down' less than men? I mean, I've read some properly complicated books by women, but I didn't feel so patronized by them as I do by crap like American Psycho, which just seems to be entirely 'woman, know thy place' to me.

Ooh! I love Charmed Life!

Have you read her last one, the one someone else finished? I've seen it on Amazon and not bought it - I was so sad when she died.

Some great book suggestions on this thread in Adult Fiction; being American, though, most are of the non-tweedy variety.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/adult_fiction/2149177-Reading-around-the-USA-in-books-please-help-me-or-even-join-in?

Just popping in to say hello (and to thank everyone for the book recommendations). I have to work now, so I'll be back this evening.

I can do Roman numerals.

Sorry, just marking place.

Sorry to hear/ congratulations on your news LRD.

i couldn't finish "the children's book", maybe i should try again

but i loved wolf hall / bring up the bodies, but i didn't find the "who's talking?" stuff that LRD describes too irritating. i did read wolf hall on a plane though, which really helped because it got a good chunk out of the way and i was "into" it properly by then. i don't think i could have picked it up and put it down and been able to get into it again as i needed to be properly immersed

i'm rereading the cazalets series at the moment

scone what a great idea that thread is!

i was in the midwest a couple of weeks ago, and by coincidence made the mistake of reading a rather gory murder mystery set in the same city that i was travelling to. not quite what the local tourism board would have wanted

ordering a strong flat white, marking place

I love a bit of Barbara Pym!

I probably secretly aspire to being the grumpy older woman, complete with tweeds and snarly terrier who mutters to herself and twirls her fantastic moustaches!

DH becomes quite alarmed when I read threads about books, we're already going to have to invest in miles of shelving for the ones I have. He lives in fear of me finding a new author to collect!

Marking place with a pint. It's a beautiful day and I'm childfree until Saturday, so considering making it a real one.

Speaking of books, I need to re-alphabetise mine, in the hopes that Delusions of Gender will turn up. Can't for the life of me remember if I've bought it yet.

stormy when we moved into our new house i put my feminist books on the shelves in the sitting room at eye-level. setting out my stall as it were

re dp worrying about a-level results, it appears not. or not yet at least. i am working from home and he is downstairs very happily making courgette cake and borscht (courgette and beetroot glut in hte veg patch)

courgette and beetroot glut in the veg patch

Still? How many plants did you plant? Or did you do what we did and plant far too many because of last year's crap harvest of, well, everything?

it's our first year with a veg patch - we've never had a garden of our own before . we failed to anticipate

(a) how much two adults can realistically eat and planted too much
(b) how much two adults can realistically eat when at least one of them is travelling for work for most of the harvesting season

O I like a bit of reading, I am currently reading The Golden Notebook and also, and I'd never have picked it up otherwise, Running Dog by Don DeLillo, because it is vaguely connected to my thesis and I've just read a reading of it, iyswim. I'm also reading When Your Kids Push Your Buttons, guess why? And note it has been chucked in the bath by DS already. And a ton of academic shit. I'm a bit crap though, always distracted by not-reading i.e. internetting.

I've read The Children's Book and it was really tough because I'd just had a little boy, and Tom, the little boy who loses his shadow just really played on the giant raw hole that blew in my invincibility cloak

I haven't read American Psycho but it's on my list. Have you read Gone Girl? I only mention it as it has an American who is psychotic in it. I have to say I sided with her somewhat. I really like the anti-heroine trope that Gillian Flynn is working even if the characters aren't exactly feminist.

Oh, and just to the reading thing, Carol Shields Unliess is fucking great, it is a protestation on the way her own work was interpreted during her lifetime.

Ooh, yes. The Offenden prize. I love Carol Shields.

American Psycho is a waste of time, IMO. It's horrible. I'll look at Gone Girl, though.

I'm feeling very inferior as a gardener on this thread, because I only just have courgettes starting and they look a bit crap.

i am ambivalent about gillian flynn. it was actually one of her books that i mentioned above re midwestern city. she writes really well, good plots, and her female characters are excellent, fully-rounded. the one where the woman witnessed her familly being massacred when a child is particularly good in terms of how she has grown up in the public eye and her reactions to that - realistic and not pulling any punches

but there are some themes that i find exploitative and problematic

I wouldn't bother with American psycho, I read it a while ago a male housemate (of the won't do any housework because a woman will do it if I don't kind) lent it to me... I gave him the portrait of Dorian grey back . AP is just relentless horribleness to women to be honest.

I wish you better times with your change of marital status LRD, I hope it goes as smoothly as these things possibly can.

Thirding the American Psycho awfulness. I always wonder about authors who can come up with such horrific stories and such brutal scenes, they will have had to visualise them from every angle in order to make them sound real. I don't think I'd want to spend a lot of time with someone who could, even idly, think about some of the more outlandish stuff in AP.

I'm probably being horribly unfair.

in other news there is a fencing dispute going on outside between next door and next door-but-one. i'm at my desk with the window open so can hear everything (i'm staying well out). it has enlivened my afternoon but not in a good way as i am quite friendly with all concerned

Hello, gin sounds good though I think my cognitive dissonance may have followed me in after getting really frustrated on the "what's wrong with telling women not to get drunk so they won't be raped?" thread on AIBU.

I love love love Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies, especially the portrayal of the Boleyn sisters and the dynamics between them. Also the depiction of More, proper antidote to A Man For All Seasons.