Heather reviewed When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill
Review of 'When Women Were Dragons' on 'Goodreads'
The Mass Dragoning of 1955 changed society. Suddenly a huge number of women were just gone. A lot of husbands and other nasty men died violently that day. And now, it just isn't mentioned in polite society.
"People are awfully good at forgetting unpleasant things."
This is a book about the empowerment that can come from female rage. Alex's aunt never quite fit into the hetereosexual, patriarchial society that had strict ideas about how women should behave. Now she is gone and left behind her daughter Beatrice. Alex ends up raising Beatrice and trying to live up to her mother's ideals.
Alex and her mother were both brilliant at math. Her mother did not dragon and impressed upon Alex the importance of never mentioning it. She never mentioned her sister, even to the point of insisting that Beatrice was Alex's sister and always had been.
"And now I realize, there …
The Mass Dragoning of 1955 changed society. Suddenly a huge number of women were just gone. A lot of husbands and other nasty men died violently that day. And now, it just isn't mentioned in polite society.
"People are awfully good at forgetting unpleasant things."
This is a book about the empowerment that can come from female rage. Alex's aunt never quite fit into the hetereosexual, patriarchial society that had strict ideas about how women should behave. Now she is gone and left behind her daughter Beatrice. Alex ends up raising Beatrice and trying to live up to her mother's ideals.
Alex and her mother were both brilliant at math. Her mother did not dragon and impressed upon Alex the importance of never mentioning it. She never mentioned her sister, even to the point of insisting that Beatrice was Alex's sister and always had been.
"And now I realize, there is a freedom in forgetting. Or at least it is something that feels like freedom. There is a freedom in not asking questions. There is a freedom in being unburdened by unpleasant information. And sometimes, a person has to hang on to whatever freedoms she can get."
I'm not sure how we are supposed to feel about the women who don't transition. Are they choosing to live a human life? Are they being held back by something? Several are described as living their own mighty lives. I'm not quite sure what point the author was trying to make with them. I loved the librarian in the book. She's amazing and she wasn't a dragon.
I've seen a lot of people on Goodreads be super concerned about the types of women mentioned in this book. I read one review that went on about how there were only white lesbians in the book and everyone else was ignored. All types of women are discussed in the book. There are both cis and trans women. Women of all ages and races are here. There are drag performers who transition during a show. It isn't explicitly stated whether they were transwomen or cis men or genderqueer or what.
This book wasn't as plot-driven as the stories that I usually read. Because of that I had to sort of push myself to get through it. I was interested mainly in the excerpts from Congressional hearings and other news that was interspersed through the main narrative. Those kept me coming back. Alex's story was much slower and less well explained.
This story was inspired by the author's rage while watching the confirmation hearing of Brett Kavanaugh and the testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. The examples of sexism in this book are absolutely rage inducing and oh so relatable. May we all be dragons.
