"It was said, or so he had been told: Fatima, beloved daughter of the Prophet, had not felt the heat of the fire as she stirred a pot of simmering halva with her hand. She didn't feel the burning sugar climbing her arm, darkening to the color of her skin, such was her grief."
-- Aamina Ahmad, _The Return of Faraz Ali_
@Beerdini I don't think anyone really treated this woman well, except for her partner (whom she didn't treat very well).
@Beerdini Yes, and no. She definitely moved toward the anti-choice side because they seemed more likely to provide for her (both financially and emotionally) but she also seemed to have some genuine misgivings about the lawsuit that made her famous. And she was just a very broken person, and many of the people who seemed to be friends or protectors really just wanted to use her as a sort of mascot.
Reading The Family Roe (which is excellent) and I cannot get over how sad the life of Norma McCorvey ("Jane Roe") was -- she was used by pro-choice feminists and she was used by Operation Rescue and I'm not sure she knew herself how she felt about abortion rights by the end.
"Two decades and change into her beef, Carlotta Mercedes braced herself for audition number five with the New York State Board of Parole."
-- James Hannaham, _Didn't Nobody Give a Shit What Happened to Carlotta_
The temptation of the old, born into the middle of things, was to see in their deaths the end of everything, the end of times. That way their deaths made more sense
-- Ian McEwan, _Lessons_
You can tell my husband is really taking turning 55 well, because he just mixed tequila, absinthe, and pomegranate liqueur.
First, I got myself born. A decent crowd was on hand to watch, and they've always given me that much: the worst of the job was up to me, my mother being let's just say out of it.
-- Barbara Kingsolver, _Demon Copperhead_
Fantastic message from the Way to Win Action Fund.
"[A] pregnant person might drive across a state border, begin to miscarry, and suffer for days without the life-saving care she would have received immediately at home. In these midterm elections, voters will decide which part of that tragedy is the bigger outrage: the pain and injury arbitrarily inflicted on the patient, or the price of the fuel in her gas tank."
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/11/midterm-elections-2022-abortion-trans-rights.html
Really sad news. I loved the Julie/Julia Project back in the day.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/01/dining/julie-powell-dead.html
Yay for Trust! Not my very favorite novel of the year (that would be Maggie O'Farrell's The Marriage Portrait) but it's definitely top five.
https://lithub.com/here-are-the-winners-of-the-2022-kirkus-prize/
@pagesturnedblog David Copperfield is one of my all-time favorites.
@pagesturnedblog I just got Demon Copperhead from the library yesterday and I am so excited for it.
"Political violence in America is being driven primarily by the far right, not the far left, and the far right is much closer to the mainstream of the Republican Party than the far left is to the Democratic Party."
Sophronisba
boosted
Steve Bannon posting thru angry tears and barely coping at the loss of Bolsonaro. His authoritarian leaders are failing BIGLY and he's utterly heartbroken. 💔
You guys, Elizabeth Finch (Julian Barnes's latest) is so good. It's short and I thought I would just breeze through it but I'm reading very slowly because there's just so much there.
@ECNC That is an interesting point, and I'm sure there's some truth to it. I have to say that in my own experience -- I am really only talking about where I grew up, and where I live now -- I don't see the same kind of "they don't belong here, they shouldn't even get to vote" hostility toward rural Americans from city-dwellers. That doesn't mean there's no condescension though.
@misslovelymess I definitely agree that Democrats do a terrible job of messaging in rural America. But honestly given my conversations with my family members I am not sure what they could say. I can't even convince my own father that Hillary Clinton hasn't had dozens of people murdered.
@ECNC My own theory, having grown up in rural Arkansas, is a little different -- I think it's at least partly that they think of themselves as the "real Americans" and everyone else as interlopers -- especially minorities but even White city-dwellers. Republicans let them have this belief, and Democrats for the most part don't.
Sophronisba
Joined Oct 2022