Book Review by Subhadra Jayaraman

In our world, where women make up roughly half the population, let’s stop for a moment and consider this world around us. Because it is important that we do, important that we see through the smokescreen and let the truth wash over us. For, the first step to reform is to acknowledge and learn.

Not sure where to start? Allow me to help –

·  Ever read the words ‘economy’ and ‘GDP’? They don’t include the hours worth of unpaid labor done by women across the globe 🤰

·  See those beautiful glass stairs leading up to the second floor? They were not made for your heels and your skirts 👠

·  Ever wondered why there’s no proper medication for your period pains (90% of women suffer from this) but there’s extensive medication for erectile dysfunction (about 15% men have this issue)? 😩

·  Observed how they clean the snow in your city? They are designed to make things easier on highways for men, not the sidewalks for the women with strollers 👩‍🍼

·  How about you people working in the lab? Ever thought about why you use only male cardiac cells to study heart problems? 🔬

·  And the readers – when we read stories about war and disasters why is the fight and power of the men more interesting than the tea table conversations of the women? 📚

As Perez articulately observes, the common theme around the world’s function seems to be – why can’t a woman be more like a man? Women are crazy, complicated, hormonal, hysterical, too difficult to study, too much work, too much variability. Well guess what, that’s just too bad, because we’re here, we exist with all our inaccuracies and variance, and we should be done with living in this world made for a man.

The answer is not to make women speak up and be loud and force their agenda across. The answer is not for a woman to be more like a man. It’s for the men to pay attention, listen, ask, involve, stop interrupting, and calm down.

𝑭𝒐𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒎𝒆𝒏 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒊𝒔𝒕: 𝒌𝒆𝒆𝒑 𝒐𝒏 𝒃𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒃𝒍𝒐𝒐𝒅𝒚 𝒅𝒊𝒇𝒇𝒊𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒕 – 𝑪𝒂𝒓𝒐𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝑪𝒓𝒊𝒂𝒅𝒐 𝑷𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒛

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5)

Pair this with a warm cup of hot chocolate with generous dollops of whipped cream to let your brain calm down as Perez lobs away injustices and data biases. Share your thoughts with us and check out my ‘bookstagram’ @theramanlibrary for more reviews and suggestions.