Joanna Russ (1937–2011)

Story: 1 / 10
Characters: 2
Setting: 3
Prose: 2

Literally, the worst book I've ever read [ Sin noticias de Gurb was the previous worst ]. A feminist science fiction book sounded interesting, mostly because the genre is dominated by male leads. However, The Female Man doesn't have a story at all. A lot of books will have no direction, but the story continues on nevertheless. However, Russ simply introduces a few characters and places without creating any events. The characters do not do anything. Compound that with a lot of jumping around and a critically-reflective narrator and the worst book ever written results.
Do not read unless paid...… (more)

A woman from a possible future, in which Earth is called Whileaway, comes back to what was the modern day at the time of writing. It doesn't really fit in with her other famous short story set on Whileaway where Whileaway is another planet and has been free of men for centuries with the short story dealing with first contact when some men turn up in a spaceship. This novel is more fantastic than SF and features women who are the same character but from very different alternative realities - at least I think so!… (more)

I read this ages ago, but someone reminded me that Jael's world has what are basically trans women living in the "male" space and the book treats them hideously. Like. They're presented as clearly women, and treated as women inside the male-only space, including being subject to abuse for being women, they're literally called "feminine", but they're not "real women". As soon as the main character women see a "half-changed", they get angry and hate them. The "changed and half-changed" are presented as horribly as possible. It's fucking vile. Like. Trans women were not totally unknown when Russ wrote this book. But she talks about them with a hatred that the men don't receive. Being a "half-man" is worse than being a "real man" to her, I guess.

The rest of the book has its moments and some deeply moving parts and it's incredibly personal but also often incredibly confusing because of the weird structure. It's very stereotypically second-wave feminist. Some of the ideas are good but I can't rate a book highly which has such a "Transexual Empire" vision of trans women.… (more)