Today I'm sharing the best book I read in November.
Of the 8 books I read this month, I had four 5-star reads:
Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story by Martin Luther King, Jr.
March: Book Three by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
Fed Up: Emotional Labor, Women, and the Way Forward by Gemma Hartley
It was a good reading month! As much as I enjoyed and learned from each of these books, there was one that immediately stuck out as one of the best books I've read this year.
It's hard to overstate how valuable I found this book. It's as if Hartley has taken everything I've struggled to articulate about what goes on in my head on a daily basis and laid it all out, not just explaining what it feels like to carry the mental and emotional load in a marriage, but also figuring out how we got here and what we can do about it. Hartley is not naive or optimistic enough to say that women can solve this ourselves if we just did things differently, added another layer to our mental load. But she also admits that the way forward is not just "men need to do better." It requires an honest look by both men and women at their assumptions, ingrained beliefs, stereotypes, and personal standards. I think if this book were not seen as a "women's" book but rightly recognized as one touching on issues affecting all of us, then we might have a chance to forge the new generation of equitable relationships that Hartley envisions.
What is the best book you read this month? Let me know in comments, or write your own post and link up below!
Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: Stranger in a Strange Land and The New Jim Crow
Five years ago I was reading: The Moonstone and Roots
Ten years ago I was reading: The Complete Sherlock Holmes Vol. II
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