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Like Jack Kerouac's intrepid little sister, Ariel Gore spins the spirited story of a vulnerable drifter who takes refuge in the recesses of the human heart. With just a few pennies and her I Ching, a change of clothes and a one-way ticket to Hong Kong, a perceptive, searching Gore makes her way through the labyrinthine customs of Cold-War China, wanders bustling, electric Katmandu, and hunkers down in an icy London squat with a prostitute and a boyfriend on the dole. Yet it is in the calm, verdant landscape of rural Italy where, pregnant and penniless, nineteen-year-old Gore's adventure truly begins. An illuminating glimpse into the boldly political Gore,creator of HipMama.com and Hip Mama magazine,this unflinching memoir offers a poignant exploration of the meaning of home, and surveys the frontiers of both land and heart.

From Black Lives Matter to the ongoingWomen's Marches, we have had some powerful moments over the last decade that have galvanized and created new, but brief, feelings of community. Many of us, however, haven't figured out how to spark that feeling on our own, or how to build off or sustain those moments. Many of us are longing for a kind of sugar-borrowing and stoop-sitting closeness we imagine existed in the 50s. Maybe we even grew up in that environment, but we moved away from home for love, work, or adventure and we don't know how to recreate it in a new place. What so many of us are missing is the closeness that connects us and make us feel like we belong to a community.In How We Show Up, community visionary Mia Birdsong delivers a modern, timely understanding of what true, authentic family and community can look like--outside of the 2-parent, 2.5 kids norm we all have in our heads. Today we have more single parents, couples who raise children outside of marriage, and more people growing older alone. Tackling topics like creating safe spaces, creativity in community, raising children in community, and more, How We Show Up is the antidote to the social fractures we face in our nation today. By sharing stories and actionable advice, and taking cues from marginalized communities--people of color, women, LGBTQ--Mia Birdsong offers us the blueprint we need to build true community wherever we are.

From award-winning and best-selling author, Leslie Feinberg, comes Drag King Dreams, the story of Max Rabinowitz, a butch lesbian bartender at an East Village club where drag kings, dykes dressed as men, perform.A veteran of the women's and gay movement of the past 30 years, Max's mid-life crisis hits in the midst of the post-9/11 world. Max is lonely and uncertain about her future , fearful, in fact, of America's future with its War on Terror and War in Iraq , with only a core group of friends to turn to for reassurance. Max is shaken from her crisis, however, by the news that her friend Vickie, a transvestite, has been found murdered on her way home late one night. As the community of cross-dressers, drag queens, lesbian and gay men, and "genderqueers" of all kinds stand up together in the face of this tragedy, Max taps into the activist spirit she thought had long disappeared and for the first time in years discovers hope for her future.

Porn. Do you think of it as a dirty word, a taboo topic, something you associate with cheesy films with bad plots? Filmmaker and author Erika Lust is here to change all that. With the goal of making porn more accessible to women, Good Porn examines the films, the industry, and the phenomenon. It breaks away from any assumptions you may have about porn, opening the door for a wholly new conversation about a medium that has too long been considered the domain of men. Come on in, ladies . . . the water's just fine.

After filing a story for a journalism assignment only two days after giving birth, Amy Westervelt had a revelation: we treat mothers like crap in this country. From inadequate maternity leave to gender-based double standards, emotional labor to the wage gap, Westervelt became determined to understand how we got here--where "having it all" is the fabled, hollow, unreachable goal. In Forget "Having It All," Westervelt traces the roots of our modern problems back to the founding of our nation and through the changing roles of men and women since. What she discovers may be surprising: the roles of mothers have flip-flopped throughout our history (for example, leading up to the Industrial Revolution, many men were home while women worked). Using this historical backdrop, Westervelt draws out what we should replicate from our past (the origin of Mother's Day, for example, was a dedicated day for mothers to organize just as laborers had done--to take stock of their place in society and push for more), and what we must begin anew (such as incorporating working fathers into our discussions about work-life balance) as we overhaul American motherhood. Ultimately, Westervelt presents a measured, historically-backed call for workplace policies, cultural norms, and personal attitudes about motherhood that will radically improve the lives of not just working moms but everyone in our country.

Beginning with the idea that memory is nothing more than "an angle of perception," Murdock explores the recurrent question asked by writers and readers of memoir alike: what actually happened? Prompted by the loss of identity that accompanied her mother's struggle with Alzheimer's and subsequent lost memories, Murdock offers that perhaps the faithful recording of the past isn't where the strength of memoir lies. Instead, Murdock looks at the basic components of memoir writing and the process of self-reflection it requires as they bring awareness to the underlying patterns of life. This captivating treatise on the corruptibility of memory, willed identity and the self as reflected through the lens of memoir speaks to all attracted to this most intimate of genres, and provides tools for exploration of the self and soul through personal narrative.

This reissued novel takes readers on a "wry and playful" (Out!) tour of lesbian sex, politics, and art in New York City. The city's sizzling - especially at the Kitsch-Inn, where the girls are mounting an all-female production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

Depicted as duplicitous, traitorous, and promiscuous, bisexuality has long been suspected, marginalized, and rejected by both straight and gay communities alike. Bi takes a long overdue, comprehensive look at bisexual politics- from the issues surrounding biphobia/monosexism, feminism, and transgenderism to the practice of labeling those who identify as bi as either too bisexual" (promiscuous and incapable of fidelity) or not bisexual enough" (not actively engaging romantically or sexually with people of at least two different genders). In this forward-thinking and eye-opening book, feminist bisexual and genderqueer activist Shiri Eisner takes readers on a journey through the many aspects of the meanings and politics of bisexuality, specifically highlighting how bisexuality can open up new and exciting ways of challenging social convention.Informed by feminist, transgender, and queer theory, as well as politics and activism, Bi is a radical manifesto for a group that has been too frequently silenced, erased, and denied- and a starting point from which to launch a bisexual revolution.

Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls is a manifesto and call to arms for people of all sizes and ages. With her trademark wit, veteran blogger and advocate Jes Baker calls people everywhere to embrace a body-positive worldview, changing perceptions about weight, and making mental health a priority.Alongside notable guest essayists, Jes shares personal experiences paired with in-depth research in a way that is approachable, digestible, and empowering. Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls is an invitation to reject fat prejudice, fight body-shaming at the hands of the media, and join this life-changing movement with one step: change the world by loving your body.Among the many Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls that you don't want to miss:1. It's Possible to Love Your Body (Today. Now.)2. You Can Train Your Brain to Play Nice3. Your Weight Is Not a Reflection Of Your Worth4. Changing Your Tumblr Feed Will Change Your Life5. Salad Will Not Get You to Heaven6. Cheesecake Will Not Send You to HellIf you're a person with a body, this book is for you.

The Coregasm Workout is a revolutionary new book that provides natural, safe, and effective techniques for enhancing sex through fitness. Developed by leading sex researcher, educator, and columnist Dr. Debby Herbenick, The Coregasm Workout introduces simple, science-backed exercises to make working out more fun and sex lives more satisfying. Debby has developed The Coregasm Workout based on her deep background in health science and unprecedented research on exercise-induced arousal in order to bring fitness and sexuality closer together. Her fact-based methods are specifically designed to improve orgasm and have been tested, refined, and proven by real women, for women. The Coregasm Workout will help improve your sex life- and help you enjoy exercising more often- through four C.O.R.E. principles: Challenge yourself through cardio, reps, and resistance Order matters: it's not just the kind of exercises you do, but the order in which you do them Relax and receive: be open to the experience of coregasm Engage your lower abs, muscles often strongly linked to coregasmFun, fascinating, and useful, The Coregasm Workout offers new exercise techniques for women who want to stay sexy, healthy, and fit, and enjoy the benefits of the gym in the bedroom.

While many feminist and queer movements are designed to challenge sexism, they often simultaneously police gender and sexuality,sometimes just as fiercely as the straight, male-centric mainstream does. Among LGBTQ activists, there is a long history of lesbians and gay men dismissing bisexuals, transgender people, and other gender and sexual minorities. In each case, exclusion is based on the premise that certain ways of being gendered or sexual are more legitimate, natural, or righteous than others.As a trans woman, bisexual, and femme activist, Julia Serano has spent much of the last ten years challenging various forms of exclusion within feminist and queer/LGBTQ movements. In Excluded, she chronicles many of these instances of exclusion and argues that marginalizing others often stems from a handful of assumptions that are routinely made about gender and sexuality. These false assumptions infect theories, activism, organizations, and communities,and worse, they enable people to vigorously protest certain forms of sexism while simultaneously ignoring and even perpetuating others. Serano advocates for a new approach to fighting sexism that avoids these pitfalls and offers new ways of thinking about gender, sexuality, and sexism that foster inclusivity rather than exclusivity.

Since their emergence as a journalistic force after the world wars, women have continued to break new ground in newspapers and magazines, redefining the world as we see it as well as the craft as it applied. Many of the pieces in Journalistas feel almost unsettlingly relevant today,the conclusions Emma "Red" Goldman drew in her 1916, "the Social Aspects of Birth Control," Maddy Vegtel's 1930s article about becoming pregnant at forty, and Eleanor Roosevelt's call for greater tolerance after America's race riots in 1943. Many have pushed other limits: Naomi Wolf's Beauty Myth brought feminism to a new generation Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones caused a media revolution: Ruth Picardie's unflinchingly honest column about living with cancer in 1997 brought a wave of British candour and a host of imitators and when two iconic women come face to face, we have at one end, Dorothy Parker on Isadora Duncan (1928), and at the other, Julie Burchill on Margaret Thatcher (2004).

If you're a Latina involved in a physically or emotionally abusive relationship, this book is for you. "Mejor Sola Que Mal Acompanada" offers support, understanding, and practical information on many issues and questions, including: what abuse is family and cultural expectations getting police, medical, and legal assistance where you can go if you leave your home what the church may say protecting your children and dealing with discrimination.

Mothers aren't supposed to be angry. Still, Minna Dubin was an angry mum: exhausted by the gruelling, thankless work of full-time parenting and feeling her career slip away, she would find herself screaming at her child or exploding at her husband.When Dubin pushed past her shame and talked with other mothers about how she was feeling, she realized that she was far from alone. Mum Rage is Dubin's ground-breaking work of reportage about an unspoken crisis of anger sweeping the country-and the world. She finds that while a specific instance of rage might be triggered by something as simple as a child who won't tie her shoes, the roots of the anger go far deeper, from the unequal burden of childcare shouldered by mums to the flattening of women's identities once they have kids. Drawing on insights from mums across the spectrum of race, sexual orientation, and class, she offers practical tools to help readers disarm their rage in the moment, while never losing sight of the broader social change we need to stop raging for good.

"It's well known that Mother River doesn't like a smart aleck," says Patricia McCairen. Accordingly, she plies her oars with reverence and skill on a sometimes hair-raising solo rafting trip along the Colorado River that winds though the stupendous stone valleys of the American Grand Canyon. Like the waters of the Colorado, which change from long, still stretches to boiling white water that barely clothes sharp rocks and hides holes that can suck down a raft, McCairen's moods- and even her name- change as the miles unwind. One moment, she's the cocky, athletic river guide Babe the next, she's an earthier, more spiritual woman who answers to the name of Patch. Hours later, she seems more vulnerable, less convinced of her strength and joy in the solitude she so zealously courts. Canyon Solitude records these shifts and beautifully limns a journey that tests McCairen's mettle and shows that determination, grit, and the will to spurn conventional rewards offer their own deep satisfactions.

These first-person accounts portray, with thoughtfulness and clarity, a wide range of caregiver experiences: the possibility of deepening relationships the opportunity for forgiveness the ability to reach out and to look within to find strength the sorrow of watching a parent grow old and the chance to say goodbye.

In her last book, outspoken urban mom Ariel Gore offered help for real-world mothers. In The Mother Trip, she gives her inspiration, encouragement, and moral support to unconventional moms. In these essays, she bashes the stereotype of the "good mother" and encourages readers to follow their instincts and redefine motherhood in their own terms.

Tofu casseroles, communes, clothing-optional kindergarten, antiwar protests - these are just a few of the hallmarks of a counterculture childhood. What became of kids who had been denied meat, exposed to free love, and given nouns for names? In Wild Child, daughters of the hippie generation speak about the legacy of their childhoods. The writers present a rearview mirror to contemporary culture with an eye on the past they remind us that there is more than one path through the present. Contributors include Lisa Michaels (Split) and Ariel Gore (Hip Mama).

Although they've grown up in a culture saturated with sex, women in their twenties and thirties have no sex book of their own. Sex and Single Girls fills this void with personal accounts of pleasure, fear, desire, risk, survival, heartbreak, and intimacy - everything that comes with exploring one's sexuality. Well-known writers and feminists treat topics ranging from online sex to abortion, from bisexuality to interracial relationships, creating a complex portrait of women's sexual experiences, activities, and preferences. Contributors include Lisa Jervis, publisher of Bitch magazine Siobhan Brooks, contributor to Whores and Other Feminists Leora Tanenbaum, author of Slut: Growing Up with a Bad Reputation Tatiana de la Tierra, editor of the Latina magazine Conmoción Michelle Tea, author of The Passionate Mistakes and Intricate Corruption of One Girl in America and many others. Through their wise, humorous, and personally empowering writings, this collection explores women's sexual lives in all their passion and authenticity.

Emily Hahn was a woman ahead of her time, graced with a sense of adventure and a gift for living. Born in St. Louis in 1905, she crashed the all-male precincts of the University of Wisconsin geology department as an undergraduate, traveled alone to the Belgian Congo at age 25, was the concubine of a Chinese poet in Shanghai, bore the child of the head of the British Secret Service before World War II, and finally returned to New York to live and write in Greenwich Village. In this memoir, first published as essays in The New Yorker, Hahn writes vividly and amusingly about the people and places she came to know and love - with an eye for the curious and a heart for the exotic.

In this ground-breaking anthology, Ariel Gore and Bee Lavender ask real moms , from Web site designers to tattoo-clad waitresses , to laugh, cry, scream, and shout about motherhood. Allison Crews fights to have a voice and be recognized as a teen mother. Angela Morrill eschews both doctors and midwife and gives birth at home. Kimberly Bright draws compelling comparisons between raising a toddler and having a psychotic boyfriend." For every young mom, Breeder offers inspiration, strength, wisdom, and humour. Contributors include Allison Crews, Beth Lucht, Ayun Halliday, Katie Granju, Peri Escarda, Allison Abner, and Kimberly Bright.

In this new, expanded edition of the acclaimed collection, writers and activists such as Rebecca Walker, Nomy Lamm, and Inga Muscio are joined by Lisa Miya-Jervis, publisher of Bitch Alison Crews, editor of Girl-Mom and Daisy Hernandez of Ms. Together, they cover a wide range of topics, from blending careers and feminist politics to the intersection of traditional culture and third-wave sensibilities.

Thanks in large part to the struggles of their activist foremothers, today's young Jewish women have a dizzying array of spiritual options. Yentl's Revenge chronicles a range of experiences lived by an entire generation of women, from Judeo-pagan witches to young Orthodox mothers, from rabbis to sex educators. Contributors ponder Jewish transgenderdom, Jewish body image, Jewish punk, the stereotype of the Jewish American Princess, intermarriage, circumcision, faith, and intolerance. Essays include Bubbe Got Back: Tales of a Jewish Caboose" by Ophira Edut, and On Being a Jewish Feminist Valley Girl" by Tobin Belzer.

For generations, literary figures from Ernest Hemingway to Frances Mayes have fueled our fantasies about the romance of expatriate life. But it's one thing to dream about living abroad and quite another to actually do it. In Expat a diverse group of women explores in vivid detail how the reality of life abroad matches up to the fantasy. Tonya Ward Singer craves a roasted chicken in China and must buy it alive and kicking. Karen Rosenberg reevaluates both her family's Judaism and her own when invited to a Passover seder in a remote Japanese village. Mandy Dowd tries to teach the French about Thanksgiving. Emily Miller admits that in Italy she craves the Hollywood entertainment she generally deplores when on U.S. soil. Tall and fair, Meg Wirth tries hard to blend in, in Borneo,to no avail. Expat taps into the bewilderment, joys, and surprises of life overseas, where challenges often take unexpected forms and overcoming obstacles (finding Drano in Ukraine, shrimp paste in Prague) feels all the more triumphant. Featuring an astonishing range of perspectives, destinations, and circumstances, Expat offers a beautiful portrait of life abroad.

Whether raised within a specific belief system or warned against all things religious, young women today have been left with questions that dating guides and pop feminist theory cannot answer. This collection answers the call,a handbook for the soul that offers the wisdom and validation of how a variety of women negotiate an empowering spiritual existence in a pop-culture world. In Bare Your Soul, women of all backgrounds and traditions share how investigating questions of spirituality affects their lives and their identities. It is a provocative look at the ways in which young women of today both celebrate and repudiate religion,and, ultimately, find answers that fit. One woman shares her practice as a Shiite Muslim and how it intersects and collides with her personal relationships. A woman raised within the Black Baptist community finally finds a spiritual connection with the Unitarian Church,then struggles to balance spiritual fulfillment with her desire to see other Black faces in her place of worship. A young mother speaks to the challenges brought on when play dates bring together her family's religion,feminist Goddess-worship,and that of her children's fundamentalist Christian friends. A Western feminist who has converted to Buddhism attempts to reconcile her gender identity with a philosophy that renders gender irrelevant, and one woman argues that the Church of Consumerism is all she needs. A compelling, much-needed anthology, this collection offers balanced, insiders' information on a wide spectrum of traditions and practices, allowing readers to make informed, intelligent spiritual choices for themselves.

In this comprehensive self-help guide, Lori Robinson has created a valuable resource for African-American survivors of sexual assault (as well as their families, friends, and communities). Robinson walks readers through the ways survivors can achieve emotional, physical, sexual, and spiritual healing, reflecting her firsthand insight into the particular difficulties African-Americans face on their journey toward recovery. Examining the issue of sexual assault in African-American communities, she discusses why African-American women are more likely than white women to experience sexual crimes-an insightful discussion framed in the context of the American slave system and modern institutionalized racism. Through interviews with prominent African-American lawyers and judges, Robinson offers accessible explanations of police and legal systems, advising readers on ways to navigate them effectively. Doctors and counselors weigh in on the importance of getting good physical care, using self-care techniques to heal, and finding the best therapist. I Will Survive also includes chapters on educating children and adults in Black communities to help prevent sexual assault prayers and affirmations from Black spiritual leaders in a variety of religious traditions an extensive resources section and encouraging first-person accounts from Black women (and men) who have healed from sexual assault and abuse.

This deftly written collection of twenty erotic tales is sure to titillate, intrigue and inspire. Editor of several successful erotica anthologies, Hanne Blank knows good sex, and this, her first book-length solo offering, demonstrates her considerable talents as a creator of erotic fiction. Blank's tantalizing descriptions, smart writing, and fantastic imagination are sure to hit their mark. Unruly Appetites draws readers in immediately with the most scintillating, intimate details of its characters' unrestrained encounters. One story describes a chance meeting on the road where "maybe turns to yes without ceremony, without fuss." Readers may find themselves both shocked and enthralled by the human-feline encounter described in "The Princess and the Tiger," or lost in possibilities from the graphic memories of a foursome aroused by steamy Polaroids. Or intrigued by the adventures of pearls-from-Tiffany Katie with the nipple-less bra under her Chanel suit, or a young virgin's deflowering in Europe: "I wonder, does that make me a tramp, not knowing the last name of the man who took my virginity?". The myriad fantasies, perspectives, dreams, realities, groupings, shapes and ages presented here offer almost limitless variety.

According to Andrea Buchanan, "Mother shock" is the state in which many new parents exist during those first confusing, chaotic and often comical years of parenting. It is the clash between expectation and result, theory and reality. It is the twilight zone of 24-hour-a-day living where life is no longer neatly divided into day and night the triple-impact of hormonal imbalance, sleep deprivation, and physical exhaustion. It is the stress of trying to acclimate quickly to the immediacy of mothering a new conception of oneself, one's role in the family and in the world a fearful new level of responsibility, and a new delegation of domestic duties.In this much-needed and delightfully funny collection of essays, Buchanan shares the insight she gains as she moves through the stages of mother shock. From "Fear of the Double Stroller" and "Confessions of a Bottle Feeder" to "I'm an Idiot" and "Everything I Needed to Know I Learned in Playgroup," Buchanan details the unimaginably difficult and unbelievably rewarding process of becoming a mother.