GenevaBookClub: Hailed some feminists as the single most important theoretical work of this century, but ignored or reviled by others, Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex occupies an anomalous place in the feminist canon. Yet it has had an undeniable impact not only on the development of critiques of sexual politics but on twentieth-century Western thinking about the concept of "woman" in general.

GenevaBookClub: Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the years before, when she lived and made love with her husband, Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now...

GenevaBookClub: The Ship of Fools has established Cristina Peri Rossi, author of a dozen other books of poetry and prose, as a leading writer in Europe and Latin America. This is her most important work in English and is recognized as a modern classic. The novel seemingly takes the form of a mosaic of travel vignettes, as the reader follows the protagonist, Equis, a misfit who travels to a number of deliberately vague locations. By inviting the reader to see modern society through the eyes of the main character, Peri Rossi is using the technique of defamiliarization to produce a biting satire of today's world. Masculinity and power are dominant themes in this innovative novel by a major feminist writer. Biting satire . . . worthy of Gulliver’s Travels.” —Women’s Review of Books.