Here are some suggested titles that I’ve read & curated by that I think will help you discover and understand your feminism journey.

Empowering, insightful, and psychology-driven, Beyond Beautiful is filled with proven, no-BS strategies for proactive self-care. This stylish and practical handbook takes a deep-dive into all of the factors that make it hard to feel good about yourself, and offers sage answers to tricky questions, like:

– Why do I hate the way I look in pictures?
– How can I stop feeling like a total slob compared to everyone on social media?
– How exactly does this self-love thing work?
– How do I find the confidence to use less make up, stop shaving, or wear what I want?
– Is body positivity really the answer?

Illustrated with full-color art, Beyond Beautiful is a much-needed breath of fresh air that will help you live your best life, know your worth, and stop wasting any more precious energy and mental space worrying about the way you look.

QUICK REVIEW:

This book is honest. Too honest that you will be defensive while reading it. Truth is, people don’t like too much honesty. We like our ugly truths as partial as it can be and got no issues with sugar-coated lies simply because it makes us feel better, especially when the topic includes body image.

This is supposed to help the readers overcome body shaming or show the correct way of handling body image-related issues which include ageing, social media, beauty standards, cosmetic surgery and a lot more. Very interesting and insightful.

WOMEN DON’T OWE YOU PRETTY will tell you to love sex, hate sexism, protect your goddamn energy, life is short, dump them, and that you owe men nothing, least of all pretty.

Florence’s debut book will explore all progressive corners of the feminist conversation; from insecurity projection and refusing to find comfort in other women’s flaws, to deciding whether to date or dump them, all the way through to unpacking the male gaze and how it shapes our identity.

WOMEN DON’T OWE YOU PRETTY is an accessible leap into feminism, for people at all stages of their journey who are seeking to reshape and transform the way they view themselves. In a world that tells women we’re either not enough or too much, it’s time we stop directing our anger and insecurities onto ourselves, and start fighting back to re-shape the toxic structures of our patriarchal society.

Florence’s book will help you to tackle and challenge the limiting narrative you have been bombarded with your whole life, and determine feminism on your own terms. After all, you are the love of your own life.

In Motherhood, Sheila Heti asks what is gained and what is lost when a woman becomes a mother, treating the most consequential decision of early adulthood with the candor, originality, and humor that have won Heti international acclaim and made How Should A Person Be? required reading for a generation.

In her late thirties, when her friends are asking when they will become mothers, the narrator of Heti’s intimate and urgent novel considers whether she will do so at all. In a narrative spanning several years, casting among the influence of her peers, partner, and her duties to her forbearers, she struggles to make a wise and moral choice. After seeking guidance from philosophy, her body, mysticism, and chance, she discovers her answer much closer to home.

Motherhood is a courageous, keenly felt, and starkly original novel that will surely spark lively conversations about womanhood, parenthood, and about how—and for whom—to live.

With women our age, the first thing one always wants to know about another woman is whether she has children, and if she doesn’t, whether she’s going to. It’s like a civil war: WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON?

– Motherhood, Sheila Heti

QUICK REVIEW:

I felt sad while reading this book yet I love how the author presented the questions and especially the moments of self-doubt that women have when we reach the point where everyone asks “when are you having kids?” “why don’t you have kids yet?” She also shared the realities on how the society sees a childless couple. 

This book feels like a peek to the lead’s journal and we accessed her most daring thoughts about becoming a mother that the society’s not ready to hear. At some point, she said that saying you don’t want kids is somewhat similar to coming out to people. Different words, but basically the same energy and it’s draining & dragging.

I decided to talk to women about their vaginas, to do vagina interviews, which became vagina monologues…At first women were reluctant to talk. They were a little shy. But once they got going, you couldn’t stop them. Women secretly love to talk about their vaginas. They get very excited, mainly because no one’s ever asked them before.

QUICK REVIEW:

Why are we shy to speak or call the vagina its name? As if it’s an embarrassment. Bakit nga ba? Bastos nga ba talaga or is it just us?

THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES is a collection of stories & poems from different women, from different cultures; different scars from pain, hate & violence. Some are young, some are old; some are re-assigned but all of them are women.  There are parts that are (mostly) painful to read because they are real stories & real feelings. They are CRUEL & HURTFUL & AWFUL. Horrific, if I may say.

This book is bitterly beautiful. It’s more than a book. It’s a political statement. Every woman must read it. No. Erase that. EVERY PERSON MUST READ IT.