The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

The novel, published in 1880, is Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s last book. This is a rich novel, containing everything about human life. It deals with emotions, inner struggles and religious believes. It captures the human soul. The book centers around three brothers, Ivan, Dmitri and Alexei or Alyosha Fyodorovich Karamazov, and their relationship with their strange and difficult father, Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov. Ivan is intellectual and atheist, Dmitri is a sensualist and Alyosha is a novice in a monastery. Dostoyevsky was a master of creating believable, living characters. However, there were few female characters, and I would have liked them more nuanced. Katerina Ivanovna had a little depth, but Grushenka seemed one-dimensional. I would have liked to see the world from their perspective.

The book really gets going when Fyodor, the selfish and ruthless father, is murdered and Dmitri is arrested. The following trial is interesting and includes psychological themes such as morality and motive, discussed from different points of view by the attorney and prosecutor.

The dialogue is often deep, philisophical and interesting. But the book is heavy and sometimes so detailed that the pace becomes painstakingly slow. It is considered a masterpiece, and it really is, but I somehow got weary of the meticulous details and thereby cared less about the characters than I initually did. However, it is a great book and especially the last hundred pages are amazing.

Bad feminist by Roxane Gay

Roxane Gay calls herself a bad feminist. She does not want to be put on a pedestal. All role models will sooner or later be pushed down. She considers herself as already pushed down. It is sad that not everyone can feel included in feminism. It seems that you can only be a feminist according to certain principles.

In her collection of essays Roxane Gay describes the narrow feminist role. She strikes a blow for feminists that don’t fit the profile as ”militant” and even use make-up and shave their armpits - as if that would be the typhical feminist. What about these feminists? Is it something wrong about beeing what is considered ”unfeminine”? It is a difficult balance. She should be careful not to become what she herself condemns, and exclude certain feminists. Feminism should be including, not be yet another rule for women that are tired of being told how to look and how to behave. (However, there might be one exception. It would be problematic to call oneself a feminist if accepting and approving the terms of the patriarchy that restricts and objectifies women - the very same patriarchy that feminists seek to destroy). Some women do happen to behave according to the traditional feminine role, and others do not. They have fought hard to be accepted. Most women probably are a mixture of different roles.

Roxane Gay discusses politicians' position of power, and how they think they have the right to make decisions about womens’ bodies, when discussing reproductive rights. She writes about black peoples’ conditions and discusses popular culture from a feminist perspective. She mentions music and sexist lyrics, comedians mysogynist attitude, young adults books and movies and television series like The Hunger Games and Girls. This is very important. Female stereotypes are common in popular culture, but she also points out that it is unfair to give a single movie or tv-series the responsibility to change the industry. The movie Bridesmaids got to take a lot of responsibility, and to call it revolutionary is putting unreasonable pressure on production. Perhaps calling it ”a touch of innovation” is enough. I wonder what Roxane Gay thinks about the series Marvel's Jessica Jones? (Comics are not known to be equal, but this is a protagonist who does not agree with the genre stereotypes.) The main character is a female anti-heroine, fighting against misogyny. Marvel's Jessica Jones is basically about abuse, both mental and physical. Assault and rape. If one is to depict rape, social structures and the consequences can not be ignored. To not be simply a way to exploit the female body as macabre, graphic, bizarre entertainment, the topic should be problemized and analyzed. It must be depicted realistically. While shows like the ”Outlander” and the 2Game of thrones” depict rape without acknowledging it, Jessica Jones call it for what it is, and the consequences of such a horrible experience are clear.

In her youth, Roxane Gay distanced herself from feminism because the word was considered an insult. She was called an angry, sex-hating, man-hating lady with a victim mentality. There are undoubtedly many who recognize themselves. Feminism is a sensitive word. Who is it that has distorted the meaning? Those who have the most to lose if it is successful. Too bad, she didn’t continued and deepend the discussion. That is precisely the problem with the book. She identifies different areas, but the analyses are not deep enough and many of the conclusions she draws are not new. Much of the content is already discussed. Furthermore, there are some contradictions in her arguments, but by calling helself a bad feminist, she might have justified a slightly fuzzy text and any holes in her argument. She does not pretend to be someone she is not, she just gives her view of society. But the book offers an important point. Roxane Gay may like the color pink and music with sexistic texts, but she's not a bad feminist. "Bad" according to her definition, is actually human. If there was something as bad feminists, the word feminist would loose it’s meaning, because we are all human. I am happy that Roxane Gay has nuanced feminism. One of the book's greatest advantages is the author’s passion and inspiration.

The most important theme is the contradictions that exist within feminism. All feminists have their own view of the concept. When privileged people like Emma Watson and Zara Larsson call themselves feminists, they are often critizized. When people express themselves even though they lack some gender studies or heavy experiences, discussions follows about who have the right to call themselves feminists. Of course, the need for more than one kind of woman is important. Not only the white, privileged woman should be able to fight for feminism. If there is anything this book indicates it is the current lack of acceptance and the need for the very concept of feminism to be more including.

Prins Charles känsla by Liv Strömquist

Something about Liv Strömquist’s books is really interesting. Perhaps it's the analyses, the history or the facts. For evert theory, Strömquist uses sources, such as researchers, psycho analysts and real events to back her arguments up.

This is about love as a social structure. Why do women often need to be acknowledged by men? Why do men often distance themselves from intimacy and feelings? In a culture that encourages gender differences and small children learn early on to behave in a certain way, it's not difficult to understand. Girls identify with their mothers, and develop caring and affirmative characteristics. Boys often don’t identify with their fathers, because they are absent. They have no role model and therefore assimilate the sexistic culture. Hence, the culture is maintained. Of course, everything improves through the years. Nowadays, men have parental leave in Sweden and are expected to spend more time with their children, not to mention the fight for gender equality with means such as the concept "hen", an indefinite pronoun that serves to take focus away from expectations concerning gender, but old traditions still form people.

This book analyses the twosome, heterosexual couple, how the society is built upon this structure, and the consequences for gender equality. Strömquist also mentions famous couples that have lived their lives according to this norm, and how it affected them, from historical people like Gustaf Fröding and his self-pity and prostitutes, and Victoria Benedictsson and George Brandes, to people of today, such as Charlie Sheen and Hugh Grant, and recent couples like Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown.

Strömquist is also describing how men opress women to be able to win them over, also a strategy in the book The Game, and whether love and relationships are gender equal. Women sacrifice everything, care about and blow up men's ego, while men do nothing of the sort. Women's identity is constituted by their bodies and what they can offer men. Their destiny is to take care of and comfort other people, and not themselves. The consequence is that men are able to seek their happiness in work or hobbies, encouraged by their wives, and women don't get the encouragement and support from their husbands to do the same. Unbelievably, despite all this, many men still seem to fear marriage, and some of them even have a condescending attitude to women. At the same time, they maintain relationstips with these women. When looking at it more carefully, it’s not very inexplicable. There are researchers that claim that men need women to maintain their independence. Without them, they have no one to be independent of. A study shows that after a divorce, women are feeling happy and feel their self-confidence growing, while men are feeling unhappy and depressed. Even though twosome marriages often mean a kind of ownership which might be unhealthy, it seems that men benefit from it, while women are restricted and not enough supported. So, perhaps, men should learn to appraciate relationships and marriage more. Women often stay in these relationships because they have learned that the only way of self-worth is to be acknowledged and approved by men. When getting hurt, women need comfort, and they also need for their men to comprehend them and therefore they try even harder to explain how they feel to be able to fix the relationship. The psychological mechanisms are very complicated, and of course can't be applied to every one. Most people probably don't think about it, and don't think it's necessary, because people have a choice, right? Of course, most men are nice and most women don't accept a dysfunctional relationship. But what if we are so used to this phenomena that we don't see it? When you start to analyze, you discover this structure that explains a lot about patterns of behavior. There are always many studies and many professional people having opinions, about any subject, and they are not always right about everything, but this book offers interesting analyses that explain some structures of society.

War's unwomanly face by Svetlana Alexievich

Svetlana Alexievich has interviewed countless people during many years, to describe the soul of the Soviet Union, in her series "Voices from the Big Utopia". She received the Nobel price in literature in 2015. In this book, two hundred women speaks of the time during the war. How they fought the enemy, how they rescued wounded soldiers, and how they themselves fired sniper’s rifle, bombed and killed. They had learned to hate, but even during the darkest of times, their hearts loved, and they saved not only their own, but German soldiers as well. Svetlana Alexievich collects these stories and makes art.

This book really affected me. It feels like I have been there, at the front, among the soldiers. 
Together, they make a choir of voices, and I wonder whether it’s easier to understand the reality of that time from one single person’s testimony, or through the fabric of many memories. The book is full of strong voices that have been silent for forty years. It was time the emotional shards, the human destinies, were told.

This is not a hero book. This book is not focusing on the winning of the war, but on the reality during and after the war. The women's stories are colorful. They remembered feelings and details, and they never stopped appreciating beauty and art. Some refused to change from their dresses, others slept with their earrings, while yet others slept while sitting up to be able to wear hats as long as possible. Because, in daytime, everything that was considered female was forbidden.

Surprisingly many young women volunteered to fight at the front. At a very young age, they convinced their parents to be allowed to participate, or escaped from their homes to join the army and be sent to the front. The loyalty to their country was immense, and more important than their families. It was not only the young girls dreams. Some of the parents even wanted their young daughters to join the army. It's difficult to understand their enormous devotion. Their team spirit and companionship. It's a big difference between communism and today's individualism, and it's interesting to learn about a totally different perspective of live.

One might think that women’s part of the war indicates some gender equality, but even though women were allowed to join the army, the men treated them far from equal, and used all kinds of excuses to justify their behavior. Their view of these women became very clear after the war, when many of them didn't want to marry a woman soldier, and even despised them. Half a million women sacrificed everything, and when returning from the war, they were forgotten. And while the male soldiers were received as heroes, the female soldiers were viewed as unfeminine and unattractive. I want to remember everyone. It’s difficult to explain, but I feel like I owe them that. They have been alone with their feelings for a very long time, abandoned by the society after the war. The least I can do is to listen to them, and remember them. She who made herself a white dress of a German parachute and married her love before a battle. She who let her daughter carry a bomb. She who drowned her own baby to not be found by the German soldiers. She who kissed her husband for the very last time. She who gave the enemy bread. She who was captured and tortured. She who still can’t handle the color red. She who came home and realized her child didn’t recognize her. She who returned home and found her own grave. And many more.

They all deserve to be remembered. This book makes them as invincible and immortal as they once were.

The Lover by Marguerite Duras

The book takes place in the French Indochina. A young, French girl in the colonial class falls in love with a rich, Chinese man and it is the beginning of a romance, despite her mother’s fear of her destroying her chances to be married.

The story technique differ from many other novels with biographical elements. It is not written in chronological order, but takes leaps in time. The novel is consisting of many short sentences, mixed with longer ones.

It’s a dense book. The prose is spare and often objective, something that is appreciated by some, and not by others. It is difficult to really know the characters when not getting into their heads. The book is beautifully written, but leaves much for the reader to comprehend and read between the lines. Indochina was a part of the French Colonial Empire, and the girl and the man can be interpreted as symbols of power and the occupied. It’s an interesting book that takes time to digest.

Night Film by Marisha Pessl

When Ashley, the daughter of a famous movie director, Stanislas Cordova, is found dead, the journalist Scott McGrath begins to investigate the family. Last time he worked on a case about the family ended in a personal tragedy. This time, something even more important might be on the line.

It took a while to get into the book. Scott McGrath was a clean slate and not very interesting, except his obsession with Cordova. I didn’t think Ashley Cordova was especially fascinating either, despite the author’s attempt. For a long time seemed like a confused emo teenager. The only character that I found interesting right away was Nora.

Just as in Cordova’s movies, there are unexplained elements and soon, Scott’s entire life is almost turning into one of these movies. Is it a dream? Is he going mad? It’s difficult to know where reality ends and illusion begins. Perhaps that is what makes this book special. Magical cracks is cutting through the world and make him question the reality and himself. Cordova’s movies seem to have a story technique that is a mixture of Alfred Hitchcock and Ingmar Bergman, but more frightening and controversial. Such movies are being interpreted and often considered cult. There are more similarities, as well. Just as Cordova, Bergman filmed many movies on his estate on Fårö in Sweden.

The author uses a special grip. She fills the novel with fake photographies and articles to frame the story and put the reader into the world of the book. It’s an interesting concept, and works most of the time, but the those supposed to be photographs of Ashley look staged. She looks more like an angry model than a mysterious, fascinating pianist.

Something happens two thirds into the book. Suddenly, the pace is increasing, and the book becomes intense when the story begins to unfold. It’s a unusual book in many ways, not least when it comes to the gothic feeling that rests over the family Cordova, that soon envelops the main character.

Jag lever, pappa: Utöya, 22 juli 2011 - Dagen som förändrade oss

The book describes the terrorist attack, 2011, in Oslo from two perspectives. Siri, a 20-year old girl, was at a Labour party summer camp on the island Utöya when the massacre occurred that killed 69 people. She called her father, Erik, a former journalist, when running for her life. Erik tries to understand what is happening.

First, the government quarter were bombed, killing several people. Two hours later, people on Utöya began to hear gun shots, ran and tried to hide. When a man, dressed like a police officer, arrived, people were relaxing, never imagining that the man was in fact the terrorist, Anders Behring Breivik. He shot everyone he could find, except small children. Siri found a way down the cliff to the shore, and hid with several others in a small cave that barely covered them. At the same time, her father tried to understand what was going on, and when he realized that someone was killing people, he drove out to the nearest point on mainland, feeling afraid and powerless.

How do you handle life after terror? How do you manage everything? Do you change? If you do, then how? The book gives insight to the massacre and how the people that survived were marked deep for ever, struggled to carry on, mourned the dead and remembered the attack, but refused to let themselves be defined by it. After the terror, Siri was very tense and reacted on every sound around her. She thought it uncomfortable to be around police officers. At the same time, she was strong and very determined to not let the fear win. In this way, the book is offering a deeper insight, a reflexion of what such a experience do to people, and how they are feeling weeks later when everyone else is carrying on.

The book might have been shorter. It is about hundred pages of memorials and other gatherings, and they are all very similar. They are important, of course, but it feels like the book drags on. It is not written in the best of ways, the language is a little uneven and sometimes repetitive. First, we get to read about Siri’s experiences, and then we get to reread the same situation from Erik’s point of view. During the terror, it’s effective because it’s interesting to get to know as much as possible of the time. But after the attack, occasionally, it slows down the pace.

However, it's an important portrayal of the worst attack in Norway in modern time. In all, 77 people were killed in the two attacks. Both Siri and Erik realized the importance of reporting, and through this book, they contribute to the event not ever being forgotten.