Contemporary Authors

• The Book of the Unnamed Midwife ( "Road to Nowhere" Trilogy) 47North (Seattle, WA), 2016

• The Book of Etta - 2017 47North, Seattle

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/megelison

  Meg Elison
  Writer
  San Francisco Bay AreaWriting and Editing
  Current
  Meg Elison
  Previous
  Ripple, The Daily Californian, UC Berkeley
  Education
  UC Berkeley
  Recommendations 2 people have recommended Meg
  Websites
  Fifty Years of Free Speech
  Portfolio
  Book of the Unnamed Midwife
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  Summary
  If you want it written succinctly, clearly, and with a little style, I can write it. If you wrote it and you need it to sound better, I can fix it. Point me at a project and I'll make it mine. Point me at a problem and I'll make it disappear.
  Experience
  Author
  Meg Elison
  June 2014 – Present (3 years 4 months)
  I am an award-winning author and essayist. My debut novel was listed as one of the best books of 2016 by Publisher's Weekly, and Amazon's Best Books of 2016. It won the Philip K. Dick Award for science fiction, is nominated for the Audie Award, and was listed as a recommendation on the Tiptree Honors list. I've been published in McSweeney's, Bustle, Terraform, The Establishment, Compelling Science Fiction, Liquid Imagination, and others.
  Ripple
  Social Marketing Associate
  Ripple
  May 2015 – March 2017 (1 year 11 months)San Francisco Bay Area
  Named one of the 50 Smartest Companies by MIT Technology Review, Ripple is the global leader in distributed financial technology.

  The 100+ person team is comprised of experienced cryptographers, security experts, distributed network developers, Silicon Valley and Wall Street veterans. We contribute code to the open-source software, as well as develop tools for and recruit financial institutions and payment networks to use Ripple.
  The Daily Californian
  Senior Staff Writer
  The Daily Californian
  September 2013 – November 2014 (1 year 3 months)
  I wrote a high-traffic and well-liked weekly online column. I cover local events, and interviewed authors and artists. I also contributed to the A&E section and The Weekender.
  The Daily Californian
  Opinion Page Editor
  The Daily Californian
  May 2014 – September 2014 (5 months)
  Managed a large editorial staff and produced the print and online version of our opinion page, including op-eds, letters to the editor, and columns. I wrote the weekly editorial on behalf of the senior editorial board.
  UC Berkeley
  Transcriptionist
  UC Berkeley
  January 2013 – June 2014 (1 year 6 months)
  As part of a work-study appointment, I transcribed classroom interaction as part of research in human development. I used a transcriber's pedal and keep to a 4:1 ratio of media to output hours for recordings of multiple voices.
  San Francisco Chronicle
  Copy Editing Intern
  San Francisco Chronicle
  January 2014 – May 2014 (5 months)San Francisco Bay Area
  Worked at the copy editing desk with the Chronicle's content managing system. Edited content by Robert Reich, Ben Fong-Torres, and Jon Carroll. Learned the daily operation of a major newspaper and a great deal about AP style.
  Caliber Magazine
  Managing Editor | Social Media Manager
  Caliber Magazine
  2012 – May 2014 (2 years)
  I wrote weekly blog entries and features for the magazine. I copy-edited weekly blog posts and magazine articles for style, content, and accuracy. Recently, I managed the social media profile of the organization across multiple platforms. I served on the editorial board as managing editor of the publication.
  The Daily Californian
  Opinion Columnist- Broke in Berkeley
  The Daily Californian
  June 2013 – September 2013 (4 months)
  I wrote a summer series called "Broke in Berkeley," which was published on Mondays in the print and online editions. I also contributed to other sections of the paper when possible- notably arts and reviews.
  The Home Depot
  Customer Service
  The Home Depot
  June 2008 – September 2012 (4 years 4 months)
  I worked in front-of-house, back-of-house, expediting, and all operations.
  Lowe's Home Improvement
  Lead Management
  Lowe's Home Improvement
  July 2002 – January 2007 (4 years 7 months)
  I worked in front-of-house, lead management, expediting, and communications.
  Honors & Awards
  Won the 2014 Philip K. Dick Award for Outstanding Science Fiction
  Philadelphia SF Society and the Philip K. Dick Trust
  January 2015
  My debut novel, THE BOOK OF THE UNNAMED MIDWIFE won the 2014 award for distinguished science fiction published in paperback original form in the United States.

  http://www.philipkdickaward.org/
  Best Books of the Year 2016
  Amazon
  Best Books of the Year
  Publisher's Weekly
  October 2016
  Organizations
  Phi Theta Kappa
  Starting January 2010
  Publications
  The Book of the Unnamed Midwife
  Sybaritic Press
  June 2014
  Winner of the 2014 Philip K Dick award.

  The apocalypse will be asymmetrical.

  In the aftermath of a plague that has decimated the world population, the unnamed midwife confronts a new reality in which there may be no place for her. Indeed, there may be no place for any woman except at the end of a chain. A radical rearrangement is underway. With one woman left for every ten men, the landscape that the midwife travels is fraught with danger. She must reach safety— but is it safer to go it alone or take a chance on humanity? The friends she makes along the way will force her to choose what’s more important. Civilization stirs from the ruins, taking new and experimental forms. The midwife must help a new world come into being, but birth is always dangerous… and what comes of it is beyond anyone’s control.

  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  The Daily Californian Articles
  The Daily Californian
  November 2013
  My pieces published by the Daily Cal including reviews, advice, and opinion pieces.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  From the Four-Chambered Heart: In Tribute to Anais Nin
  Sybaritic Press
  August 2013
  My poem "Anaïs" is featured in this tribute anthology.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Broke in Berkeley
  The Daily Californian
  June 2013
  I wrote an summer column called "Broke in Berkeley," on the economic issues faced by UC Berkeley students. It was published weekly on Mondays in the online and print editions. I also contribute to other sections of the paper, and I'm particularly active in A&E.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Hipsters in the Natural Habitat
  Caliber Magazine
  February 2013
  In the 7th print edition of Caliber Magazine, my article "Hipsters in their Natural Habitat" was featured on the cover. Two-page spread plus additional content in "Hipster Bingo."
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Alternate Lanes: An Anthology of Travel Using Alternate Transportation in the City of Angels
  Los Angeles, CA
  September 2012
  This is a poetry anthology on the subject of transportation. My piece "Bus" was published therein.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison, Marie Lecrivain
  Scribendi 2012
  University of New Mexico
  April 2012
  Scribendi is the literary journal for honors students in colleges in the Southwest. My piece "Abort/Retry/Fail?" was published therein.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Achive of Caliber Articles
  Caliber Magazine
  2012
  A collection of my articles for Caliber Magazine on politics, pop culture, movies, music, and lifestyle.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Near Kin: A Collection of Words and Art inspired by Octavia Estelle Butler
  Sybaritic Press
  March 2014
  An excerpt from my novel "The Book of the Unnamed Midwife" is included in this anthology.
  Authors:
  Meg Elison
  Projects
  Books and Cleverness
  Starting February 2013
  This is my personal blog, where I review books and films and talk about issues that interest me.
  Team members:
  Meg Elison
  50 Years of Free Speech: Perspectives on the Movement that Revolutionized Berkeley
  Fifty Years of Free Speech is an original publication by The Daily Californian that explores the actions of students on the Berkeley campus during the seminal university protest movement of 1964.

  The book incorporates the newspaper's extensive Free Speech Movement archives and includes perspectives by Free Speech Movement veterans to commemorate the movement's 50th anniversary.
  Team members:
  Meg Elison, Chloe Hunt, Alex Berryhill
  Languages
  Sign Languages
  Skills
  BloggingCopy EditingCreative WritingEditingAP StyleMagazinesNewspapersWritingJournalismBooksProofreadingResearchPublicationsPublic SpeakingCopywritingSee 29+
  How's this translation?Great•Has errors
  Education
  UC Berkeley
  UC Berkeley
  Bachelor's Degree, English
  2012 – 2014
  Mt. San Jacinto College
  Associate of Arts, Liberal Studies; Liberal Studies
  2009 – 2012
  Activities and Societies: Phi Theta Kappa, American Sign Language Culture Club, Honors Program

• Literary Treats Q&A - https://literarytreats.com/2017/01/12/author-qa-the-book-of-the-unnamed-midwife-meg-elison/

  Author Q&A | The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, Meg Elison
  Posted on 12 January 2017
  elison-bookoftheunnamedmidwifecover

  When the publicists for Meg Elison’s The Book of the Unnamed Midwife reached out and called the book “a modern-day look at women’s equality and access to reproductive health,” I was immediately intrigued. I think it’s a particularly timely and relevant topic, and I love seeing it explored in fiction.

  SYNOPSIS

  Philip K. Dick Award Winner for Distinguished Science Fiction

  When she fell asleep, the world was doomed. When she awoke, it was dead.

  In the wake of a fever that decimated the earth’s population—killing women and children and making childbirth deadly for the mother and infant—the midwife must pick her way through the bones of the world she once knew to find her place in this dangerous new one. Gone are the pillars of civilization. All that remains is power—and the strong who possess it.

  A few women like her survived, though they are scarce. Even fewer are safe from the clans of men, who, driven by fear, seek to control those remaining. To preserve her freedom, she dons men’s clothing, goes by false names, and avoids as many people as possible. But as the world continues to grapple with its terrible circumstances, she’ll discover a role greater than chasing a pale imitation of independence.

  After all, if humanity is to be reborn, someone must be its guide.

  Its sequel, The Book of Etta, comes out February 2017.

  Q&A with Meg Elison

  megelison_authorphoto

  Meg Elison is a high school dropout and a graduate of UC Berkeley. Her debut novel, The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, won the 2014 Philip K. Dick Award. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and writes like she’s running out of time.
  In your own words, can you tell us about The Book of the Unnamed Midwife?

  I began with a burning injustice in birth culture and misogyny, and I read the entire canon of post-apocalyptic fiction because I wanted to end the world, over and over. The books delivered that, sometimes sadly, sometimes angrily. But even the best ones scarcely dealt with women at all. I was at Berkeley when I began it, and I remember asking one of my professors if the main female character in Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises was meant to be read as barren, as an analogue to the protagonist’s castration. The professor, who had spent twice my lifespan behind the podium, blinked and told me he had no idea; the question had just never come up. Science fiction and post-apocalypse fiction was the same. Very few writers seemed to consider that all these furtive sex scenes might end in pregnancy, or that these refugees from the end of the world might need tampons. With a few exceptions, like Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and P.D. James’ Children of Men, the genre seemed barbarously ignorant of women’s lives. So the book began to take shape because it needed to exist.

  In The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, birth control and a woman’s right to bodily autonomy are central to the plot, what inspired you to write about this subject?

  I’ve watched the War on Women rage on and on, with the rollback of abortion rights from state to state and an insidious slide back into casual misogyny in common rhetoric and culture. I went through puberty with a copy of Our Bodies, Ourselves in my lap, and the struggle for women’s equality was presented to me as something that had been won, at least in the United States. It didn’t occur to me until it was far too late how easily we could lose all the ground that we’ve gained. Piece by piece, the rights of women are being dismantled. I can’t be at every Planned Parenthood to escort people safely, and I can’t be loud enough to shout down legislation that tries to take our power away. Writing this book was the loudest I could scream my worst fears and hopefully help keep them from coming true.

  Slate has called The Book of The Unnamed Midwife, the “science fiction analog to the Zika crisis.” What do you feel are the connections?

  Zika is a crisis of reproduction freedom. It disproportionately affects women and makes pregnancy hazardous and morally fraught. I remember being terrified when El Salvador issued its advice concerning Zika: just don’t get pregnant. The government gave that advice to women who have almost no access to birth control, in a nation where abortion is illegal. Now, Zika is making inroads in Florida, where the state has actively worked to block funding for reproductive health care and comprehensive sex education. Zika will do the most damage in places where women are already disadvantaged and have no recourse. The plague in Midwife isn’t Zika, but it elicits the same kind of terror. It flourishes in those places where women already have little to no reproductive freedom and it brings terror into the delivery room. I never wanted to correctly predict a future as scary as this one.

  What was the most interesting thing you learned while researching this book?

  I spoke with a couple of midwives and all of them were happy to share with me the most horrific sleep-robbing stories they had of how bad births can go. More than one of them told me that they don’t share stories of birth-trauma with pregnant people, because we have a culture of terrifying them before labor. But they were happy to share with me, once I told them about the book. I learned that birth control expires a lot faster than I hoped it would. Weirdly, my research taught me a lot about civic engineering. I wanted to know what services would shut down first, and how. I wanted to know how fast cholera would run in the streets when municipal water cut out. I learned some things that might save my life in a disaster smaller than the one I wrote.

  What do you want readers to take away from reading your book?

  I want people who read Midwife to really grapple with what being a woman is like. I used the most extreme circumstances to tell this story, but many women deal with intimidation and assault under normal circumstances. I want the reader to see women as people, and to be disgusted by their relegation to chattel. I hope that readers see that although this book is grim and gutting, there’s hope in it. I’m a realist, but reality usually offers a sliver of hope.

  What’s coming next?

  The sequel to Midwife, The Book of Etta will be out soon! It’s about Etta, the young woman mentioned in the frame tale of Midwife, and it deals more with gender essentialism and the way things aren’t what we thought they would be when we first began them. I’ve also got a couple of other books in the works and I’m always writing short stories. What’s coming next is more barn-burning stories with kick-ass queer people in them, because that’s what I do.

  +

  Thanks to the author and her publicists for the Author Q&A above.

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• Meg Elison - http://megelison.com/

  About Meg Elison

  Meg Elison is a Bay Area author and essayist. Her debut novel, THE BOOK OF THE UNNAMED MIDWIFE won the 2014 Philip K. Dick Award and was listed as a Tiptree Committee recommendation. Her second novel, THE BOOK OF ETTA, was published in 2017 by 47North. She writes like she's running out of time and lives in Oakland.

• Unbound Worlds - http://www.unboundworlds.com/2017/02/meg-elison-reveals-book-etta-came/

  INTERVIEWS
  Meg Elison Reveals How The Book of Etta Came To Be
  By SHAWN SPEAKMAN
  February 21, 2017

  AMAZON
  BARNES & NOBLE
  INDIEBOUND
  IBOOKS

  SHARE
  Cover detail from The Book of Etta by Meg Elison.
  The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood is one of the most important books ever written.

  It is an incredible story but the power of the book goes beyond its content. While The Handmaid’s Tale is the quintessential warning about the terrible power of totalitarian theocracies, what that would mean for women in such a world, and how women can regain and retain their own agency, the book is a warning that has become all too pertinent in recent years. Since 1985 when the book published, Atwood’s readers have managed to keep that warning alive. To be there when needed.

  The warning takes many forms, some of them inspired by the book. The Book of Etta by Meg Elison is one of those inspirations, a book published today that echoes elements of The Handmaid’s Tale with new import.

  Meg Elison has taken the time out of her busy schedule to answer several questions about The Book of Etta and her work.

  Powerful stuff below! Read!

  elison-midwifeUnbound Worlds: The Book of Etta is in fine bookstores today. But first tell readers about Etta and The Book of the Unnamed Midwife?

  Meg Elison: Etta and Midwife really occurred to me at the same time, as one continuous story. I wanted to write about a world where women were both prized and endangered, and what it would be like for the women who have always failed to comply with what they’re supposed to do and be. Both the Midwife and Etta make choices in terrifying worlds that don’t necessarily keep them safer, but do allow them to be who they are.

  The Midwife is the founder of Etta’s society, so she’s taken on some legendary status as a hero to both those people and to Etta. Etta models on the Midwife’s journey: her dedication to freeing slaves and fighting for a better world come from her hero. Etta’s curiosity and bravery to leave her safe city and go out on the road are part of who she is, but the Midwife shows her the way.

  UW: These books feature powerful elements similar in scope to those found in The Handmaid’s Tale. Where do you draw these elements from? Your own life? The current political landscape? Fiction?

  ME: The tragedy of The Handmaid’s Tale is that it’s just as relevant now as when it was published. When I was younger, I thought that progress was inevitable and could not be rolled back. I didn’t understand the nature of the culture war we’re in. Atwood, writing in the late seventies, saw that the gains of women were tenuous and it would take only a decent-sized disaster to roll us back into the idea of women as chattel. In the entire canon of science fiction, I saw the autonomy of women and girls treated as collateral damage. Nuclear fallout? Too bad, you’re slaves now. Meteor impact? Rape gangs will be with you shortly. Zombies? Don’t worry, your primary concern will still be regular men. It’s politics, it’s art. It’s the day a stranger on the subway thrust his penis into my hand. It’s The Handmaid’s Tale’s evergreen position on the backlist. The rage that fueled me to write Midwife—the rage that fuels me still—comes from everywhere. As a woman, it is my birthright and will almost assuredly be the fight of my life.

  UW: Etta is part of a dark world, the result of a plague wiping out much of mankind. She refuses to the play the role that society wants — and maybe needs — of her. How much of Etta is within Meg Elison? Any examples you can share?

  ME: The world that I live in is still luckier than Etta’s. I hope we stay that way. However, there are of course ways in which I am like Etta, and refuse to accept a role that was defined for me. Like Etta, I’m queer. I’ve been queer in places where it’s not accepted or acceptable; I was one the many, many kids I know who found themselves homeless when their queerness was brought to light. Like Etta, I have had to defend myself using violence. I fought off an attempted rape when I was ten years old. That was mostly luck; I could have easily been overpowered or just terrified into immobility. That fight never really ends. It is always with me, and it changes who I am as a person and as a writer. My experience of an unsafe body, a woman’s body, a noncompliant body, a queer body that was available for plunder helped me write Etta’s experience and the position of women in the Road to Nowhere books.

  UW: What is it about futuristic fiction that allows you to examine themes in our present? Are you at all worried about some of the things you are seeing now — and how might they lead to that ill-fated future?

  ME: Like most people who are paying attention, I’m worried all the time. I have had to construct careful disconnection from the shrieking fireball that has become our news cycle in order to maintain any kind of productivity or optimism. Policy is hard to predict; we prepare for doomsday and hope for the best, but we cannot know how things will turn out. As a futurist, I try to start at the end and look backward. I can create a possible future and then convince readers to ask themselves how we got here. Some of the things that I’m seeing now: legislation crafted to punish women for their sexuality, laws to protect certain people’s rights to discriminate against LGBTQ people, and the continued legal dehumanization of poor people, immigrants, disabled people, and the incarcerated, engender fear for the future.

  ‘Ill-fated’ makes it sound like we were always doomed to this. We were not and we are not. I believe, in a small inextinguishable way, that we can do better. So I turn off the news and write.

  UW: What are working on next? Will there be more “The Book of” books? Do tell!

  ME: I am always working on more! I am writing the third and final Road to Nowhere novel now, with my title being The Book of Flora. Readers of Etta will know what character I’m handing the torch to, and I hope they’re as excited to follow her as I am. I’m also at work on a horror novel and some nonfiction, as well. I’m writing all the time, trying to beat the clock in my chest and say all that I can say before it’s too late.

  The Book of Etta by Meg Elison is in fine bookstores now!

9/26/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1506472400254 1/1
Print Marked Items
The Book of Etta
Publishers Weekly.
263.50 (Dec. 5, 2016): p53.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* The Book of Etta
Meg Elison. 47North, $14.95 trade paper (314p) ISBN 978-1-5039-4182-3
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
In this gritty sequel to her Philip K. Dick Award-winning The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, Elison returns to her
postapocalyptic American Midwest milieu, but far in the future, when the midwife protagonist of the first novel is
largely a legend. The plague that destroyed human civilization lingers, killing women in childbirth, fetuses in the
womb, and newborns. Far more boys survive than girls. The various pocket communities that have survived have
found their own ways of coping with the gender imbalance. In matriarchal Nowhere, women collect men into "hives."
In nearby Jeff City, castrati live as women, giving the illusion of gender balance. In Estiel, formerly St. Louis, a
monstrous dictator known as the Lion raids other communities for their women and girls. Etta--or Eddy, as he calls
himself outside the confines of Nowhere--is a young transgender man who can't find a place for himself in a world
where people with wombs are classified as either baby-making machines or midwives. He's a wanderer and explorer
by nature and has no interest in any other role. Elison continues to startle her readers with unexpected gender
permutations and fascinating relationships worked out in front of a convincingly detailed landscape. (Feb.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Book of Etta." Publishers Weekly, 5 Dec. 2016, p. 53. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA475224860&it=r&asid=a21278dce58ee3830d3e5483c3f5a030.
Accessed 26 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A475224860

• The Speculative Herald
  http://www.speculativeherald.com/2017/03/16/review-the-book-of-etta-by-meg-elison/
  Word count: 1028

  Review: The Book of Etta by Meg Elison
  MARCH 16, 2017
  Review: The Book of Etta by Meg ElisonThe Book of Etta by Meg Elison
  Series: The Road to Nowhere #2
  Published by 47North on February 21st 2017
  Genres: Science Fiction
  Pages: 314
  Format: eARC
  Source: Publisher
  Thanks to 47North for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

  LibraryThing button-amazon book-depository-button audible-button

  four-stars
  Nowhere is a small community founded on the teachings of the Unnamed Midwife, flourishing nearly 100 years after a plague drove women to the brink of extinction. But outside Nowhere’s walls, violent men still seize what they desire. Can there be any hope for a better future?

  Meg Elison caused a stir with her debut, picking up the Philip K Dick award for her twist on the apocalyptic in The Book of the Unnamed Midwife. Set a century later, The Book of Etta is less a direct sequel than a chance to explore how the world has changed in the longer term.

  As such, I think The Book of Etta can be approached as a stand-alone novel (although your mileage may vary). A hundred years down the line, the Unnamed Midwife is a semi-mythical icon in the small matriarchal community of Nowhere. We can pick up the salient facts as we go along: that women remain a tiny minority because female infant mortality is unusually high and many mothers are killed by a birthing fever (however, those prefer clear context from the start may be put off). Outside Nowhere’s walls, women are frequently sexually enslaved by unscrupulous men – the world hasn’t recovered its balance or empathy down the years.

  The eponymous Etta is an anomaly: a woman who has rejected Nowhere’s traditional paths of Mother or Midwife to become a raider, travelling across the Midwest to trade and scavenge – and, in service to the Unnamed Midwife – to rescue women from unpleasant fates. We meet her disguised as Eddy, confronting a man who wishes to sell a young girl. There’s no room left to doubt that he has been abusing her, and Eddy’s response is swift and ruthless. The Unnamed Midwife would approve.

  If I thought The Book of the Unnamed Midwife was unflinching, The Book of Etta rips away any hope for a better future. Eddy’s raids center on Estiel (St Louis), home to a warlord known as the Lion; rich in fuel, trucks and bullets, his depredations to seize weapons and women range across the plains and clear to Utah. While I loved the range of small communities the narrative introduces – and their differing approaches to both the gender imbalance and the Lion’s threats – in the end it seems that only violence can stop violence.

  Civil discourse is a luxury that has perished in the ashes of the old world; while stashes of old world weapons remain to be discovered, those who have them can enforce their way of life. It’s pretty bleak reading, but as in Midwife I appreciate that Elison acknowledges that and has her protagonists struggle with the question of why they keep fighting.

  While there’s no doubting the feminism of Midwife, Etta ups the ante, also tackling reproductive rights and intersectional feminism. Elison peels away layers of world-building to develop her ideas chapter by chapter, exploring implications and consequences through Etta/Eddy’s travels. It becomes evident that Etta is a lesbian – an almost unacceptable concept in a world barely able to re-populate (in Nowhere, they rip pages from books to erase the idea; abortion is known only because nobody is willing to deface the Book of the Unnamed Midwife) – and eventually we realise that Eddy isn’t just a disguise: he is our protagonist’s true identity.

  One of the reasons I like The Book of Etta is that it recognises that questions of identity don’t disappear in inconvenient circumstances. It engages (or tries to engage) with how someone might struggle to grapple with such questions in a community that has no context for them.

  However, I have a lingering concern: the (presumably) unintentional link between being trans and a history of sexual abuse. The implications (Eddy was born in the chair) bother me enormously – while it is rejected at one point, it returns in extremis, leaving the line blurred. And it’s not unique to Eddy. Flora (a transwoman) was castrated and sold into sexual slavery before identifying as a woman; while we meet other transwomen, only an uncertain contrast is offered by Tommy, who is otherwise confined by Nowhere’s matriarchal culture.

  As the third book has been announced as The Book of Flora, I hope this will put my concern to rest by fleshing out the secondary trans characters and giving us better insight into Flora herself. I also hope it will offer some reassurance on Eddy’s future, as I finished The Book of Etta worried that his trials were far from over: a post-Mormon underground matriarchal cult as focused on childbirth as Nowhere itself seems an unlike place for Eddy to flourish.

  Those more interested in story than questions of gender or identity will find themselves well-served by a taut, nail-biting narrative. However, while there are occasional explosive action sequences, this is a predominantly introspective novel. I think it’s just as ground-breaking as Midwife (if not more so), but I suspect – sadly – that it will garner fewer adherents.

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  About Latest Posts
  Anna Chapman
  Anna Chapman
  I've been reading for nearly as long as I've been walking, arguably with greater success (or at least fewer bruises). I never did grow out of my love for fantasy, space opera and speculative fiction, and I never intend to.

  More reviews and other opinions at x+1 (there's always room for one more).

• Foreword Reviews
  https://www.forewordreviews.com/reviews/the-book-of-etta/
  Word count: 411

  THE BOOK OF ETTA
  Meg Elison
  47North (Feb 21, 2017)
  Softcover $14.95 (314pp)
  978-1-5039-4182-3

  This is a layered dystopia—feminist, violent, and blunt, it will engross its readerships.

  There are hints that women in the time before the plague had choices, but Etta of Nowhere—who goes by Eddy when she’s on the road scavenging––cannot imagine such a world. In the world that she knows, gender only enslaves you, turning you either into a commodity or a monster.

  Rejecting possibilities of domesticity in her seemingly safe community, Eddy takes to the road often, eager to rescue the women and girls in the burnt-out towns he travels through. He has particular interest in freeing those enslaved in Estiel, the former St. Louis, under the dictatorial Lion—a man who “climbed to the top using women as stairs.” But working to undermine the vicious system that regards women as things will compromise all of Eddy’s hard-won convictions.

  Elison’s novel is both bleak and rich, presenting wide and intricate variations of social systems that regard women as a resource. The Lion’s violence is rendered in brutal prose, and the ease with which need can turn to villainy is examined in stark and heartbreaking terms. “There is no such thing as safe wanting,” Eddy warns a man from Nowhere: “Desire turns to chains faster than you can breathe.” As Eddy and Etta—one and yet separate—work across broken landscapes from the midwest to New York, they test boundaries: of gender identification, of freedom, and of concepts of right and wrong.

  Elison’s is a layered dystopia. Feminist, violent, blunt, and disturbing, it remains as aware of the human capacity for folly as it seems convinced that base instincts can be risen above. Survival sometimes requires breaking all the rules—a lesson Etta learns in a slow and painful way, and that will stick with engrossed readerships long after.

  Reviewed by Michelle Anne Schingler
  February 9, 2017

  Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The author of this book provided free copies of the book to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. No fee was paid by the author for this review. Foreword Reviews only recommends books that we love. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

• RT Book Reviews
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/book-etta
  Word count: 420

  RT Rating:

  Genre:
  Science Fiction, Futuristic
  Published:
  February 21 2017
  Publisher:
  47North
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  5 GOLD: Phenomenal. In a class by itself.
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  4: Compelling. A page-turner.
  3: Enjoyable. A pleasant read.
  2: Problematic. May struggle to finish.
  1: Severely Flawed. Pass on this one.
  THE BOOK OF ETTA
  Author(s): Meg Elison
  After the phenomenal success of The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, it is no surprise to find that The Book of Etta is on par with Elison’s first outing. The worldbuilding and depth of character involved in this novel are fantastic. That said, there is a section of the story where things are just not flowing as they should, where something is just a bit “off.” Without being spoilery, a novel that depends on the gritty reality of daily life fails when it brings in the mystical without explanation. Does this prohibit the story in any way from progressing or engaging the reader? No. Therefore it will not hold back this raving review. But it is something to be aware of. This is otherwise a terrific read.
  Etta’s home city of Nowhere has been a protected secret haven for years. Founded by the Unnamed Midwife, Nowhere is a world where the safety of its women and mothers is paramount. The honor of motherhood and childbearing, in itself a great sacrifice and danger, is every woman’s social goal. Etta is not like most women. She becomes a raider rather than a mother, and it causes ripples in the community of Nowhere. However, when those she loves the most are kidnapped, it puts Etta in the uniquely qualified position of their rescuer. Can Etta do it though? And can she do it alone? (47NORTH, Feb., 341 pp., $14.95)
  Reviewed by:
  Victoria Frerichs

• Publishers Weekly
  https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-5039-3911-0
  Word count: 370

  The Book of the Unnamed Midwife

  Meg Elison. 47North, $14.95 trade paper (300p) ISBN 978-1-5039-3911-0

  MORE BY AND ABOUT THIS AUTHOR
  Elison's gripping and grim first novel, which won the Philip K. Dick Award in its previous, small press publication, tells the story of an unnamed woman who survives a plague that wipes out most of humankind in just weeks, leaving 10 male survivors for every woman. Years after the initial wave of the terrible disease, all pregnancies still end in the death of the baby, and most also kill the mother. Told by turns through the diary of the protagonist, the diaries of other survivors, and third-person narration, the tale covers her several years of wandering, dressed as a man, from San Francisco, where she had worked as a nurse and midwife, through the dangerous, near-empty western U.S., where marauding groups of men try to enslave any woman they meet or are occasionally recruited into polyamorous "hives" dominated by one alpha woman. Eventually, she finds a stable, caring community where the inhabitants allow their members to find their own appropriate gender roles; at last she can live without fear, be the person she wants to be, and practice her trade for the betterment of everyone. The story is beautifully written in a stripped down, understated way, though frequently gruesome in its depiction of rapes, murders, and stillbirths. The protagonist, who sometimes calls herself Karen, or Dusty, or Jane, is beautifully realized as a middle-aged, bisexual woman with considerable skills, an indomitable will, and great adaptability, though she suffers considerably and is far from a superwoman. A prologue and an epilogue set long after the events of the main narrative (and reminiscent of the concluding chapter of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale) hint at a positive future, leaving the reader with a glimmer of optimism in the midst of despair. This fine tale should particularly appeal to readers of earlier feminist dystopias such as The Handmaid's Tale, Suzy McKee Charnas's Walk to the Edge of the World series, and P.D. James's The Children of Men. Many questions are left unanswered at the book's end, but a sequel is forthcoming. (Oct.)

• Slate
  http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/01/28/the_book_of_the_unnamed_midwife_the_2014_sci_fi_novel_that_eerily_anticipated.html
  Word count: 806

  This 2014 Sci-Fi Novel Eerily Anticipated the Zika Crisis
  By Torie Bosch
  The Book of the Unnamed Midwife.
  Sybaritic Press

  Due to fear of the Zika virus, the government of El Salvador has asked women to delay pregnancy until 2018—almost two years from now. On Thursday, World Health Officials declared that the virus was “spreading explosively.” Zika symptoms are fairly mild for most people but the disease can be devastating for developing fetuses, resulting in babies born with tiny heads, a condition called microcephaly. (The connection between Zika and microcephaly hasn’t been established conclusively, but the evidence seems strong.) In a bit of cosmic cruelty, Zika has taken hold in South and Central America, where, thanks to the influence of the Catholic Church, abortion access is highly limited. In fact, El Salvador is known to have the world’s strictest abortion laws; in some cases, women have been locked up after having a miscarriage. No wonder the government doesn’t want women to get pregnant. It doesn’t want a generation of microcephalic babies on its hands—and it doesn’t want women demanding increased access to abortion. El Salvador’s request may be extreme, but it has some company; for instance, Jamaica has also suggested that women wait 6-12 months before getting pregnant.

  ADVERTISING

  Disasters, emerging diseases, and other news events often inspire us to seek out similar story lines in fiction, movies, and TV. The Ebola crisis of 2015 prompted many references to the 1995 film Outbreak (a film that now seems more cartoonish than scary). So it isn’t surprising that some on Twitter are invoking Children of Men—both the 1992 novel by P.D. James and the 2006 film adaptation—as a fictional precursor to the new Zika threat. In Children of Men, women simply stop getting pregnant. The cause of this worldwide infertility is unclear, but the effect is obvious: Humanity is on the verge of extinction.

  But there is a better science fiction analog to the Zika crisis: The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, by Meg Elison, which was published in 2014 In Children of Men, abortion and birth control are rendered moot; in The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, birth control and a woman’s right to bodily autonomy are central to the plot.

  In Elison’s novel, a pandemic nearly annihilates the population. And the disease itself is sexist, hitting women much harder than men. The few women who remain, whether because they are immune to the disease or somehow survive it, are in danger of being taken captive, to be used as sex slaves. To make the situation even crueler, women can become pregnant—but the babies all die. And so do a lot of the mothers.

  When the titular midwife recognizes the forces at play, she disguises herself as a man for protection and goes raiding for birth control—Depo-Provera shots, the vaginal ring, the birth control patch. Every time she comes across women of child-bearing age, she tries to give them contraceptives. She describes her plan here:

  So is that the mission now? Angel of birth control, out to stop the crop of dead babies before it starts? Got the morning after pill, but I doubt I’ll get to use it on anyone. Wish I could get some RU486. Have the tools to do a D&C if I meet anyone who needs to abort. Can implant an IUD, but passed them over at the university. Too risky without being able to sterilize. Guess this is what I can do. Can make it easier. Can’t fix it. Nobody can. Not that different from what I used to do. Every day I remember what Chicken said, = nothing to do now but survive. Doing that now, but it’s not the only thing. Can’t be. Just gotten to the point where it feels too hard to keep trying. Every woman in labor says she can’t do it. Couldn’t stop what was happening, but I could make it easier. All the same.
  Our world is not nearly so bleak, of course. But if the women of El Salvador, Jamaica, and other countries under threat of Zika are being told to avoid pregnancy until the virus is under control, then an angel of birth control is exactly what they will need. As in The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, we are facing a disease that disproportionately affects women—and in a part of the globe where reproductive choice is limited at best.

  Read more in Slate about the Zika virus.
  Torie Bosch is the editor of Future Tense, a project of Slate, New America, and Arizona State that looks at the implications of new technologies.