TO THE WOMAN IN THE PINK HAT by LaToya Jordan is a powerful exploration of racial inequality through the lens of feminist sci-fi. Reviewed and starred by IBR senior reviewer Joelene Pynnonen. The post STARRED Book Review: To the...
To the Woman in the Pink Hat
by LaToya Jordan
Genre: Science Fiction / Feminist
ISBN: 9781619762367
Print Length: 100 pages
Reviewed by Joelene Pynnonen
A powerful exploration of racial inequality through the lens of feminist sci-fi
In the near future, a horrifying organization has risen. Posing as a health center that conducts birth control studies, it instead steals the uteruses of young women of color who seek its services and transplants them into women who are willing to pay. Jada Morris had been leading the SU’s, a resistance movement against the company, until she was incarcerated for a violent crime.
Now, she has been transferred to The Center, a rehabilitation program aimed at helping her confront her past and getting her back into society. As The Center’s therapy tactics become increasingly confronting, Jada starts to question whether there are darker things happening behind the scenes than she realizes.
To the Woman in the Pink Hat is a feminist sci-fi novella that delves into the possible ramifications of reproductive technology in a world that doesn’t value people of color. Speculative fiction has long been a vehicle for exploring cultural and social issues in the world, and Jordan uses it to its full potential here.
This book puts a new, sci-fi spin on the US’s past acts of forced sterilization against marginalized groups. The same motives apply here with the added horror of capitalist gains. In a world that has all but forgotten the atrocities of the not-too-distant past, To the Woman in the Pink Hat is an important conversation piece. The fact that it is set so near in the future hits the message home even more. Reading this feels like it could be authentic a decade or two down the line if science and racism continue the trajectory they are on.
Echoes of Marge Piercy’s feminist masterpiece, Woman on the Edge of Time, flicker within these pages. Both pieces take a hard look at the state of the world through the eyes of some of its most vulnerable members. In To the Woman in the Pink Hat’s case, an impoverished Black woman. Despite the similarities in the protagonist of each works’ situations, Jada feels more empowered. The people she is surrounded by are as disenfranchised as her, but they are a community and there is so much strength in them. Jada also doesn’t have the luxury of being able to envision a glimmering utopia that’s in reach if she just makes the right choices. In her world, she’s stumbling blindly, and all semblance of hope has to come from within her or those around her.
There’s a lot of nuance to this novella. While it primarily addresses the issues of racism and misogyny, it does so in the context of wider power imbalances. It poses difficult questions that don’t have clear answers. Like, how can justice be served in a world where luxuries for some come at the cost of the rights of another? If committing a crime is the only way a person can address the wrong done to them, does that make it justified? And in a world where everything is wrong, how does a person find the right path?
This novella packs a powerful punch for something so succinct. It doesn’t flinch from the dark places science will go if left unchecked, but there is also warm compassion and, above all, hope. To the Woman in the Pink Hat is a heavy and often confronting read with lovely sparkles of light scattered throughout, a wonderful addition to the shelf of anyone with an interest in social politics, race theory, or feminism.
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