num_pages: 336
description: This extraordinary timely new collection of essays by the award-winning writer of The Other Siderooted in her own experience with sexual assaultpursues questions of justice sexual violence and retribution.In 2014 Lacy Johnson was giving a reading from The Other Side her instant classic (Kirkus Reviews) memoir of kidnapping and rape when a woman asked her what she would like to happen to her rapist. This collection a meditative extension of that answer draws from philosophy art literature mythology anthropology film and other fields as well as Johnsons personal experience to consider how our ideas about justice might be expanded beyond vengeance and retribution to include acts of compassion patience mercy and grace. From Speak Truth to Power about the condition of not being believed about rape and assault; to Goliath about the concept of evil; to Girlhood in a Semi-Barbarous Age about the sacred feminine ideal woman and feminist art Johnson creates masterful elaborate gorgeously written essays that speak incisively about our current era. She grapples with justice and retribution truth and fairness and sexual assault and workplace harassment as well as the broadest societal wrongs: the BP Oil Spill government malfeasance police killings. The Reckonings is a powerful and necessary work ambitious in its scope which strikes at the heart of our national conversation about the justness of society.
language: English
title: The Reckonings
publisher: Scribner