Books like Discriminating Sex — picked by fans

Pearsall’s book is the sort that leaves a reader entertained, deeply informed, and unable to see the past the same way again. Polygamy, she shows, was at the center of the social and political systems of many Indigenous nations. As European soldiers and settlers attempted to trade with—or dominate—the people of these nations, they provoked violent reprisals. Opposition to monogamy drove Indigenous resistance movements. Europeans increasingly argued that their monogamous practices made them racially and religiously superior to the people they subordinated. The centrality of metaphors about monogamy and polygamy to American revolutionary political ideas is one of the book’s most enlightening—and entertaining—contributions in a book rich with surprises.

What does it mean to be free—and how can you prove that you are? Millward’s utterly engrossing book demonstrates how significant Black women’s reproductive sexuality was to their pursuit of freedom. Following the formal end of US participation in the international slave trade in 1808, white enslavers placed unprecedented demands on enslaved Black women to bear more children. Because the laws defined the child according to the mother’s free or unfree status, enslaved women literally birthed the property of white enslavers. But what if a currently enslaved person proved that the womb from which they entered the world belonged to a free person? Millward shows how Black women and their descendants paved their own pathways to freedom.

Men, did you know that too little body hair or too much talkativeness could keep you from being admitted to the United States in the early 1900s? The Straight State will have readers shaking their heads at the outrageous presumptions that immigration inspectors applied to keep “degenerates” out of the country. This was the first time that federal officials had both the interest and power to create policies against homosexuality, and they were crassly influenced by the eugenics movement and hostility to the poor. Canaday also shows how early welfare policies perpetuated gender stereotypes and discrimination against sexual “deviants,” favoring the married over the single. I learned so much! 

Aimee Semple McPherson lived a trailblazing life as the founder of the Four-Square Gospel Pentecostal church in Los Angeles, the first woman to own a US radio station, and a captivating, theatrical preacher. The beauty of Sutton’s book is the way he shows how McPherson’s sexual charisma—as well as her nearly career-ending sexual scandals—enabled her to define herself as the embodiment of Christian virtue. Wearing white and preaching with props and scenery worthy of a Hollywood set, McPherson used a show business savvy to portray conservative Christianity as the bedrock of Americanism.

In this book, Lisa See drops us into the lives of three young women of Asian descent who were fighting to make their way in a city and society that saw them as “dolls” rather than people. The friendship at the heart of the novel is compelling, but I am equally impressed by See’s historical research.

She weaves her fictional characters through real events, people, places, and cultures. I often shy away from “historical fiction” as a genre, cringing at the license some authors take with the history side of things, but See is an excellent social historian and storyteller. I loved this opportunity to visit World War II America, the entertainment industry, and, most especially, San Francisco’s Chinatown through the eyes of these women. 

Noteworthy is a pitch-perfect novel set in the elite a capella group of a selective performing arts boarding school. Undistinguished Alto 2 Jordan Sun disguises herself as a guy to land a spot in the all-male Sharpshooters a capella group, only to realize she has to keep up the act for the remainder of her Junior and Senior years. Hijinks ensue as Jordan finds herself questioning her identity, her sexuality, and her place in the world. The writing in this book is crisp and funny, and I enjoyed learning a bit about how a capella works. Most of all, I enjoyed watching Jordan become more sure of herself even as her ruse starts to wear thin. This is a light-hearted read with some heavier discussions of race, class, gender, and sexuality deftly woven throughout. If you like voice-driven music books as much as I do, add Noteworthy to your list. 

The subtitle, Lessons in Food and Love from a Year in Paris, drew me to this memoir of a woman stranded in the city of her dreams without her husband. She fills her lonely days learning about French food. I enjoyed the memoir’s structure. Each chapter studies an iconic local dish: the history of the dish, the way it is made, her travels to find it, and tasting...lots of tasting. Her recipes, adjusted for American kitchens, are the bonus de resistance.  

But Mah doesn’t write only about food. She also shares her struggles with loneliness, missing her husband, and finding her way around France on her own. I totally recommend this personal and informative memoir by a Chinese American Francophile. 

It was hard finding just one book out of the many that have been written about Chinese food’s fortune’s abroad, but Liu ably chronicles a love-affair that is as old as the United States themselves, which begins with would-be rebels throwing chests of Fujian tea into Boston harbor. Liu points to the long history of Chinese in America, and the impact they have had as laborers, miners and cooks, particularly for low-income groups who welcomed the rarity of the warm hash dishes that came to be known as chop suey. This is a book that allows the reader the chance to appreciate the degree to which “Chinese” food in America is in a world, and a class, all of its own.

The railroad worker and the interpreter; The Hong Kong beauty/midwife and the fishmonger’s daughter; the Kung fu master’s family turned tong bosses and the civic leaders and charity organizers; the merchants and the opium dealers; the church ladies and the rice wine hooch brewers; the lofan (white) Aunt Elva with a painful secret….

These are some of the unforgettable characters from Chin’s sprawling family. I loved this glimpse into the Chinese American experience in New York City during the same time my family was muddling through in Georgia. I also have reason to believe my grandfather knew some of these characters personally through his correspondence and Chinese liberation work. Chin did honor to all of the ancestors with this skillful weaving of history, memory, anecdote, and a daughter/granddaughter’s loving intuition.

I loved reading this recently released wonderful book. It’s not a parenting book–and Jon would be surprised that I list it with my favorite parenting books—but it’s a fabulous book about his life and how the child of immigrants who ran a Chinese restaurant in Palo Alto became one of the top movie directors in the US with Crazy Rich Asians and the upcoming Wicked.

But I’m including it in this list because he talks about his incredible parents and how they protected, supported, and believed in him. He also describes how he is now using what he learned to raise his four children. My book includes a very brief version of his story, but I loved learning the rest of it.