YUP, RANI PATEL IN FULL EFFECT IS FEMINIST AF.

I’m passionate about providing psychiatric treatment to diverse teens who are struggling through various hardships. Along the way, these teens make poor choices in relationships and in self-care because that’s how real life often plays out when youth are raised in chaos. It’s important to me that their imperfect journeys aren’t dismissed. That’s why I’m also dedicated to translating their struggles into realistic young adult fiction that isn’t written to please but rather to expand narrow-minded views of mental health issues and diverse life experiences.

Real life isn’t perfect prose. Real life isn’t a perfect plot. Real life isn’t a perfect, happy ending. Real life can be brutal, scattered, mistake-filled, and beautiful. And when these real-life teens embrace their worth and learn to use their voice, they are fierce. They are feminist AF. Like my teen patients. Like Rani.

This School Library Journal blog post lists amazing, diverse feminist YA books. I’m delighted that RANI PATEL IN FULL EFFECT is on it!

Click on this link:

Feminist AF: Feminist YA That Does Not Disappoint, A Guest Post by Mary Ellis

JAYA AND RASA: A LOVE STORY selected for the 2019 IN THE MARGINS BOOK AWARD!

The characters of Jaya & Rasa are amalgams of some diverse LGBTQ teens I’ve treated, ones facing horrific situations (sex trafficked, physically/emotionally/sexually abused, bullied, and/or suffering from untreated mental health issues including suicidal thoughts and attempts). I’m grateful my version of their struggles and triumphs has been included on the 2019 In the Margins Recommended Fiction Book List!

“In the Margins strives to find the best books for teens living in poverty, on the streets, in custody - or a cycle of all three. Our charge is to seek out and highlight the best fiction and non-fiction titles (Pre-K through adult) of high-interest appeal to youth ages 9-21 living in poverty, on the streets, or in custody...Youth feedback is a critical factor in both book nomination and selection.” —In the Margins Selection Committee

https://inthemarginssite.blog/2019-2/

https://inthemarginssite.blog/awards-list/

I AM MORE THAN MY HAIR.

Recently, I shaved my head for the second time in my life. I love my bald head and I don’t care if anyone else likes it, I just hope it challenges societal norms. Maybe it will encourage people to think beyond their ingrained assumptions about bald women. Assumptions they don’t usually hold about bald men. Assumptions they feel necessary to share with me:

1. The only possible reason to go bald as a woman is that I’m undergoing chemo. I’m not.

2. Or I must hate men. I don’t.

3. Or I’m lesbian. I’m not, but that doesn’t mean I’m straight because I’m not. I’m queer.

4. Or how did I ever get a husband? Um, love.

5. Or even though I’m bald, I’m still pretty. Stop commenting on my appearance. My worth is not determined by it.

Maybe it will also encourage people to move towards tolerance, acceptance, and love.

I dig this quote from the New York Times article Buzzed: The Politics of Hair : “...because we focus so much attention on the head, especially on the female head, and because this attention is gendered, and because, more than anything, this attention is visible, absent hair on a woman’s head can be read as disruptive to the politics of the male gaze. Looking at a woman’s face, at her hair, has conventionally been an exercise of desire, and of an assertion of male power. Disrupting this convention, disrupting this gaze, allows us to see a different set of possibilities for the female head. The shaved head ‘speaks’ in a different way.”

Check out the full article for more. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/05/fashion/buzzed-politics-of-hair-emma-gonzalez-rosemcgowan.html