Read a good SF short story, called Rabbit Test. It was exactly the sort of thing that makes me want to cry. It’s a very American story of course, as it’s about abortion and control of women’s fertility, but the story is such an old one for women, of constant control, of advances and setbacks, of bodies that seem designed sometimes to put us in our place and a world surrounding us to tell us yes, that is indeed your place.
There was a couple of very small off-notes which perhaps few would notice or care about. And one in particular which was something I always see and can’t unsee. The only time the Muslim world, or anything Muslim, comes up it’s a shah’s physician – probably Ibn Sina is meant – doing a pregnancy test: ‘It doesn’t work any better than you’d think’ says the authorial voice, and perhaps that’s true, but it’s something I can’t help but see.