We like consuming words on the page almost as much as we like consuming food on the plate. Welcome to the Scout Book Club: a brief and regular rundown of what we’re reading, what’s staring at us from the bookshelf begging to be read next, and what we’ve already read and recommend.

As a women-run publication, a crucial part of Scout’s MO and identity is amplifying the voices of other women – in the kitchen, on the dining room floor, behind the scenes, on the page, etc. – no matter the day of the year. With that in mind, below is just a small selection of books by a diverse (although we acknowledge that it is by no means exhaustively so!) and “vocal” group of women authors who we’ve read lately:

Baldwin, Styron and Me (Biblioasis), by Mélikah Abdelmoumen | Although a prolific author in her native French language, Baldwin, Styron and Me holds the unique position of being Mélikah Abdelmoumen’s first book available in English translation. In it, Abdelmoumen breaks down the unusual (read: interracial) friendship developed between two famous authors – William Styron and James Baldwin – investigating, ruminating, and extrapolating on their relationship and the impressions they made on each other (personally and professionally) as well as on their various communities. Alongside her depictions and analyses of a series of meticulously researched and cited exchanges between the two friends, Abdelmoumen presents her own relationship to their individual ouvrés, and her parallel experiences with racism as a woman born of a Quebecois mother and Tunisian father on Quebec soil (Chicoutimi).

Pragmatic, emotional, timely, and urgent, Baldwin, Styron and Me is unlike anything I’ve read, and is just the sort of book that begs translation in as many languages as possible. Ultimately, Baldwin, Styron and Me is an homage to the power of literature to provoke important discussions, and a call to action for more discussions like those that took place between and around Styron and Baldwin, as well as for the continued tradition of passing down important literature through generations. At the same time, it’s an entry into the canon of such literature itself, offering a potential bridge for bringing together readers with the Other. Baldwin, Styron and Me releases on Tuesday, March 11th, 2025.

DETAILS | Available for pre-order from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, and Upstart & Crow.*

Females (Verso), by Andrea Long Chu | Niche, dense, and intellectual – but not standoffish or lacking in humorous inflections – Chu’s long-form essay, Females is inspired by Valerie Solana’s infamous SCUM Manifesto and her lesser-know screenplay, Up Your Ass, plus Chu’s personal experiences as a transgender woman, along with the premise that “Everyone is female.” Through contemplating and deconstructing the titular concept to persuade the reader of the universality of female-ness, author Andrea Long Chu has effectively (and ironically) composed one helluva brain-twister – albeit a compassionately and non-intimidatingly concise 109-page-long one (including Afterword). Originally published in 2019, the 2025 Verso-published edition (just released this month) includes the aforementioned pertinent new Afterword by Chu, in which the author reflects, regrets, suggests amendments, and contextualizes the original essay and its motives. It also comes dressed up in an irresistibly gorgeous and chaotic red, black and white cover treatment. Don’t resist. Read it, grapple with it, and then encourage everyone you know to get on the bandwagon with you. Books breaking down deeply-ingrained societal preconceptions and gender paradigms – even problematically and non-pragmatically so, like Females – as well as presenting under-recognized voices and original ideas, and inviting complex thinking, need to be circulated, ingested and discussed now, more than ever. And Chu is an award-winning critic and lauded non-fiction writer for good reason!

DETAILS | Available soon from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, Upstart & Crow.*

Junie (Book*Hug Press), by Chelene Knight | In her unconventional 2018 memoir, Dear Current Occupant, Vancouver author Chelene Knight is enlightened to the power of teachers as role models; stating, in the prologue: “This is for the teachers. Growing up…I never had a Black or mixed race woman teacher who understood what it was like to grow up poor, to live with a mother who struggled with addiction and sex work, or be a child forced to carry the weight of a low-functioning adult on her shoulders while trying to get an education.” A bit further down the page, she expands: “Society puts so much blame on the parents…But let’s break this down a bit: if a child spends eight hours a day, five days a week, for fifteen years of their life, sitting at a desk listening to “teachers,” then how much of the responsibility falls to these teachers?” Fast-forward to 2022, the year that Knight’s follow-up novel was published. Junie follows the titular young Black woman, newly uprooted by her mother (Maddie, an entertainer in jazz clubs and an alcoholic) and coming of age in Vancouver’s East End circa the 1930s. Set almost a century in the past, and featuring a cast of fictional characters, on the surface Junie seems like a wild departure for the writer – or is it? Just a handful of pages in, it’s not difficult to see the similarities, especially when we are introduced to the character, Miss Shirley. Junie’s mentorly schoolteacher is a large and vibrant Black woman who encourages Junie’s artistic talents in and out of the classroom, and makes her feel like she “sees the gold in me.” This is in sharp contrast to her biological mother; both Junie and her best friend, Estelle, have distant, unattached, and formidable-seeming women for mothers (Estelle’s is the self-made business woman who runs the club where Maddie sings), and both experience this lack of motherliness differently, trying to reconcile and/or repair it while also attempting to flourish independently and navigate their own autonomous places in the world.

Far from glorifying Depression-era Vancouver and Hogan’s Alley, and despite the immense suffering at the core of its story, Junie nonetheless offers an evocative and largely uplifting, positive portrayal of an active and colourful Vancouver community, tenderly told through the youthful eyes of a young woman with an artist temperament on a quest for love.

DETAILS | Available from such local independent bookstores as Upstart & Crow.*

All the Parts We Exile (Knopf Canada), by Roza Nozari | Newly published as of February 25th, 2025, Toronto-based writer, illustrator and activist, Roza Nozari’s memoir is a destabilizing account of the young Iranian-Canadian’s life to-date, growing up as the youngest of three daughters to immigrant parents (an abusive, unfaithful, and mostly physically absent father; and emotionally absent, secretive, and traumatized mother) in an oft-dysfunctional household that moves across various neighbourhoods around the Toronto area according to their financial circumstances. Being the only family member not born in Iran, Nozari’s childhood and youth is spent perpetually morphing herself according to the shapes, desires, and expectations of others – often while repressing or all-out denouncing her own true identity and feelings in the process. As Nozari ages, and is increasingly exposed to the cruelties of the two often contradictory cultures of her heritage/homeland and home turf (small town Ontario) – which is deeply entrenched in racism, homophobia and misogyny – she is repeatedly, variously invalidated and delegitimized, being told that ultimately her very existence as a queer Muslim woman is a paradox. How will she ever be wholly herself, without also inevitably denying an integral part of her identity, she wonders? The struggle never ends – even as she flings herself into feminist, queer politics, fucks who she wants, and says “fuck you” to those (including those closest to her: her family) who don’t support her. An overall intensely emotional, personal excavation of the self, All the Parts We Exile is interspersed with emotive black-and-white self-portraits (by Nozari, naturally) and occasional moments of relief – usually evoked by descriptions of Persian food-related experiences and traditions. Easy to read, but by no means an easy read, written by a voice that has fought hard to come forth and demand our attention.

DETAILS | Available from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books and Upstart & Crow.*

We Could Be Rats (Scribner Canada), by Emily Austin | Ottawa-based author Emily Austin’s latest novel is an imaginative, hypersensitive portrayal of friendship, sisterhood, family, coming-of-age, queerness, depression, and general malaise, set in small-town Ontario. Divided into three sections – “Sigrid’s Note”, “The Truth”, and “Sigrid” – the story begins deceptively, told through multiple attempts / variations of the Sigrid’s (supposed) suicide note. As We Could Be Rats unfolds, though, the layers of deception are revealed, and Sigrid and her sister, Magrit, are made more raw, vulnerable and slightly less unknowable to each other. A bittersweet and heartfelt ode to childhood and rebellion, and a slyly horrific tale of the insidious ways that our environments can erode and inflict lasting damage on anyone who dares not to conform, written by a relatively young and burgeoning queer literary voice.

DETAILS | Available from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, and Upstart & Crow.

Where the Waters Meet (Great Plains Press), by Stephanie Boulay | Where the Waters Meet follows an angsty and isolated young woman named Titi, who is coming of age in a remote village located literally “where the waters meet”. Where the Waters Meet is told through Titi’s limited perspective as she transitions from childhood into teenagehood, from being mostly sheltered and reliant on her caretaker (whose relationship with her is ambiguous, besides their difference in age and life experience) to being increasingly self-determined, inspired by a chance encounter with a boy from across the river. The author of Where the Waters Meet is probably best known for their music – as one half of the Quebecois sister folk music duo, Les Sœurs Boulay; as well as in her own right as a solo artist – however, she identifies first and foremost as a writer. However you personally regard Boulay, though, the lyrical and folkloric quality of her 2020 novella is undeniable (and natural, considering her dual talents) – even the chapter names (for instance: “Fighting life in my wooden suit of armour”, “All the oranges I’ve eaten before in life”, and “Trapping in them the tongues of smaller beasts”, to name just a few) suggest song titles. Much like an ambient music album, this slim, poetic narrative invites immersion, via a single sitting reading.

DETAILS | Available as a special order from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, and Upstart & Crow.*

The Head (Great Plains Press), by Robyn Braun | Trish, a young Mathematics professor vying for tenure, is entangled in a romantic affair with one of her married colleagues…but, on the advent of her thirtieth birthday, that is the least of her problems. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a small, offensive and perpetually crying head has appeared in her bedroom. Although repulsed, burdened and baffled by it, Trish can’t bring herself to part with it; instead, she feels the contradictory yet overwhelming need to defend and attend to it – even if she doesn’t understand how or why. Is the mysterious head a stand-in for her sexual, professional, familial trauma, which is triggered by its appearance? Trish obviously feels unworthy of, and ill-equipped to navigate, true friendship. At the same time, she harbours a desperate need for support that is neither recognized by nor received from her parents, sexual partners, or trusted colleagues and students, who alternately abject her, reject, ill-advise her, stigmatize her, and/or try to silence, blame and discredit her; to convince her to either “deal with” (take responsibility for) it, ignore it, or dispose of it. Even Mathematics – Trish’s grounding and guiding force, cannot provide the comfort she needs or explain away the mystery of the wailing head. Braun’s first novella is a disturbing, thought-provoking and uncategorizable (feminist?) work of fiction.

DETAILS | Available as a special order from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, Upstart & Crow.*

Paradise Rot (Verso Books), by Jenny Hval | Fecund and fertile, Norwegian musician and author Jenny Hval’s seminal novel foments and ferments in a former brewery located in Aybourne, now the house where foreign student, Jo (also from Norway), resides with her unusual roommate, Carral. The house, with its mysterious origins, seems to have a psychotropic effect on its inhabitants, who drift in and out of states of consciousness, inviting illicit encounters, and forging transmutable bonds. A real trip. Make yourself comfortable, and then relax into it – it will be over quickly (in just 160 pages), but its effects will linger on in your psyche long after you emerge on the other side.

DETAILS | Available from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books.

Dear Dickhead (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), by Virginie Despentes | In Despente’s most recent work of fiction (translated from the original 2022 French version, Cher Connard), two Parisian middle-aged creatives, both famous and infamously degenerate – Rebecca, an actress, and Oscar, a mystery book author – forge an unlikely friendship which evolves against the background noise of COVID lockdowns, and the #MeToo movement and its backlash. Bonded by their respective ventures into sobriety, the extreme circumstances combined with their ally-ship have an unexpectedly positive effect on the pair, who become a little less unlikeable, and a little more tolerant and lucid, responsible and “adult” even, in the process. Told almost entirely through the Rebecca and Oscar’s confessional email exchanges (broken up by the occasional blog post written by Oscar’s own #MeToo accuser and former coworker, Zoe), Dear Dickhead is a compelling read, as well as a truly timely one, and one that I think merits it the (rare) distinction of being a genuinely good piece of COVID-era literature. And I suspect that, much like its central characters, it will only get “better” with the passing of time.

DETAILS | Available from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, and Upstart & Crow.

Years and Years (Open Letter), by Hwang Jungeun | Years and Years, a Korean-to-English translation from Open Letter Books’ 2023 Translator Triptych series, is a compact yet deeply emotional read heralding from celebrated Korean author, Hwang Jungeun. In her latest novel, Jungeun explores the tension between a singular family’s individual members by lending each of its (wildly different) women their respective chapters and voices. Over the course of a succinct 200 pages, Jungeun adeptly reveals the complexity of family dynamics by turning the very concept of “truth” inside-out, giving readers glimpses into the interior dialogues of its female characters.

DETAILS | Available as a special order from such local independent bookstores as Massy Books, Iron Dog Books, and Upstart & Crow.*

Naked: The Confessions of a Normal Woman (Pow Pow Press), by Éloïse Marseille | Bodies and their functions are bizarre. Sex is strange. And both (frequently) have the potential to be abso-friggin-lutely hilarious. Unfortunately, women’s bodies and sexuality are still widely taboo topics, and it’s all too uncommon that we are granted permission by women with agency to laugh at them – perhaps uncomfortably, but not unkindly/unsympathetically (maybe even empathetically). With her graphic novel memoir, Naked, Montreal-based author and artist, Éloïse Marseille, invites us to do just that. Marseille’s effervescent, outspoken personality (last year I had the good fortune of seeing her speak on a comics panel at Montreal’s Read Quebec Book Fair) comes through loud-and-clear in her drawing style – which is bubbly, bold and cartoonish – dialogue, and narrative voice. Depicting her uncensored, personal sexual journey from childhood to twenty-something woman, including a porn addiction and early medical diagnosis with serious implications, and no shortage of foibles and follies, awkward and emotional moments, shame and self-deprecation, disappointments, realizations and pleasures. A delightfully silly, honest, squirm-inducing and honest read from a brand new addition to the comics/graphic novel scene.

DETAILS | Available as a special order from such local independent bookstores as Iron Dog Books and Upstart & Crow.*

*It would be remiss for me not to mention Vancouver’s various independent and used book stores, and encourage you to pay them an in-person visit to seek out these and other titles.