Although Helen Merrick’s book, The Secret Feminist Cabal has been out for some time (it won a 2010 Atheling Award and was nominated for the 2010 Hugo’s). This is the first time I have seen it promoted in ebook form (which makes it so much more tempting to buy- and I did) and it’s available at Wizard’s Tower Books, headed by the wonderful Cheryl Morgan1.
What is the Secret Feminist Cabal?
The Secret Feminist Cabal is an extended answer to the question Helen Merrick asks in her introduction: "why do I read feminist sf?" In this wide-ranging cultural history we are introduced to a multiplicity of sf feminisms as Merrick takes readers on a tour of the early days of sf fandom, tracks the upheavals of the 1950s and 1960s and the explosions of feminist sf in the 1970s, and contextualizes subsequent developments in feminist sf scholarship.
Her history is expansive and inclusive: it ranges from North America to the UK to Australia; it tells us about readers, fans, and academics as well as about writers, editors, and publishers; and it examines the often uneasy intersections of feminist theory and popular culture.
Merrick brings things up to date with considerations of feminist cyberfiction and feminist science and technology studies, and she concludes with an intriguing review of the Tiptree Award as it illuminates current debates in the feminist sf community. Broadly informed, theoretically astute, and often revisionary, The Secret Feminist Cabal is an indispensable social and cultural history of the girls who have been plugged into science fiction. [Source]
Published by Aqueduct Press books, it is available from Amazon, but I prefer not to deal with them if I can avoid it, besides you can purchase both formats ( mobi and epub ) from Wizard’s Tower DRM free.
If you are keen on the paperback version Booktopia has it for $21.90 and if you type the words FINALS in the appropriate coupon box in checkout (before midnight tonight) you can get free postage(not just on Helen’s book but on your whole order).
1. After a little more digging it seems that its probably been available through Aqueduct press for a while in ebook form↩
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