Difficult Women Book Club’s monthly meetings help boost female voices

The UNC-Chapel Hill branch of the Difficult Women Book Club met in Peabody Hall this past Tuesday night to discuss their latest book of the month, "Violeta" by Isabel Allende. 

The Difficult Women Book Club is a Barcelona-based organization devoted to reading novels solely created by female-identifying authors, but the club is welcome to all. 

Natalie Peña-Galvis, president of this club, shared her experience with the founding of this branch. While reading "Beloved" by Toni Morrison in class, Peña-Galvis recognized how instead of discussing the novel as a group, they instead split off to write individual essays, sparking her idea to reach out to the current secretary, Molly Voit, and the current treasurer, Annah Ndirangu to possibly start a book club. 

Soon after, Peña-Galvis discovered the creator of the Difficult Women Book Club, Linda Massi. 

“I think just creating a community where people can read a book and then just get together and talk about it. Which is super simple, but that's the essence of what a book club is,” Peña-Galvis said when asked about her main goals for the organization. 

This week's meeting was held to discuss a novel following Violeta Del Valle through letters to her loved ones as she witnessed various upheavals throughout her century-long life. 

The monthly book is decided through input from each chapter of the club, and ultimately the book receiving the most votes at the end will be the selected read, Peña-Galvis said. 

“I feel like it's just really nice to hear different perspectives and sides of women that you don't necessarily when it's written by people who haven't lived those kinds of experiences or don't have the lens that females do,” Ndirangu said.  “I feel like you don't think about it at first glance whenever you're just in a library or in a bookstore. About who actually is writing the stories that you're reading? So, it encourages me to read and engage more with female authors.”

The global aspect of the club is especially important to the readers, Peña-Galvis said.

“I especially love how it's such an international community. I think it's so cool that people from literally every corner of the world are all reading the same book at the same time, like maybe reading it in different languages. It creates a community without having to know the other people,” she said.

Voit said the global nature of the club is reflected in this week's book choice. 

“This month is reading an author from Chile. And then in the past we’ve read authors that are Palestinian or American. There's all different kinds of narratives that are in the stories you're reading, which is really cool,” she said. 

Each of the three members of the executive board have experienced a different side of Difficult Women Book Club since its founding. 

For Ndirangu, the club has allowed for members to express various opinions, enjoy themselves and creatively stimulate their minds outside of their academic literature. 

Voit expressed her appreciation for the way the group pushes her to read novels she wouldn't otherwise look at. 

“Especially because I'm not an English major, I was really excited to be able to read books and keep myself accountable to reading and being able to talk about that with other people who are interested in reading,” Voit said. 

Peña-Galvis discussed this book club as a reading outlet. 

“We have to read so much for other classes, it's so easy for that hobby to kind of get lost. But if you have a book club where you come together every month, that kind of carves out of time for it,” she said. 

She also shared her appreciation for the group setting. 

“Everyone was so energetic and enthusiastic. It's just so fun and it's so nice to be surrounded by people who also get really excited and passionate about books,” she said.

UNC-Chapel Hill’s Difficult Women Book Club will soon be starting their novel for October, with information on the books, meeting dates and how to join here. 

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