bookchickdi: That's What She Said by Kimothy Joy

Thursday, April 5, 2018

That's What She Said by Kimothy Joy

That's What She Said by Kimothy Joy
Published by Harper Wave ISBN 9780062796769
Hardcover, $21.99, 103 pages

March was Women's History Month, and I had the opportunity to review Karen Karbo's In Praise of Difficult Women, (my review here) profiling 29 women who made broke the rules and contributed to society.

This month, I had the chance to review Kimothy Joy's That What She Said- Wise Words From Influential Woman, which is a wonderful companion piece to In Praise of Difficult Women. Joy is an artist and social activist, whose signature style combines watercolor and ink pen with hand lettering.

That's What She Said perfectly combines Joy's art with her social activism. In the introduction, Foy credits her mother, the oldest of eight children born to a Mexican-American family. Her mother was the first in her family to go to college and earn a master's degree. She was an entrepreneur, a schoolteacher and a spiritual leader, and she imbued her daughter with the idea that women's "strength and resilience are limitless".

Joy profiles dozens of strong, resilient women in her book. Each woman gets two pages- one a very brief profile of her accomplishments, and the other a vibrant drawing by Joy, accompanied by a quote from that woman.

There are the usual suspects here- Amelia Earhart, Frida Kahlo, Marie Curie, Eleanor Roosevelt, and some that may be new to the reader- Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, mathematician and computer scientist Grace Hopper, young German student Sophie Scholl who led a German Nazi resistance group, and British suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst.

A few of my favorite quotes here are:

"I only move forwards, never backwards, darling."- Grace Jones
"I had reasoned this out in my mind; there was one of two things I had a right to, liberty or death; if I could not have one, I would have the other." - Harriet Tubman
"I am building a fire, and every day I train I add more fuel. At just the right moment, I light the match."- Mia Hamm
"Do we have to know who's gay and who's straight? Can't we just love everybody and judge them by the car they drive?"- Ellen DeGeneres

At the end of this beautifully designed book, there is a place to write about a woman who inspired you, making this a perfect book to give as a gift to your Mom for Mother's Day or a graduation gift for a young lady you'd like to inspire and encourage. It would be great to see some of these drawings and quotes made as posters for sale. I could see them on many a dorm room wall.