*Apologies for the occasional interruptions in this episode. We were contending with door knocking, phone calls and very loud package deliveries.*
Imagine, if you will, a very safe and special place for women. It’s candy-hued and tastefully lit; it’s a space of female community and mutual empowerment. Most of all, it’s secret, exclusive, guarded. If a cis man ever tries to enter, he will be met with force. It’s The Wing meets Skull and Bones, and behind the gates, New York’s most elite women are plotting change.
This is Nevertheless, a clandestine social club at the heart of Laura Hankin’s witty, suspenseful satire A Special Place for Women. The novel follows an out-of-work, lonely journalist named Jillian Beckley who pitches a moonshot story to her old editor and crush: An exposé of what really goes on inside the long-rumored, never-confirmed-to-exist club. She believes that the powerful women of Nevertheless were behind the election of the city’s first woman mayor, and that they engineered her downfall after she tried to pass a wealth tax. She infiltrates the club — with some help from her childhood friend, Raf, a celebrity chef who agrees to pretend to be her boyfriend — and quickly discovers there is a lot going on. But what exactly? Is it just kitschy cute you-go-girl feminism, salary negotiation workshops, and virtue signaling? Or is there something darker… even something genuinely spooky?
We chatted with Laura — who is, full disclosure, a longtime close friend — about her new book, safe spaces for women, girlbosses, Rachel Hollis, capitalism, female friendship, and so much more.
Here’s a brief excerpt of our conversation:
Claire: There's so much to discuss in this book: corporate feminism and girlbosses, pastel furniture and cute neon signs that say, like, fuck the patriarchy, Tarot decks on sale at Urban Outfitters, and, of course, being special women, which we all are. Laura, thank you so much for joining us.
Laura: Thank you so much for having me. We've had so many conversations over the years, but never one recorded before.
Emma: The pressure is on! To kick us off, where did the idea for this book come from?
Laura: So the funny thing that I don't think you knew until today, Emma, is that you played a role. About four years ago, you invited me to come and meet you for a coffee at this exclusive women-only space, The Wing. I remember being so excited to meet you there. I had never been before, but I had obviously seen the gorgeous Instagram. And I was like, “Oh my god, it's gonna be this incredible utopia for women. I'm gonna feel so welcomed. Maybe I'll try to join.” And I was at this place in my life where I didn't feel particularly impressive — [My first book], Happy And You Know It, had not been published yet. I was running around to a bunch of day jobs. And I remember going and meeting you and you were so wonderful. But I just felt so out of place and so self-conscious. I was like, “What am I doing here? My dress is so wrinkly. I'm too short.” It just made me wonder, what would happen if a woman who really did not picture herself being part of an exclusive club had to infiltrate it for her career?
Claire: I was really intrigued by the idea of setting a really dark thriller/satire/mystery in these really glossy, cozy spaces that are supposed to be safe spaces for women who are threatened by male violence at every turn. I'm curious for you, what appealed to you about this juxtaposition of genre and setting?
Laura: I think I was always like, “Oh, if I could just get into those beautiful spaces, and be surrounded by other women, and suddenly, I just had my allies in the fight and we could rest together, then everything would be great.” And that is obviously not the case. And so I wanted to dig underneath these shiny surfaces. Because I feel like sometimes the shiny surfaces can hide the deepest secrets. And also, I'm really drawn to shiny surfaces, and I want to be a part of them.
Emma: In the book, you get at the inherent tension between advocating for gender equality and the exclusivity of an elite club — even if it is focused on women. It erases so many other ways that oppression plays out in our culture [other than gender], and also turns this social justice mission into a capitalist product. It's something that I think was you dealt with really compassionately, which, as someone who was a member of The Wing, and loved it, but also felt really conflicted about it the whole time, I really appreciated.
Claire: It's so seductive to believe that you could belong to this beautiful place full of impressive people. And I feel like your book really gets at this. [Places like] The Wing, and more importantly, Nevertheless [the fictional women’s club in the book], they're trying to embody an ideal of acceptance. That is what social justice is built on. It's not exclusivity, it's everyone gets the same, everyone gets their needs met equally. But what we really want in our communities is to be special. There's no community, the way that humans build community, without some people not being in it. And that is fundamentally inextricable from the appeal of a social club. So how do you find community without betraying the ideal of “everyone is equal, everyone is accepted”? It’s very difficult for the women of Nevertheless to resolve that. Do you feel like you're still struggling with resolving that?
Laura: A little bit? It's really nice to be able to have a “common enemy.” That might be the wrong [term], but to be able to be like, “well, the men can't come.” And I think a lot of the women in the club in the book will say the right things. Like, “we have to remember these other women, too, we have to support them, the ones who are not as fortunate as us.” But it takes hard work to actually reach out and include those other people. And also, then it would make going to the club not feel quite as exciting and fun, right? Having something be secret or exclusive makes it automatically feel so much more important than it actually is.
Emma: I think so many of us don't want to admit the appeal of that, because it feels kind of gross to be like, “I like being special. I like being included in the thing that not everyone is [included in].” And so if you can dress that up in a mission, then you don't have to feel bad.
Claire: There's this incredible balancing act that these companies are trying to do, which is marketing both acceptance and exclusivity, and trying to capitalize on both of those desires. Because what we all want is to be accepted and for other people not to be. And so if you can sell both sides of that, that's very effective.
Emma: Laura, you do a really good job of interrogating those impulses, and universalizing the experience [of wanting to be chosen] and then picking it apart, but doing it from a really compassionate place, which makes A Special Place For Women such a fantastic read.
Laura: Ultimately, I always really love my characters. And so I always do want them to succeed and try to be better. So I think I was coming at the writing of the book from that place. It's like, okay, they might fail, they might do some bad things. But is there hope for redemption for us all? Can we find a way to both belong and not keep people out unnecessarily?
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. You can listen to the full Rich Text audio chat in this newsletter, or wherever you get your podcasts!
You can buy “A Special Place For Women,” which comes out May 11th, here, check out her virtual book launch here, and follow Laura on Instagram and Twitter!
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