Even If You're Broken: Essays on Sexual Assault and #MeToo

Even If You're Broken: Essays on Sexual Assault and #MeToo by Pryal, Katie Rose Guest. paperback edition. ISBN: 9781947834422.

**Winner of the GOLD Medal in the 2020 IPPY Book of the Year Awards.** This dazzling collection, “rich in vulnerability and candor,” reveals how a young professor found her voice by confronting her difficult past. In this clear-eyed, incisive, and sometimes darkly funny book, author and law professor Katie Pryal takes readers on her journey from a place of fear and silence to one of courage and hope. For years, Pryal experienced the many ways women are manipulated and exploited, but she kept the abuse secret because she believed she must in order to succeed in her career. One day she spoke out, and, although terrified, she transformed her life from one of silent acceptance to one of strength by telling her own stories and speaking out against gender violence in every corner of society. Her stories include a grim yet hilarious account of attempted sexual manipulation by a male professor that nearly cost Pryal her degree; a surreal, quick-witted tale of attempting to report her own sexual assault to a college Title IX office—once she became a full-time professor; a bizarre story of being secretly filmed by an artist for a massive public exhibit. Pryal then turns her legal eye outward and provides sharp critiques of the Bill Cosby case, the musician Kesha’s struggle to break free of her abuser’s recording contract, the unending tangle of sexual assault and college sports—and more. By taking on the difficult subjects of gender violence and sexual assault and handling them with grace and even humor, Pryal implores us to open our hearts to survivors and their stories so that we, too, will no longer be silent. If you enjoy books by Rebecca Solnit and Melissa Febos, you will love Even If You’re Broken. “Gives a voice to survivors whose bravery is often overlooked just because they are silent.” -BookTrib Magazine “Pryal’s evocative essays remind us that there is power and beauty in our imperfect journey.” -Andrea Pino, co-author of We Believe You: Survivors of Campus Sexual Assault Speak Out