Fieldwork As a Sex Object and At Sea
Meena Kandasamy & Y.M. Abdel-Magied
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1h 3m
Join Women's Prize-shortlisted author Dr Meena Kandasamy and award-winning engineer-turned-novelist Y.M. Abdel-Magied in conversation with Ash Sarkar for an evening exploring two forms of modern warfare against women—one waged online, one offshore—and what it takes to fight back.
In Meena Kandasamy's incendiary Fieldwork as a Sex Object, Amrita Chaturvedi—communist Twitter personality with a reality TV past—wakes on her birthday to find a deepfake porno of her face going viral via WhatsApp aunties. Her executioners? A cartel of keyboard warriors styling themselves after V for Vendetta, on a ruthless crusade to wipe out "desi jezebels" and Make India Hindu Again.
In Y.M. Abdel-Magied's thrilling At Sea, expert driller Zainab takes charge of a high-stakes oil rig operation, leaving her pregnant sister behind for the job of her life. The catch? She's the only woman amongst a crew of hardened men who want nothing to do with her. As the rig teeters on collapse, Zainab realizes the real danger lies not in the machinery but in the cold calculations and base desires of the men she must work alongside.
Together, Meena, Y.M., and Ash will explore the different battlegrounds of modern misogyny—from incels and influencers to the machismo of Big Oil—the impossible choices women face when ambition collides with systemic hostility, and why both authors refuse to let their fierce, complicated heroines be silenced. Hardback copies of Meena Kandasamy's Fieldwork as a Sex Object (RRP £16.99) & Y.M. Abdel-Magied's At Sea (RRP £16.99) are available as an add-on at checkou