Review of Kristen Koopman, “Solve for X,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 203-231 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
Content note: Lots of misogyny and low level sexual harassment.
This is a story for any academic who has ever walked into the room and been the only one of their kind in the room — for the women, for the minorities, for the people in the “wrong” field for their gender, for all the people in the intersections.
It’s a — quite long for LSQ — complex and complicated story of the difficulties of being a woman, and a minority woman at that, in academia, and in a science field at that. It’s at times hard reading, but rightfully so, because that’s not an easy position to navigate, a fact both Julia, newly-appointed member of faculty, and her PhD student, Mercedes, must face; but it’s also at times rather cathartic. And while the way they face the issues is what makes this story speculative, an intriguing example of SF, it’s not the main focus of the story, just an elegant allegory.
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