The Society of Shame

<b>&#147;If you liked <i>Lessons in Chemistry</i> by Bonnie Garmus read <i>The Society of Shame</i> by Jane Roper.&#148; &#151;<i>The Washington Post</i><br><br>In this timely and witty combination of <i>So You've Been Publicly Shamed</i> and <i>Where'd You Go Bernadette?</i> a viral photo of a politician's wife's &#147;feminine hygiene malfunction&#148; catapults her to unwanted fame in a story that's both a satire of social media stardom and internet activism and a tender mother-daughter tale.</b><br><br>Kathleen Held&#146;s life is turned upside down when she arrives home to find her house on fire and her husband on the front lawn in his underwear. But the scandal that emerges is not that Bill who's running for Senate is having a painfully cliched affair with one of his young staffers: it's that the eyewitness photographing the scene accidentally captures a period stain on the back of Kathleen&#146;s pants.<br><br>Overnight Kathleen finds herself the unwitting figurehead for a social media-centered women&#146;s right movement #YesWeBleed.&#160;Humiliated Kathleen desperately seeks a way to hide from the spotlight. But when she stumbles upon the&#160;Society&#160;of&#160;Shame&#151;led by the infamous author Danica Bellevue&#151;Kathleen finds herself part of a group who are all working to change their lives after their own scandals. Using the teachings of the&#160;society Kathleen channels her newfound fame as a means to reap the benefits of her humiliation and reclaim herself. But as she ascends to celebrity status Kathleen's growing obsession with maintaining her popularity online threatens her most important relationship IRL: that with her budding activist daughter Aggie.<br><br>Hilarious and heartfelt <i>The Society of Shame</i> is a pitch-perfect romp through politics and the perils of being extremely online&#151;without losing your sanity or your true self.