About the Book

There are substances called mycotoxins that cause illness in people. There are also molds in feed-grain called vomitoxins (really!) which can cause a severe antiperistaltic reaction in animals. Pigs are the most sensitive species.

Dr. Howard Lerner is a veterinary scientist whose family is shattered following his daughter Lily’s violent attack in a public bathroom in Chicago. Months after the assault, Dr. Lerner, a researcher in porcine diseases, discovers a substance that condenses a mycotoxin and serendipitously creates a weapon which can be used for self-defense.

Strong Women in Chicago is a funny, feminist version of the classic movie Death Wish. Here too, the police (in this case a female officer assigned to Lily Lerner following the attack) eventually figure out how a growing number of women are protecting themselves using a very unusual method of self-defense. SWIC (Strong Women in Chicago) is a chain of women’s exercise facilities owned by wealthy Mitzi Solomon. It is she who helps create a place made possible that women have only dreamed of: a place where they are safe from dangerous men.

About the Author

Fern Kupfer taught creative writing at Iowa State University for over thirty years and is the author of three novels and two memoirs: Surviving the Seasons (Delacorte), No Regrets (Viking), Love Lies (Simon and Schuster) and Leaving Long Island (Culicidae Press). Before and After Zachariah, a story about family life with a severely disabled child, is in its third edition (Chicago Review Press).

Her essays and articles have appeared in Newsweek, Newsday, Redbook, Family Circle, Woman’s Day, The Women’s Review of Books, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Parents, Cosmopolitan, and The Des Moines Register. Collections include: Nice Jewish Girls (Plume/Penguin), The Secret Lives of Lawfully Wedded Wives and Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers on Fairytales (Anchor/Doubleday).

Fern Kupfer lives in Ames, Iowa with her husband Joseph Geha. Together they are part of the Iowa Writer’s Collaborative and write the substack: Fern and Joe.