In these high flying media conglomerate days, I never expect to find insightful commentary on gender issues in anything mainstream. Newspapers? When even the supposedly liberal New York Times dedicates half of an article about a reproductive rights march that totaled about a million people (the largest march on Washington ever) to the 150 protesters that bothered to show up, there's no hope. Movies? Aside from a few good ones that manage to sneak in, I think I can sum the situation up by noting that filmmakers believe that female characters must either be almost entirely eliminated from movies (such as in Bee Movie, which didn't like the fact that bee hives are almost 100% female in real life, and made all the bees male), or be sex vixens or romanticsimps , for the most part. Books? OK, this is where it gets interesting. I brought two books to read on a recent flight. One was an acclaimed literary novel, the other an "exotic thriller" that was a huge best seller. In both books, I found fascinating ideas about gender roles, gender identity, and sexuality.