The Women Are Not Fine: Domestic Violence Awareness and Prevention

Dr. Laura welcomes Hope Reese, journalist and author of The Women Are Not Fine: A Dark History of a Poisonous Sisterhood, and Lana Wells, Associate Professor and Brenda Strafford Chair in the Prevention of Domestic Violence at the University of Calgary, to the show for an important conversation about domestic violence awareness and prevention. Hope shares the history behind her book, which investigates a group of women in a Hungarian village who poisoned a large number of abusive men in their lives a century ago. She explores how the conditions that shaped these women’s experiences continue to affect women today. Lana brings her expertise in gender-based violence prevention to examine why domestic violence remains so prevalent and what needs to change to stop it before it starts. For Dr. Laura, who lost her niece Jasmine and Jasmine’s daughter Aaliyah to domestic violence and homicide in 2019, this issue is deeply personal and one she is committed to raising awareness about through the WITH HER (www.withher.ca) movement she co-founded.

Dr. Laura, Hope, and Lana explore the warning signs of domestic violence, coercive control, and the cultural attitudes and institutional systems that allow abuse to continue. Lana shares research into patterns of domestic violence and prior police interactions, explaining why prevention efforts must shift responsibility away from victims and toward those causing harm. Hope highlights the power of storytelling, historical understanding, and community conversations in challenging the normalization of violence against women. Together, they discuss the importance of educating boys and men, empowering bystanders to intervene safely, and fostering empathy, healthy relationships, and accountability in families, schools, workplaces, and communities. Despite the difficult realities of domestic violence, this conversation offers hope for a future where collective action, stronger support systems, and cultural change can help create a safer world for women and girls.

“Teaching men, teaching boys, having them be able to empathize, see themselves in each other, in somebody else's shoes. This is like a key challenge to our moment…” Hope Wells

“And I think we're asking the wrong questions. I think we need to be asking: why does he think it's okay to hurt or control someone he loves?” Lana Wells

About Hope Reese:

Hope Reese is a journalist and author whose work appears in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Boston Globe, and other publications.

Her debut book, The Women Are Not Fine, investigates the Angel Makers of Nagyrév — a group of women in rural Hungary involved in one of the deadliest mass poisoning cases in history. Through archival research and reporting, Reese explores the forces behind the crimes, including survival, poverty, and violence in the aftermath of World War I.

Website: HopeReese.com
LinkedIn: HopeReese

About Lana Wells:

Lana’s ability to work across disciplines, translate knowledge into action, meaningfully advance systems change, and develop innovative policy and practice solutions has positioned her as a distinguished changemaker in Alberta and beyond. As an Associate Professor in the UCalgary Faculty of Social Work and the Brenda Strafford Chair in the Prevention of Domestic Violence, Lana founded Shift: The Project to End Domestic Violence in 2010 – the first primary prevention research hub in Canada to focus solely on stopping domestic and sexual violence before it starts. In leading this work, Lana has collaborated with community leaders and policymakers to produce over a hundred violence-prevention reports used by various orders of government and community organizations throughout Canada and abroad with a focus on advancing primary prevention. Lana actively supervises graduate students within the Faculty of Social Work and is a research fellow with the School of Public Policy.

Lana holds a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work from the University of Calgary and a combined honours degree in Religious and Women Studies from McMaster University. In her spare time, you can find Lana on a bike with her family in the Rocky Mountains.