As women across the country publicly opened up about harassment and assaults by politicians, actors, and news personalities, I cracked open Manhattan Beach, the new novel from Jennifer Egan. And there it was in black-and-white: the systematic belittling of women harkening back to a time when the phrase “boys will be boys” might have been coined. Who says fiction is fake? Who says novels are mere fantasy? The fiction writer casts an eye on society with a perception — and with the advantage of...