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Books by Female Authors Everyone Should Read in Their Lifetime

04.17.2016 by Edee Lemonier // 59 Comments

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In July, 2015 Time ran an article entitled 35 Books Everyone Should Read in Their Lifetime. There are tons of book lists all over the Internet. But this is Time, for crying out loud. An institution. So where did Time go for their list? Reddit. Oof. So it should come as no surprise that Time‘s list was severely lacking one thing: female authors. 35 titles, only three women. Really, Time?

I posted a link to the article on Facebook and asked my friends if we could do better. I listed 10 off the top of my head. Three hours and 87 comments later, we had a list. Whoa, Nelly, did we have a list. Over 100. The commenters were from a blend of male, female, and genderqueer authors, editors, and publishers within the Portland literary community.

What I loved most about pulling this list together (aside from how easily everyone could rattle off books/authors), is the number of authors for whom many of us said, “Anything and everything by her!” With that in mind, I will also post a list of just the authors. Because how in the hell is anyone expected to list just one title by Margaret Atwood or Ursula K. LeGuin or Barbara Kingsolver or Dorothy Allison or Lidia Yuknavitch or Judy Blume or—see what I mean? And I realize there are some author names missing, but they will go on the other list. Also note that some books are for younger readers (Magic Treehouse and Junie B Jones), but I felt it worthwhile to list because they are series, kids love them, and anything that will get kids reading chapter books belongs on the list.

Enjoy!

Books by Female Authors Everyone Should Read in Their Lifetime

  1. A Good Man is Hard to Find, Flannery O’Connor
  2. A Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret, Atwood
  3. A House Divided, Pearl S. Buck
  4. A Room of One’s Own, Virginia Woolf
  5. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley
  6. A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle
  7. All About Love, Bell Hooks
  8. Always Coming Home, Ursula K. LeGuin
  9. An Untamed State, Roxane Gay
  10. Anagrams, Lorrie Moore
  11. Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret, Judy Blume
  12. Artificial Things, Karen Joy Fowler
  13. Baby’s on Fire, Liz Prato
  14. Bad Behavior, Mary Gaitskill
  15. Bad Feminist, Roxane Gay
  16. Bastard Out of Carolina, Dorothy Allison
  17. The Bean Trees, Barbara Kingsolver
  18. Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Katherine Boo
  19. The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath
  20. Beloved, Toni Morrison
  21. Blackbird, Jennifer Lauck
  22. Blood & Guts in High School, Kathy Acker
  23. Blood Gravity, Gayle Towell
  24. The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison
  25. Call Me Home, Megan Kruse
  26. Carry the Sky, Kate Gray
  27. Cat’s Eye, Margaret Atwood
  28. The Chronology of Water, Lidia Yuknavitch
  29. Clan of the Cave Bear, Jean M. Auel
  30. Collected Poems of Anne Sexton
  31. The Color Purple, Alice Walker
  32. Compression Scars and Fat Girl Terrestrial, Kellie Wells
  33. Cunt, Inga Muscio
  34. The Dead and the Living, Sharon Olds
  35. Deathcats, Luisa Valenzuela
  36. Deenie, Judy Blume
  37. Democracy, Joan Didion
  38. Dirty Words on Clean Skin, Anita Finlay
  39. Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, Alexandra Fuller
  40. Dora: A Head Case, Lidia Yuknavitch
  41. The Enchanted, Rene Denfeld
  42. The End of Eve, Ariel Gore
  43. The Face of War, Beryl Markham
  44. Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
  45. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel
  46. The Gaze, Elif Shafek
  47. The Girl on a Train, Paula Hawkins
  48. The Glass Castle, Jeanette Walls
  49. The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
  50. Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn
  51. The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck
  52. Good Woman, Lucille Clifton
  53. Harriet the Spy, Louise Fitzhugh
  54. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage, Alice Monro
  55. Honored Guest: Stories by Joy Harjo
  56. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros
  57. Housekeeping, Marilynn Robinson
  58. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, Julia Alvarez
  59. How to Make an American Quilt, Whitney Otto
  60. How We Become Human, Joy Harjo
  61. I Feel Bad About My Neck, Nora Ephron
  62. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou
  63. I Remember Nothing, Nora Ephron
  64. In the Land of Dreamy Dreams, Ellen Gilchrist
  65. In This Light, Melanie Rae Thon
  66. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel, Susanne Clarke
  67. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan
  68. Junie B. Jones (series), Barbara Park
  69. Just Kids, Patti Smith
  70. Landfall, Ellen Urbani
  71. The Lacuna, Barbara Kingsolver
  72. The Lathe of Heaven, Ursula K. LeGuin
  73. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. LeGuin
  74. Lessons from a Dead Girl, Jo Knowles
  75. Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name, Vendela Vida
  76. The Liars Club, Mary Karr
  77. Like a House on Fire, Cate Kennedy
  78. Like Water for Chocolate, Laura Esquivel
  79. Little Miss Strange, Joanna Rose
  80. Lord of Misrule and Bogeywoman, Jaimy Gordon
  81. Love in Infant Monkeys, Lydia Millet
  82. The Lover, Marguerite Duras
  83. Machine Dreams, Jayne Anne Phillips
  84. Maddaddam Trilogy, Margaret Atwood
  85. The Madwoman’s Underclothes, Germaine Greer
  86. Magic Tree House (series), Mary Pope Osborne
  87. The Motorcycle Betrayal Poems, Diane Wachowski
  88. Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
  89. Music for Torching, A.M. Homes
  90. Notes from No Man’s Land, Eula Biss
  91. Olive Kitterage, Elizabeth Strout
  92. The Orchardist, Amanda Koplin
  93. The Orchid Thief, Susan Orlean
  94. Out of Africa, Isak Dinesen
  95. The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton
  96. Parable of the Sower, Octavia E. Butler
  97. Plague of Doves, Louise Erdrich
  98. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
  99. Possessing the Secret of Joy, Alice Walker
  100. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
  101. Ramona Series, Bevery Cleary
  102. The Real and the Unreal, Ursula K. LeGuin
  103. The Red Tent, Anita Diamant
  104. Rise, L. Annette Binder
  105. The Round House, Louise Erdich
  106. Ruby, Cynthia Bond
  107. The Sadeian Woman, Angela Carter
  108. Safekeeping: Some True Stories from a Life, Abigail Thomas
  109. Sexing the Cherry, Jeanette Winerson
  110. The Small Backs of Children, Lidia Yuknavitch
  111. Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison
  112. Sons, Pearl S. Buck
  113. The Stories of Eva Luna, Isabel Allende
  114. Strange Things Happen Here, Luisa Valenzuela
  115. Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston
  116. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
  117. Trash, Dorothy Allison
  118. View with a Grain of Sand, Wislawa Szyborska
  119. West with the Night, Beryl Markham
  120. The Westing Game, Ellen Raskin
  121. The White Album, Joan Didion
  122. White Oleander, Janet Fitch
  123. Why Did I Ever?, Mary Robison
  124. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
  125. Wild, Cheryl Strayed
  126. The Will to Change, Bell Hooks
  127. Wise Children, Angela Carter
  128. Woman Hollering Creek, Sandra Cisneros
  129. Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronté

Post Update:

Wow! I didn’t anticipate the amazing response! Here’s the deal. This list was created when a group of us were just randomly tossing out titles and authors one night on Facebook. We can’t possibly know every female author, and it’s only natural we left some out. It wasn’t intentional, that’s just how it went down. Yep, there’s more Lidia Yuknavitch than Jane Austen. My friends and I love really visceral, really intense writing, which is what you get with Lidia. Also, many of us know her personally, so it’s kind of natural her name comes up. The intent was not to slight anyone. We’re just humans rattling off book titles. But I’m more than happy to add to the list. If there is an author/books you feel passionately about, please leave it in the comments below, and I’ll get to it as quickly as I can.

Readers’ Additions:

  • Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard
  • The Black Prince; The Sea the Sea; The Philosopher’s Pupil (for more titles, see comments), Iris Murdoch
  • A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan
  • Eat the Document, Dana Spiotta
  • UnAmericans, Molly Antopol
  • Half of a Yellow Sun, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Possession, A.S. Byatt
  • Enormous Changes at the Last Minute, Grace Paley
  • Middlemarch, George Eliot
  • Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
  • Last Things, Jenny Offill
  • How to Build A Girl, Caitlin Moran
  • Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel
  • Behind the Scenes at the Museum, Kate Atkinson
  • The Gathering, Anne Enright
  • The Keep, Jennifer Egan
  • I Capture the Castle, Dodie Smith
  • On Beauty, Zadie Smith
  • Traveling Mercies, Anne Lamott
  • The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse, Louise Erdrich
  • The Museum of Extraordinary Things, Alice Hoffman
  • Nothing was the Same, Kay Redfield Jamison
  • Love Medicine P.S., Louise Erdrich
  • Two Serious Ladies, Jane Bowles
  • The Artists’ Way, Julia Cameron
  • The Harry Potter series, JK Rowling
  • A Map of the World, Jane Hamilton
  • Bel Canto, Ann Patchett
  • The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern
  • Room, Emma Donaghur
  • The Long Winter (The Little House series), Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • The House on Coliseum Street, Shirley Ann Grau
  • The Keepers of the House, Shirley Ann Grau (Pulitzer, 1965)
  • The Black Prince and Other Stories, Shirley Ann Grau
  • All my Puny Sorrows, Miriam Toews
  • The History of Love, Nicole Krauss
  • February, Lisa Moore
  • A Restricted Country, Joan Nestle
  • Anne of Green Gables, Lucy Montgomery
  • Far to Go, Alison Pick
  • In Another Place, Not Here, Dionne Brand
  • Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, Jeanette Winterson
  • Bottle Rocket Hearts, Zoe Whittall
  • The Diviners, Margaret Laurence
  • Runaway, Alice Munro
  • Tender Buttons, Gertrude Stein
  • Paris France, Gertrude Stein
  • The Autobiograhy of Alice B Toklas, Gertrude Stein
  • Wars I Have Seen, Gertrude Stein
  • Oyster, Janet Turner
  • Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
  • The Grass Is Singing, Doris Lessing
  • Martha Quest, Doris Lessing
  • What Alice Forgot, Liane Moriarty
  • Death Comes for the Archbishop, Willa Cather
  • My Antonia, Willa Cather
  • O Pioneers!, Willa Cather
  • Dry White Season, Nadine Godimer
  • Tale for the Time Being, Ruth Ozecki
  • The Elegance of the Hedgehog, Muriel Barberry
  • The Man Who Loved Children, Christina Steed
  • During the Reign of the Queen of Persia
  • Art Objects, Jeanette Winterson
  • Regeneration Trilogy, Pat Barker
  • Boy Snow Bird, Helen Oyeyemi
  • Kindred, Octavia Butler
  • Wild Seed, Octavia Butler
  • Zami A New Spelling of My Name, Audre Lorde
  • Woman on the Edge of Time, Marge Piercy
  • He, She and It, Marge Piercy
  • A Weave of Women, E.M. Broner
  • My Year of Meats, Ruth Ozeki
  • The Invention of Wings, Sue Monk Kidd
  • The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
  • River Finger Woman, Elana Dykewomon
  • Beyond the Pale, Elana Dykewomon
  • The Sparrow, Mary Doria Russell
  • Mother of Pearl, Melinda Haynes
  • Tipping the Velvet, Sarah Waters
  • The Dance of the Dissident Daughter, Sue Monk Kidd
  • The Mermaid Chair, Sue Monk Kidd
  • When Things Fall Apart, Pema Chödrön
  • America’s First Black Woman Political Writer: Essays and Speeches, Maria W. Stewart
  • Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black, Bell Hooks
  • In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens, Alice Walker

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Categories // Café News, Reading

Comments

  1. Vivien says

    April 18, 2016 at 10:56 am

    It would be awesome if you could add some Iris Murdoch to this list. I suggest The Black Prince, The Sea The Sea, or The Philosopher’s Pupil. Or The Unicorn, or The Sacred and Profane Love Machine…. or The Severed Head. She’s so good, I really can’t decide between these.

    Reply
  2. Julie says

    April 18, 2016 at 12:37 pm

    The Handmaid’s Tale is listed twice here. Looks like it was entered incorrectly the first time (which also has a comma after Margaret, i.e. “Margaret, Atwood”) and listed under A as “A Handmaid’s Tale.”

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 18, 2016 at 12:40 pm

      Thanks, Julie! This is one of those that more than one person added in our Facebook thread. When I put them all in the spreadsheet to sort them out and delete duplicates, I didn’t catch it because of “A” and “The.” oops! Thanks for spotting it. I deleted the incorrect one.

      Reply
  3. Swannie says

    April 18, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    Shocked Annie Dillard isn’t on that list. Pilgrim At Tinker Creek?

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 6:16 pm

      Added, thanks 🙂

      Reply
  4. JD says

    April 18, 2016 at 7:29 pm

    Not one Willa Cather book?!?

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 18, 2016 at 7:33 pm

      Like I said before, we were just rattling off titles. Can’t know all of them, right? Which ones would you like added? Let me know and I’ll make sure it goes up there. Thanks for you input!

      Reply
      • Donna says

        April 20, 2016 at 6:11 pm

        O Pioneers!, My Antonia, and Death Comes For the Archbishop
        (But all of them, really!)

        Reply
        • Edee Lemonier says

          April 20, 2016 at 9:37 pm

          Got ’em, thanks!

          Reply
  5. Michael Keefe says

    April 18, 2016 at 7:39 pm

    Great list! #13 is my completely unbiased favorite.

    (Check the spelling on #50.)

    Further nominations:
    Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Good Squad (Pulitzer finalist! In a year nobody won!)
    Eat the Document, by Dana Spiotta
    and, although I’ve yet to read it, I’d bet that The UnAmericans, by Molly Antopol, will have staying power
    likewise, either Half of a Yellow Sun or Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 18, 2016 at 8:46 pm

      In reverse order:

      Additions: Again, thanks! Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is definitely someone everyone should read! I haven’t read the others, but I’m glad for the recommendations.

      #50: thanks for the catch!

      #13: unbiased. um… 😉

      Reply
    • Tina says

      April 20, 2016 at 8:54 pm

      Typo – It’s “A Visit from the Goon Squad,” not “Good Squad.”

      Reply
  6. Elizabeth Hickey says

    April 18, 2016 at 8:55 pm

    Favorites from my bookshelf in no particular order:
    Possession, A.S. Byatt
    Enormous Changes at the Last Minute, Grace Paley
    Middlemarch, George Eliot
    Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
    Last Things, Jenny Offill
    How to Build A Girl, Caitlin Moran
    Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel
    Behind the Scenes at the Museum, Kate Atkinson
    The Gathering, Anne Enright
    The Keep, Jennifer Egan
    I Capture the Castle, Dodie Smith
    On Beauty, Zadie Smith

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 18, 2016 at 9:53 pm

      Thanks, Elizabeth – added!

      Reply
  7. Bridget says

    April 19, 2016 at 1:34 pm

    Isabel Allende? House of the Spirits, Daughter of Fortune, etc. Big miss.

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 6:18 pm

      #113, The Stories of Eva Luna. I’ll add those two, as well.

      Reply
  8. Mary Meredith Drew says

    April 19, 2016 at 5:19 pm

    Alice Walker, Sandra Cisneros, Esmeralda Santiago, Diana Abu Jaber, Julia Glass, Amy Tan, Toni Morrison, Monica Drake, Carson McCullers, Sara Gruen, Geraldine Brooks, Anne Lamott, Julia Alvarez, Karen Karbo, Carson McCullers, Karen Joy Fowler…

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 6:18 pm

      Most of them are up there. Since you don’t have a specific title, how about I save it for the author list?

      Reply
  9. Mary Meredith Drew says

    April 19, 2016 at 5:22 pm

    I see some of the women I named are on the list already. Happy to see that, and I agree with you on most of them. I rarely can get around to the men! Except for Sherman Alexie, Tanehisi Coates, and Anthony Doerr. 🙂

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 6:18 pm

      All awesome male writers. I’m especially a huge fan of Sherman Alexie. Thanks!

      Reply
  10. Laura Rifkin says

    April 19, 2016 at 7:19 pm

    Anything by Elana Dykewomon!

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 8:58 pm

      Thanks. I’ll be sure and include her name when I put together the list of authors!

      Reply
  11. Dayv Jones says

    April 19, 2016 at 7:48 pm

    Jane Bowles – Two Serious Ladies

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 8:58 pm

      Got it 🙂

      Reply
  12. Ann Goraczko says

    April 19, 2016 at 7:55 pm

    Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott
    The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich
    The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman
    Nothing was the Same by Kay Redfield Jamison
    Love Medicine P.S. by Louise Erdrich

    Reply
  13. Krista says

    April 19, 2016 at 8:36 pm

    The artists way- Julia Cameron

    Harry Potter series – JK Rowling (how did we miss this???)

    A Map of the World – Jane Hamilton

    Bel Canto – Ann Patchett

    The Night Circus- Erin Morgenstern

    Room – Emma Donaghur

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 8:58 pm

      Added!

      Reply
  14. Barb Mayes Boustead says

    April 19, 2016 at 9:29 pm

    How about Laura Ingalls Wilder? Any book could go on the list, really, but the most definitive of the Little House series is often thought to be “The Long Winter”.

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 10:07 pm

      Holy smokes, Laura Ingalls Wilder. I didn’t read them growing up, but I’ve known a lot of girls/women who learned to love reading because of them. Thanks for the suggestion. Added!

      Reply
  15. Anita Bell says

    April 19, 2016 at 9:53 pm

    If you haven’t read anything by Shirley Ann Grau I hope you will look for her books. She won the Pulitzer in 1965? for The Keepers of the House. Also, wroteThe House on Coliseum Street, The Black Prince and other Stories, and others. She is too little known these days. At one time her books were mostly out of print, but I don’t think that is the case anymore.

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 19, 2016 at 10:09 pm

      A Pulitzer? Wow! How did that not make the Time list? Holy smokes! Thanks for your input. Added 🙂

      Reply
  16. Deb Stone says

    April 19, 2016 at 10:28 pm

    We need a shared Google doc, Edee, where people can add books in alpha order by author or title. Or a FB group where there’s a post for each book so we can discuss them under the book title post as we read them. Or… we’ll you know, a clubhouse!

    Reply
  17. Jocelyn H says

    April 20, 2016 at 8:04 am

    Great list! I’d like to add:

    All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews
    The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
    February by Lisa Moore
    A Restricted Country by Joan Nestle
    Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
    Far to Go by Alison Pick
    In Another Place, Not Here by Dionne Brand
    Oranges are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson
    Bottle Rocket Hearts by Zoe Whittall
    The Diviners by Margaret Laurence
    Runaway by Alice Munro

    I could go on and on… 😉

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 20, 2016 at 9:38 pm

      Got ’em, thanks!

      Reply
  18. Eileen Dreamwalker says

    April 20, 2016 at 6:08 pm

    A million thank yous. Not a novel but could not be happy without Mary Oliver….especially “A Summer’s Day”I hope my book club will hit this list! We are reading Handmaids Tale at present

    Reply
  19. Donna says

    April 20, 2016 at 6:18 pm

    Gertrude Stein:
    Tender Buttons
    Paris France
    The Autobiograhy of Alice B Toklas
    Wars I Have Seen
    etc.

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 20, 2016 at 9:39 pm

      Added, thanks!

      Reply
  20. Fiona Hamer says

    April 20, 2016 at 9:12 pm

    My additions would be
    Janet Turner Hospital for Oyster
    Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre
    Doris Lessing Martha Quest and The Grass is Singing
    Liane Moriarty What Alice Forgot

    (So many times there, but these are from a list I made where the criteria was how much they’d influenced my thinking, or just plain stuck in my thoughts. Oyster came top on that list)

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 20, 2016 at 9:39 pm

      Added, thanks!

      Reply
  21. Cb says

    April 20, 2016 at 10:17 pm

    Nadine Godimer dry white season

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 20, 2016 at 10:59 pm

      Got it, thanks! 🙂

      Reply
  22. Kay Henderson says

    April 21, 2016 at 7:21 am

    Ruth Ozecki – Tale for the Time Being
    Muriel Barberry – The Elegance of the Hedgehog
    Christina Steed – The Man Who Loved Children
    Joan Chase – During the Reign of the Queen of Persia
    Jeanette Winterson – Art Objects
    Pat Barker – Regeneration Trilogy
    Helen Oyeyemi – Boy Snow Bird

    Reply
  23. Rebecca Silverstein says

    April 21, 2016 at 8:34 am

    Octavia Butler – Kindred
    Octavia Butler – Wild Seed
    Audrey Lorde – Zami A New Spelling of My Name
    Marge Piercy – Woman on the Edge of Time
    Marge Piercy- He, She and It
    E.M. Broner – A Weave of Women
    Ruth Ozeki- My Year of Meats
    Sue Monk Kidd- The Invention of Wings
    Sue Monk Kidd- The Secret life of Bees
    Elana Dykewomon – River Finger Woman
    Elana Dykewomon – Beyond the Pale
    Mary Doria Russell – The Sparrow
    Melinda Haynes – Mother of Pearl

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 21, 2016 at 10:24 am

      Got ’em, thanks!

      Reply
  24. Rebecca Silverstein says

    April 21, 2016 at 8:36 am

    Audre Lorde…my iPad autocorrected…

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 21, 2016 at 10:25 am

      No problem. I have a love/hate with autocorrect 🙂

      Reply
  25. Rebecca Silverstein says

    April 21, 2016 at 8:38 am

    Sarah Waters – Tipping the Velvet

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 21, 2016 at 10:25 am

      Added. And thanks for all the wonderful additions!

      Reply
  26. Jennifer Garcia says

    April 21, 2016 at 12:03 pm

    Here are my must reads, just off the top of my head. I’m sure if I looked in my library, I’d find a dozen more.

    Spiritual Journey books:
    “The Dance of the Dissident Daughter” Sue Monk Kidd
    “The Mermaid Chair” Sue Monk Kidd (read “Dance…” first, this one isn’t exactly a sequel but sort of)
    “When Things Fall Apart” Pema Chödrön

    Black Feminist Books:
    Maria W. Stewart, America’s First Black Woman Political Writer: Essays and Speeches
    “Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black” bell hooks (I’ve read 5 of her books)
    “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens” Alice Walker

    Reply
    • Edee Lemonier says

      April 21, 2016 at 12:25 pm

      Those sound awesome, Jennifer. Added!

      Reply
  27. Janet Hughes says

    April 22, 2016 at 3:58 am

    Amy Greene – Bloodroot
    (A relatively new southern author)

    Betty Smith – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

    Stephenie Meyer – The Host
    (Couldn’t put it down, and I was on vacation in Italy!)

    Catherine V Forrest – anything she wrote

    Reply
  28. linda anselmi says

    April 23, 2016 at 10:18 am

    Anya Seton — Devil Water, Katherine, Green Darkness, Foxfire …
    Georgette Heyers — Devil’s Cub, Infamous Army, Lady of Quality…

    Reply
    • linda anselmi says

      April 23, 2016 at 10:32 am

      Barbara Mertz (aka Barbara Michaels– Be Buried In The Rain, Elizabeth Peters — Street of Five Moons…)

      Reply
  29. Sherry Henson says

    April 24, 2016 at 5:24 am

    Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns; The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler; Circle of Friends by Maeve Binchy

    Reply
  30. Jane Arlene Herman says

    April 28, 2016 at 7:33 pm

    Please add to your list: Jeanne Cordova’s “When We Were Outlaws”. Any of Jeanne’s books are great read.

    Reply
  31. Nessa McCasey says

    May 11, 2016 at 1:53 pm

    H is for Hawk, by Helen MacDonald
    Brown Girl Dreaming, by Jacqueline Woodson
    Tell The Wolves I’m Home, by Carol Rifka Brunt

    Are some favorites I read in the past couple of years. Thank you for this list. I will print out and give to my mother to share with her book club – they are always looking for good books. And I need a good list to read from, as well!

    Reply
  32. Nancy says

    February 22, 2017 at 7:25 pm

    Ayn Rand…Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, Anthem (to name three).
    I know there are other female novelists that I could name (and many of them are listed above, but…). ~nan

    Reply
  33. Ann Goraczko says

    December 9, 2017 at 2:11 pm

    I discovered Diana Gabaldon and the Outlander series in August, 2016. I couldn’t stop until I read all 8 novels and her Lord John Grey series and related titles. I finally finished them in December, 2016, and started reading them all over again.

    Reply

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    March 1, 2017 at 3:10 am

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