I love it when someone I trust tells me about a new book they’ve read that they think I would like. It’s better than a new restaurant, better than a new movie. In fact it’s even better than a new coffee shop opening in town.
Living in Portland, Maine means all of these things happen a lot – restaurants opening, movies coming, new coffee shops – and it also means that there are going to be many months of indoor activities.
We have a good bookstore, Longfellow Books, and we have a good bookclub, Maine Women Write. But what I couldn’t find was a good list of “new” books by women. So I made this one up from my life here in Portland and I share it with you in hopes that you trust me and that it will give you as much pleasure as it has given me.
I give you 50 of my favorite books written by women in the past 50 years:
Tales of Burning Love – Louise Erdrich
Gilead – Marilynne Robinson
Olive Kitteridge – Elizabeth Strout
The Autobiography of My Mother – Jamaica Kincaid
Grace Paley: The Collected Stories – Grace Paley
Break It Down – Lydia Davis
Dance of the Happy Shades – Alice Munro
The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing
A Girl Named Zippy – Haven Kimmel
The Wide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys
The Bottle Factory Outing – Beryl Bainbridge
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek – Annie Dillard
A Swiftly Tilting Planet – Madeleine L’Engle
Kindred – Octavia Butler
The Joy Luck Club – Amy Tan
A Thousand Acres – Jane Smiley
The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone – J.K. Rowling
The God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy
White Teeth – Zadie Smith
The Elegance of the Hedgehog – Muriel Barberry
Stones from the River – Ursula Hegi
The Tiger’s Wife – Tea Obreht
The Feminine Mystique – Betty Friedan
The Solace of Open Spaces – Gretel Ehrlich
The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
Against Interpretation – Susan Sontag
Slouching Towards Bethlehem – Joan Didion
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou
Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret – Judy Blume
Wise Blood – Flannery O Connor
The Dispossessed – Ursula LeGuinn
Speedboat – Renata Adler
The Sea, The Sea – Iris Murdoch
The Bloody Chamber – Angela Carter
The Color Purple – Alice Walker
The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
Beloved – Toni Morrison
Bad Behavior – Mary Gaitskill
Geek Love – Katherine Dunn
Possession – A.S. Byatt
The Secret History – Donna Tartt
The Shipping News – Annie Proulx
Birds of America – Lorrie Moore
Journal of a Solitude – May Sarton
Magic for Beginners – Kelly Link
The Liars Club – Mary Karr
A Visit from the Goon Squad – Jennifer Egan
The Flame Throwers – Rachel Kushner
Okay, I’ve shared mine. Now it’s your turn. Send me your suggestions and I’ll post it here.
Happy reading.
When She Woke by Hillary Jordan (Also her novel Mudbound)
Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (not new, but a classic)
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver
The Pilot’s Wife by Anita Shreve
The Glass Castle by Jeanette Wells
That’s all I can think of for now, but I’m sure I have more!
oh yes – while I was out walking I also thought of Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley. Maybe we will have to go for a hundred.
Yep, Mudbound and When She Woke by Hillary Jordan
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A Woman in Berlin, Anonymous
Persian Girls, Nahid Rachlin
Hate List, Jennifer Brown
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Skloot
Late Wife, Claudia Emerson
White Teeth, Zadie Smith
Black Milk: On Writing, Motherhood and the Harem Within, Elif Shafak
Also by Shafak: Bastard of Istanbul
The Tiger’s Wife, Tea Obreht
The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern
The Almond, Nedjma
So many more
yes yes yes – The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and a friend of mine is reading Gone Girl and she won’t answer the phone or do anything around the house until it’s done.
I just finished Gone Girl today. Wow. What a fucked up book in the very best psychotic way. I loved it. I finished it in two or three days. Immortal Life was great.
that does it. I’m there.
More:
The White Bone by Barbara Gowdy
Operating Instructions by Ann Lamott
The Giver by Lois Lowry
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
thanks, keep them coming.
Ship Fever by Andrea Barrett
The News from Spain by Joan Wickerhsam
A Little More About Me by Pam Houston
The Edge of Marriage by Hester Kaplan
how cool – i have not read one of these. what a good idea i had.
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Back When We Were Grownups by Anne Tyler
Fortune’s Rocks by Anita Shreve
Blackbird House by Alice Hoffman
The Last Uncle (poetry) by Linda Pastan
how could i leave out Alice Hoffman? thanks for your input
So many authors; so little time!
Wanderground-Sally Gearhart
The Dyke and the Dybbuk-Ellen Galford
Burning Questions-Alix Kates Shulman
nice ones – thanks gretch
Oriana Fallaci – ‘A Man’ or any of her essays
Ann Hood – ‘The Obituary Writer’
Asne Seierstad – ‘The Bookseller of Kabul’
I will think on this…for now all recommended are well-written.
I noticed some of the listed suggested writers/books are not well-written; they are, however, well marketed. My preference is to spend my time reading books that are thoughtful, reflective, perhaps action & with a focus on public policy and social change.
Love & Light – jk cosmos
great suggestions – thanks. I loved The Bookseller of Kabul and I will add the others to my reading future. I like and read lots of different kinds of books so it is helpful to get input from people who have specific interests such as yourself. Keep them coming.
so which ones, in your humble opinion, weren’t well-written (but, as you say, well marketed)? For me, a novel may be well-written but boring as hell…..
Come to Me, Amy Bloom
Where You’ll Find Me, Ann Beattie (or The New Yorker Stories)
The Collected Stories, Amy Hempel
The Whole World Over, Julia Glass
You are the second person to say hey what about Amy Hempel. I love Amy Hempel – her At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom slayed me. Thanks Sarah.
Also: I Am No One You Know, Joyce Carol Oates
Mrs. Bridge, Evan S. Conell Howard’s End, EM Forster
Dear Life, Alice Munro Who Do You Love, Jean Thompson Someone, Alice McDermott Unaccustomed Earth, Jhumpa Lahiri
Just working on Dear Life – I love Alice Munro. Thanks Natalie.
The Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon, Broken For You by Stephanie Kallos, Wounds of Passion by bell hooks, Pages For You by Sylvia Brownrigg…
oh yeah – thanks Kristen.
So great to have all these compiled! I’d add a couple of new voices to the list — Chimimanda Adichie (Purple Hibiscus, Americanah) and Jami Attenberg (The Middlesteins). Also an older title — Into the Forest by Jean Heglund.
I know. I can’t wait to compose the “new” list. I’ll bet there’s 50 more at least. Thanks, Kate.
I would love to see a list of the best lesbian fiction. Pages For You by Sylvia Brownrigg was wonderful and having finished it only yesterday, I’m feeling the gap left in my library. Huge appreciation in advance for any suggestions!
Like I needed another reading list …. thank you thank you!
It’s wonderful to have a list of women writers vetted by women readers and writers. Here are a few that are at the top of my list.
The Paris Wife, Nancy Horan
Life After Life, Kate Atkinson
Mother of Rain, Karen Spears Zacharias
Ghost on Black Mountain, Ann Hite
Cat’s Eye, Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood (on my top ten list)
… dreaming of seeing my own name here one day!