Autobiography/Memoir/Letters
(The) Adventures of Cancer Bitch by S.L. Wisenberg
As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto ed. by Joan Reardon
Bird of Paradise: How I Became Latina by Raquel Cepeda
Biting the Moon: A Memoir of Feminism and Motherhood by Joanne S. Frye
(The) Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
(The) Feminist and the Cowboy: An Unlikely Love Story by Alisa Valdes
(The) Good Daugher: A Memoir of My Mother’s Hidden Life by Jasmin Darznik
(The) New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance by Elna Baker
Riding Fury Home by Chana Wilson
(The) Woman Who Could Not Forget: Iris Chang Before and Beyond the Rape of Nanking by Ying-Ying Chang
Feminism
African Americans Doing Feminism: Putting Theory into Everyday Practice ed. by Aaronette M. White
Arab and Arab American Feminisms: Gender, Violence, and Belonging ed. by Rabab Abdulhadi, Evelyn Alsultany, and Nadine Naber
F ‘em!: Goo Goo, Gaga, and Some Thoughts on Balls by Jennifer Baumgardner
Girldrive: Criss-Crossing America, Redefining Feminism by Emma Bee Bernstein and Nona Willis Aronowitz
(The) Guy’s Guide to Feminism by Michael S. Kimmel and Michael Kaufman
How to Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran
(A) Marriage Agreement and Other Essays: Four Decades of Feminist Writing by Alix Kates Shulman
Reading Women: How the Great Books of Feminism Changed My Life by Stephanie Staal
(The) End of Men: And the Rise of Women by Hanna Rosin
(The) Second Sex: Volume I by Simone de Beauvoir
(A) Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft
Fiction
* This section is a little tricky, because any book can be viewed through a feminist lens. The books listed here are either books generally acknowledged to be part of the “feminist canon,” or books that I feel are particularly ripe for feminist discussion.
Alice Adams by Booth Tarkington
Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates
(The) Chaperone by Laura Moriarty
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf by Ntozake Shange
God Dies by the Nile by Nawal El Saadawi
Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott
(The) Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek
Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
(The) Round House by Louise Erdrich
Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
Some Sing, Some Cry by Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza
Women’s History
America and the Pill: A History of Promise, Peril, and Liberation by Elaine Tyler May
Beauty Shop Politics: African American Women’s Activism in the Beauty Industry by Tiffany M. Gill
Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff
Empress of Fashion: A Life of Diana Vreeland by Amanda Mackenzie Stuart
Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution by Sara Marcus
Helen Keller: A Life by Dorothy Herrmann
(The) Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Jackie After O by Tina Cassidy
Jane Austen: A Life Revealed by Catherine Reef
Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts by Stacy A. Cordery
Let the People In: The Life and Times of Anne Richards by Jan Reid
On a Farther Shore: The Life and Legacy of Rachel Carson by William Souder
Pain, Parties, Work: Sylvia Plath in New York, Summer 1953 by Elizabeth Winder
(The) Queen: A Life in Brief by Robert Lacey
Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution by Caroline Weber
Reading Jackie: Her Autobiography in Books by William Kuhn
She-Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England Before Elizabeth by Helen Castor
Sky Burial: An Epic Love Story of Tibet by Xinran
Women’s Studies-Related Nonfiction
Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural History by Florence Williams
Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein
(The) Dressmaker of Khair Khana by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
(The) Education of Women and The Vices of Men by Bibi Khanom Astarabadi
Girls Like Us: Fighting for a World Where Girls Are Not For Sale by Rachel Lloyd
Good Porn: A Woman’s Guide by Erika Lust
Hijas Americanas: Beauty, Body Image, and Growing Up Latina by Rosie Molinary
Making a Killing: Femicide, Free Trade, and La Frontera ed. by Alicia Gaspar de Alba and Georgina Guzmán
Our Lady of Controversy: Alma López’s Irreverent Apparition ed. by Alma López and Alicia Gaspar de Alba
Rape New York by Jana Leo
Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America by Melissa V. Harris-Perry
Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom by bell hooks
Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape ed. by Jessica Valenti and Jaclyn Friedman
