Happy International Women’s Month! This month has been a beautiful opportunity for us to celebrate the achievements and narratives of women. It’s also been awhile since I’ve done one of my book articles, so I figured, what better way to finish the month of March than by recommending some of my favorite books by women? Apart from being written by women, these books spotlight women’s stories, empowering journeys of character development, strong relationships between women, and healthy, beautiful romances. Happy reading, and be sure to check out my other book articles here, here, and here!
- Savage Appetites – Rachel Monroe (nonfiction)
Savage Appetites presents the in-depth tales of four women who fall into traditional crime archetypes in order to discuss the question of what draws women to the genre of true crime. There’s the detective, a bored middle-aged heiress who pioneered groundbreaking forensic methods with crime scene dollhouses in the 1940s. The victim, a young woman who moved into Sharon Tate’s guesthouse after the Manson murders and became enmeshed in the Tate family’s fight for victims’ rights. The attorney, a landscape architect who began advocating for, and later married, a man wrongly on death row for Satanic violence. And the killer, a teen who planned her own mass shooting in 2015 after being sucked into the online fandom of the Columbine shooters. I usually gravitate towards fiction, but the synopsis really drew me in. Monroe unfurls her analysis like a red-stringed crime board—even when a piece of evidence seems superfluous, its connection to the storyline soon falls flawlessly into place.
- The Island of Sea Women – Lisa See (historical fiction)
The Island of Sea Women offers a rich look into the lives of Korea’s Jeju Island haenyeo 해녀, or all-female divers, who are now regarded as Korean national treasures due to their dwindling numbers. In the era of Japanese colonialism in the 1930s, two aspiring haenyeo—Young-sook, the daughter of her village’s chief diver, and Mi-ja, the shunned daughter of a Japanese collaborator—forge a decades-long friendship that is later pushed to the breaking point as a result of their class differences and the events of World War II and the Korean War. While Lisa See is best known for her Chinese historical fiction, The Island of Sea Women is just as fascinating and well-researched as her previous works despite being outside her area of expertise. And, as user PorshaJo on Goodreads puts it, “no one can write a female tight-friendship story that is torn due to some ‘conflict’ like Lisa See.”
- Meg and Jo – Virginia Kantra (fiction)
In this modern-day Little Women retelling, Meg is a stay-at-home mom of twins, Jo is a food blogger moonlighting as a prep cook in a high-end restaurant, Beth is an up-and-coming country songwriter, and Amy is a fashion student in Paris. The four sisters return to the family farm in North Carolina for the holidays after their mother falls ill, and rediscover the bonds of family and sisterhood. Both Meg and Jo and its sequel, Beth and Amy, prove that the sisters’ story really is timeless with the way it’s flawlessly adapted to such a different social context while still keeping with its original spirit.
- The Wedding Date – Jasmine Guillory (romance)
Fake dating? Check. Meet-cute in a broken elevator? Check. After bonding over cheese and crackers in a broken hotel elevator, Alexa Monroe agrees to act as Drew Nichols’ fake girlfriend for his ex’s wedding the next day. However, the connection between them becomes more than they could have ever expected, and the two begin slowly falling for each other (duh!) while claiming that “they don’t want anything.” Other than the great story, I enjoyed the references to places in the SF Bay Area, the interracial relationship (Alexa is Black, and Drew is white), and the attention paid to safe sex. However, I will add that Alexa and Drew have some MAJOR communication issues to work through.
- In Five Years – Rebecca Serle (fiction)
NYC corporate lawyer Dannie Kohan is on track to achieve her ideal five-year plan—she’s engaged to her longtime boyfriend David, has a solid friendship with her lifelong best friend Bella, and just landed a job at her dream law firm. However, a sudden glimpse of her life five years in the future shows her in a completely different apartment with a completely different man, demonstrating just how fragile even the best-laid plans can be. Other than the setting, what I loved most about In Five Years was that even though a large portion of the book centers around Dannie’s love life, it’s clear to see that the real love story in In Five Years is the friendship between her and Bella. But does Dannie’s vision come true? Yes. In a way.
- Instructions for Dancing – Nicola Yoon (young adult fiction)
High school senior Evie Thomas is done with romance after her dad leaves her mom for his mistress. So, it’s the worst timing ever when, every time she sees a couple kiss, she begins seeing visions of how their relationship began and how it will eventually end. Her quest to figure out the cause of her visions leads her to take ballroom lessons at the La Brea Dance Studio with a boy named X, who challenges her perception of love and slowly helps her bring down her walls. I particularly enjoyed the magical realism and realistic character development, as well as the message of the book—never take love for granted, and enjoy every moment.