After I finally got back into reading and listening to books regularly, once I started hitting my volume goals, I began to set other types of goals for myself. Catching up on classics and iconic works that got by me during my school years was just one of my side-goals, in addition to hitting 150 books for the year. Another was to read more stories focused on women.
To be clear, I am a woman, and I obviously have my own perspective as one, but the older I get, the more aware I've become of how limited my knowledge is on the subject of feminism, the impact women have made in history, the struggles they've faced, and what it means to be a woman of a different culture, or from a different part of the world. Hey, if I'm going to wave around my 150-books-in-2025 achievement badge, I may as well be honest and say that I still have a lot to learn.
Among the dozens of books I read in 2025 -- plenty of fantasy, romance, sci-fi, and other genres for my entertainment -- I made a point to find books that might help me learn and appreciate women’s stories and history.
Powerful Historical fiction
As a fiction reader, historical fiction was a way for me to ease into the topic of women in history. Of the novels that I read this year, a few of them really stuck with me...
Atmosphere
Taylor Jenkins Reid's novel is set in the '80s and focuses on a woman who dreams of going to space -- a task more often assigned to men in the U.S. at that time. Like the other Taylor Jenkins Reid books I've read (including The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, which is due for an adaptation), I was instantly caught up in Atmosphere's characters, the setting and the drama (including a great love story that would make for a pretty outstanding LGBTQ+ movie if it’s ever adapted), and -- paired with a non-fiction book that I'll get into in the next section – this really helped me appreciate the challenges women faced in rising the ranks of the space program.
Witchcraft for Wayward Girls
Grady Hendrix's novel is set in the 1970s and focuses on a home where pregnant teens are hidden away until they have their babies. There are fantasy and horror elements to the story, which I enjoyed, but it also helped me to see just how brutal society could be toward young women during that time period, which was really not so long ago.
A Resistance of Witches
Speaking of witches (because who doesn’t love a good scary or not-so-scary witch story?), I also loved Morgan Ryan’s historical fiction book about witches during World War II. A Resistance of Witches focuses on a coven of witches in Europe who are divided on whether or not to get involved in the war. The witch part is certainly fiction, but the topic of women being involved in World War II isn’t, so this was a fun, fantasy-focused exploration of that subject.
The Nightingale
And speaking of women during World War II, I also read The Nightingale. While there are no witches in Kristin Hannah's historical fiction novel, the story, which is set to be adapted for a movie starring Dakota and Elle Fanning, centers on two sisters living in Nazi-occupied France and the obstacles and choices they face. This one was such an emotional read, and I can’t wait to see how it’s brought to the screen when the movie arrives.
Fascinating Non-Fiction
Branching out to read more non-fiction has been a goal of mine for the last couple of years, and that certainly helped with trying to learn from stories told by and about women. Since I was just talking about World War II, I'll start there:
The Nine: The True Story of a Band of Women Who Survive the Worst of Nazi Germany
This non-fiction book from Gwen Strauss tells the story of her great aunt and the other women who were resistance fighters during World War II and were imprisoned in a German labor camp until they managed to escape. It feels important to me to learn more about the women who risked their lives to resist the Nazis and help in the war efforts, however they could. The Nine's story is inspiring and also devastating when taking into account everything they faced just to survive, and the toll it took on them.
Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space
I mentioned earlier that I read a non-fiction book related to the space program (when talking about Atmosphere). Adam Higginbotham’s book focuses on the Challenger disaster, but it also delves into the space program in the U.S., including how it grew and changed over the years leading up to the '80s. That includes some insights on the program's eventual inclusion of women and people of color. I think reading this one before Atmosphere enhanced my appreciation for Taylor Jenkins Reid's novel.
How to Kill A Witch: The Patriarchy's Guide to Silencing Women
Claire Mitchell and Zoe Venditozzi's book offers fascinating historical insights and specific accounts during the witch trials in Scotland in the 1500s in How To Kill A Witch. The way women were treated in society during that time period is understandably a relevant factor there.
Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men
While the other non-fiction books are set during a specific time period, this one – by Caroline Criado Pérez – focuses more on the numbers in general, and really helped me wrap my mind around the impact data can have on major decisions within society, particularly when gender isn’t taken into account. Invisible Women is also going to lead us into the third category I want to talk about, because one of the things I really liked about Criado Pérez’s book was how it touched on examples related to women in different parts of the world. It’s a frustrating read in many respects, but a fascinating one.
Stories About Women From Different Cultures And Parts Of The World
Like anyone, my life experience is limited to things like my own personal culture, religion and where I grew up. So reading more stories centered on women from different cultures and parts of the world has been enriching in terms of broadening my perspective.
Death of the Author
Nnedi Okorafor’s sci-fi novel centers on Zelu, a disabled Nigerian-American writer who finds her writing breakthrough in a futuristic story about androids that changes the course of her life. As intriguing as the sci-fi aspect of Death of the Author was, I was also drawn in by the challenges Zelu faced in her life, her writing and her interactions with her family. This book also made me really want to try Jollof rice!
The Lion Women of Tehran
I could have included Marjan Kamali’s novel in the historical fiction section of this article, as I appreciated so much about what The Lion Women of Tehran revealed about life in Iran in the 1950s and the decades that followed, including how much it varied depending on your class. But I also very much appreciated this story for its perspective on a girl growing up in Tehran, the relationships she forms and the hopes she has for her life.
Cursed Daughters
Set in Nigeria, Oyinkan Braithwaite’s novel focuses on a line of women in Lagos who descend from one who was cursed. Whether or not they’re all destined to fail at love as a result is one of the questions that’s explored in this clever story, which jumps across time as it focuses on the more recent generations of women in this family.
Crying In H Mart
Books and movies about food rarely fail to make me hungry, and as emotional as Crying in H Mart was, the memoir also triggered my appetite on more than one occasion. The topic of food was a big part of Michelle Zauner’s memoir, as it ties in with her culture and the memories she has with her family. In addition to learning so much about the singer’s life through her book, she delves into thoughts and feelings on her identity as a Korean-American woman, and her memories of taking care of her terminally ill mother.
Looking back on my reading year in 2025, I’m grateful for the books I read that changed my perspective, but I also know there’s so much more to learn and appreciate, so if you have any recommendations for books focused on women’s stories, please drop them in the comments!
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