500 Great Books by Women

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This list is a great way to discover a range of women’s writing.

From the book 500 Great Books by Women: A Reader’s Guide by Erica Bauermeister, Jesse Larsen, & Holly Smith.

Note: There are actually more than 500 books listed in the original book (and on this list.)

The list is alphabetical by author.

Pages: 1 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

  1. 1.
    Womenfolks: Growing Up Down South
    by Shirley Abbott

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  2. 2.
    A Natural History of the Senses
    by Diane Ackerman

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  3. 3.
    ?
    Bake-Face and Other Guava Stories
    by Opal Palmer Adisa

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  4. 5.
    Changes: A Love Story
    by Ama Ata Aidoo

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  5. 6.
    Women of Sand and Myrrh: A Novel
    by Hanan Al-Shaykh

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  6. 7.
    Mrs. Vargas and the Dead Naturalist
    by Kathleen Alcala

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  7. 8.
    Little Women
    by Louisa May Alcott

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  8. 9.
    Family Album
    by Claribel Alegria

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  9. 10.
    ?
    Nampally Road
    by Meena Alexander

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  10. 11.
    ?
    The Stillborn (Longman African Classics)
    by Zaynab Alkali

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  11. 12.
    ?
    Grandmothers of the Light: A Medicine Woman's Sourcebook
    by Paula Gunn Allen

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  12. 13.
    The House of the Spirits
    by Isabel Allende

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  13. 16.
    Tirra Lirra by the River

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  14. 17.
    ?
    The Butcher's Wife
    by Li Ang

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  15. 18.
    I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
    by Maya Angelou

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  16. 19.
    Aquamarine
    by Carol Anshaw

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  17. 21.
    Incantations and Other Stories
    by Anjana Appachana

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  18. 22.
    ?
    Alicia: My Story
    by Alicia Appleman-Jurman

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  19. 23.
    ?
    The Twilight Years
    by Sawako Ariyoshi

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  20. 25.
    ?
    A Midwife's Story
    by Penny Armstrong

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  21. 26.
    The Dollmaker
    by Harriette Arnow

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  22. 27.
    Cat's Eye
    by Margaret Atwood

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  23. 28.
    Emma (Oxford World's Classics)
    by Jane Austen

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  24. 29.
    The Land of Little Rain (Modern Library Classics)
    by Mary Austin

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  25. 30.
    So Long a Letter (African Writers Series)
    by Mariama Ba

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  26. 31.
    Gorilla, My Love
    by Toni Cade Bambara

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  27. 32.
    Artemisia (Second Edition) (European Women Writers)
    by Anna Banti

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  28. 33.
    A Week Like Any Other: Novellas and Stories
    by Natalya Baranskaya

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  29. 34.
    Regeneration
    by Pat Barker

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  30. 35.
    Nightwood
    by Djuna Barnes

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  31. 36.
    The Good Times Are Killing Me
    by Lynda Barry

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  32. 37.
    Composing a Life
    by Mary Catherine Bateson

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  33. 38.
    ?
    Yes Is Better Than No
    by Byrd Baylor

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  34. 39.
    The House of Ulloa (Penguin Classics)
    by Emilia Pardo Bazan

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  35. 41.
    ?
    A Belfast Woman
    by Mary Beckett

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  36. 42.
    Yoruba Girl Dancing
    by Simi Bedford

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  37. 43.

  38. 45.
    Plain and Simple: A Woman's Journey to the Amish
    by Sue Bender

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  39. 46.
    ?
    Farm Under a Lake
    by Martha Bergland

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  40. 47.
    The World and the Bo Tree
    by Helen Bevington

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  41. 48.
    When I Was a German, 1934-1945: An Englishwoman in Nazi Germany
    by Christabel Bielenberg

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  42. 49.
    ?
    A Bridge Through Time: A Memoir
    by Laila Abou Saif

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  43. 50.
    Circle of Friends
    by Maeve Binchy

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Pages: 1 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

This is a community list. You can contribute, edit, or help maintain it by adding it to your lists.
Created by desertlizard on Jul 17, 2006.
 

Comments

kthejoker
Austin

Ouch, no Ayn Rand? — 1 year ago

Not that big a fan, but I’m sure The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged is more deserving than some of the books on this list.


Melissa B.
Oklahoma City

Saints and Strangers — 2 years ago

The book listed at #93 appears to be written by an actual man (as opposed to being written by a woman under a male pseudonym). I don’t have access to the source book for this list, but based on where it is on the list alphabetically - between “Carson” and “Cary” - I’m inclined to think that the book is supposed to be the “Saints and Strangers” by Angela Carter.


Untitled — 2 years ago

Number 283 is misspelled, the correct english title should be “The Löwensköld ring”. I went to the editing page, but could not figure out how to edit the title, maybe someone with more experience of this site could fix it?


Untitled — 2 years ago

Thanks for doing this list!
There were some misspelled titles & right-title-wrong-authors on here, so I fixed those.