So Long a Letter

Published in 1989, this is the oldest book on this list, and yet it still resonates in its depiction of the female condition in Senegal specifically, and Africa in general. Ramatoulaye, a recently widowed Senegalese schoolteacher, writes a letter to her old friend and fellow teacher, Aissatou, to share her struggles after her husband took on a second wife 25 years into their marriage. Juxtaposed against pre- and post-independence from colonial power France, the novel shines a light on how much less Senegalese women benefited from newfound rights and freedoms than their male counterparts.