100 books like Eva Peron

By Julie Taylor,

Here are 100 books that Eva Peron fans have personally recommended if you like Eva Peron. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave: Emancipated from Bodily Servitude by the State of New York, in 1828

Katie Pickles Author Of Heroines in History: A Thousand Faces

From my list on heroines in history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been interested in exploring the characteristics and meaning of heroines in history since I met two fellow travelers in Nova Scotia in 1990 who introduced me to the work of Joseph Campbell and his The Hero with a Thousand Faces. As a history professor I am interested in women’s changing place in society and the history of heroines is an excellent way to explore this. I am passionate about moving beyond individual, celebratory stories to instead explore themes for a dynamic modern archetype of a heroine across time and cultures. I like to imagine a time when all humans can be heroes without the feminine suffix.

Katie's book list on heroines in history

Katie Pickles Why did Katie love this book?

Autobiographies and narratives by heroines make for powerful reading and offer welcome wisdom.

Feminist and abolitionist Sojourner Truth’s story involves fighting sexism and racism out of first-hand experience and adversity. This book reminds us of the diversity present in the history of feminist heroines rather than the often privileged white, middle-class women’s voices.

Truth’s legendary ‘Ain’t I a woman?’ speech was delivered at the 1851 Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio.

By Sojourner Truth,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave is a powerful, landmark narrative originally published in 1850 by abolitionist and preacher Sojourner Truth, who was born a slave in 1797 in rural New York. Truth was a nationally recognized proponent of civil rights and women's rights, speaking widely about gender and racial inequities. Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the history of slavery and its cruel hardships in the United States.


Book cover of Joan of Arc: The Image of Female Heroism

Katie Pickles Author Of Heroines in History: A Thousand Faces

From my list on heroines in history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been interested in exploring the characteristics and meaning of heroines in history since I met two fellow travelers in Nova Scotia in 1990 who introduced me to the work of Joseph Campbell and his The Hero with a Thousand Faces. As a history professor I am interested in women’s changing place in society and the history of heroines is an excellent way to explore this. I am passionate about moving beyond individual, celebratory stories to instead explore themes for a dynamic modern archetype of a heroine across time and cultures. I like to imagine a time when all humans can be heroes without the feminine suffix.

Katie's book list on heroines in history

Katie Pickles Why did Katie love this book?

This superbly researched book breaks new ground about the relationship between image and reality for heroines in history.

Warner manages to both bring Joan of Arc alive as an historical actor, and also show how her image has been invented and reinvented through history. Warner taught me that when it comes to heroines, there is often an important blurred relationship between fact and fiction. Importantly, gender and sexuality are also at the heart of Warner’s interpretations.

Warner captures the story of a truly amazing heroine and also reveals Joan’s incredible significance. 

By Marina Warner,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Joan of Arc as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Joan has a unique role in Western imagination - she is one of the few true female heroes. Marina Warner uses her superb historical and literary skills to move beyond conventional biography and to capture the essence of "Joan of Arc", both as she lived in her own time and as she has 'grown' in the human imagination over the five centuries since her death. She has examined the court documents from Joan of Arc's 1431 Inquisition trial for heresy and woven the facts together with an analysis of the histories, biographies, plays, and paintings and sculptures that have appeared…


Book cover of Our Lady of the Rock: Vision and Pilgrimage in the Mojave Desert

Katie Pickles Author Of Heroines in History: A Thousand Faces

From my list on heroines in history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been interested in exploring the characteristics and meaning of heroines in history since I met two fellow travelers in Nova Scotia in 1990 who introduced me to the work of Joseph Campbell and his The Hero with a Thousand Faces. As a history professor I am interested in women’s changing place in society and the history of heroines is an excellent way to explore this. I am passionate about moving beyond individual, celebratory stories to instead explore themes for a dynamic modern archetype of a heroine across time and cultures. I like to imagine a time when all humans can be heroes without the feminine suffix.

Katie's book list on heroines in history

Katie Pickles Why did Katie love this book?

This book combines thought-provoking text with stunning landscape photography.

In 2010 in the Californian Mojave Desert Maria Paula’s feet started bleeding with a similar pattern to the stigmata of Christ nailed to the cross. In this engaging book Bitel grapples with the modern resurgence of apparitions and cult. She makes the fascinating suggestion that modern technology has led to a new global audience for spiritual apparitions, contributing to the continuation of pre-modern Christian behaviour.

It is a theme that I take up and write about the modern transcultural emergence of shrines to female figures from Vietnam’s shrine of Ba Chua Xu, the Lady of the Realm, to the Weeping Madonna of Rockingham, Australia.  

By Lisa M. Bitel, Matt Gainer (photographer),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Our Lady of the Rock as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

For more than twenty years, Maria Paula Acuna has claimed to see the Virgin Mary, once a month, at a place called Our Lady of the Rock in the Mojave Desert of California. Hundreds of men, women, and children follow her into the desert to watch her see what they cannot. While she sees and speaks with the Virgin, onlookers search the skies for signs from heaven, snapping photographs of the sun and sky. Not all of them are convinced that Maria Paula can see the Virgin, yet at each vision event they watch for subtle clues to Mary's presence,…


Book cover of Women Warriors and Wartime Spies of China

Katie Pickles Author Of Heroines in History: A Thousand Faces

From my list on heroines in history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been interested in exploring the characteristics and meaning of heroines in history since I met two fellow travelers in Nova Scotia in 1990 who introduced me to the work of Joseph Campbell and his The Hero with a Thousand Faces. As a history professor I am interested in women’s changing place in society and the history of heroines is an excellent way to explore this. I am passionate about moving beyond individual, celebratory stories to instead explore themes for a dynamic modern archetype of a heroine across time and cultures. I like to imagine a time when all humans can be heroes without the feminine suffix.

Katie's book list on heroines in history

Katie Pickles Why did Katie love this book?

This book is packed with the history of Chinese warrior heroines and spies. From Hua Mulan to Soong Ching-ling, the book resonates with connections across the centuries, as well as modern differences.

All too often the fate of these brave and outstanding women was to die for their cause, a theme that I think is so important for many heroines in history. Edwards is adept at identifying how her heroines challenge and defy their position in society. She also reveals the gendered position that heroines occupy as fighters, and in particular, the challenge that it poses to women’s transnational traditional place as gendered feminine carers and life-givers. 

By Louise Edwards,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Women Warriors and Wartime Spies of China as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this compelling new study, Louise Edwards explores the lives of some of China's most famous women warriors and wartime spies through history. Focusing on key figures including Hua Mulan, Zheng Pingru and Liu Hulan, this book examines the ways in which these extraordinary women have been commemorated through a range of cultural mediums including film, theatre, museums and textbooks. Whether perceived as heroes or anti-heroes, Edwards shows that both the popular and official presentation of these women and their accomplishments has evolved in line with China's shifting political values and circumstances over the past one hundred years. Written in…


Book cover of A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American Nation

Cassandra Good Author Of First Family: George Washington's Heirs and the Making of America

From my list on the fascinating families of America’s founders.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a child, I loved reading books about time travel, and now as a historian, I do a sort of time travel for my job. I have always been especially drawn to reading women’s correspondence, particularly when the women involved were pushing against gender roles and finding ways to access political power. I approach doing history as if it’s an ethnography of a group of people with entirely different beliefs, norms, and even emotions from us today; after all, the past is a foreign country. I’m especially intrigued by uncovering how personal relationships worked in the past and how relationships with political figures allowed family and friends to access power.

Cassandra's book list on the fascinating families of America’s founders

Cassandra Good Why did Cassandra love this book?

Allgor is an expert on women’s important role in building political society in the founding era, and in this compelling biography, she places Dolley Madison at the center of that story.

Indeed, Madison lived in the nation’s capital until 1849, giving her a decades-long career as a prominent figure in society and political operative. James Madison’s presidency was truly a partnership with his wife, as her charismatic sociability complemented his quiet, reserved demeanor. 

By Catherine Allgor,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Perfect Union as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An extraordinary American comes to life in this vivid, groundbreaking portrait of the early days of the republic--and the birth of modern politics

When the roar of the Revolution had finally died down, a new generation of American politicians was summoned to the Potomac to assemble the nation's newly minted capital. Into that unsteady atmosphere, which would soon enough erupt into another conflict with Britain in 1812, Dolley Madison arrived, alongside her husband, James. Within a few years, she had mastered both the social and political intricacies of the city, and by her death in 1849 was the most celebrated…


Book cover of Madam President: The Secret Presidency of Edith Wilson

Tracey Enerson Wood Author Of The President's Wife

From my list on amazing women whose stories were lost or hidden.

Why am I passionate about this?

 As a military wife, and daughter, sister, mother, and mother-in-law to military members, I gained a strong perspective of what it is like to be behind the scenes, keeping the family together and building my own career while supporting the important missions of the men around me. In my reading, I’m drawn to historical fiction, as I feel it makes the stories come alive for me. I love a good story, and what entertains and informs even better than the documented facts are the dialog, relationships, and emotions of the characters. So it seems only natural to write about the amazing women behind the curtain in history in the engaging and memorable form of novels.

Tracey's book list on amazing women whose stories were lost or hidden

Tracey Enerson Wood Why did Tracey love this book?

 After learning of the intense relationship between Woodrow and Edith Wilson, this was the next book I turned to in order to learn more about both of them and their role in history.

It provides an excellent foundation on Edith’s upbringing and adult life before she met Woodrow, which informs her actions during their marriage. It provides wonderful photographs, illustrating the era and the close circle of associates that helped and hindered them on their journey.

By William Hazelgrove,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Madam President as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

After President Woodrow Wilson suffered a paralyzing stroke in the fall of 1919, his wife, First Lady Edith Wilson, began to handle the day-to-day responsibilities of the Executive Office. Mrs. Wilson had had little formal education and had only been married to President Wilson for four years; yet, in the tenuous peace following the end of World War I, Mrs. Wilson dedicated herself to managing the office of the President, reading all correspondence intended for her bedridden husband. Though her Oval Office authority was acknowledged in Washington, D.C. circles at the time--one senator called her "the Presidentress who had fulfilled…


Book cover of The War Years and After

David Emblidge Author Of My Day: The Best Of Eleanor Roosevelt's Acclaimed Newspaper Columns, 1936-1962

From my list on Eleanor Roosevelt, her times, and her column “My Day”.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a cultural historian (degrees in English and American Studies). I taught at the university level for 25 years (Emerson College, principally) and worked 20+ years as an acquisitions editor, in book publishing, at Harvard, at Cambridge University Press, and for a small company I founded, Berkshire House. I was politically sympathetic to Mrs. Roosevelt’s POV before the “My Day” book project came to me, but, coincidentally, her long run as a syndicated columnist interested me also because my first job, fresh out of college, was as a cub reporter for Associated Press. I learned, in a hurry, how to deliver a story on deadline, with all the facts double checked.

David's book list on Eleanor Roosevelt, her times, and her column “My Day”

David Emblidge Why did David love this book?

There are several biographies of Eleanor Roosevelt, but few match this 3-vol. effort for its comprehensiveness and its sensitivity to the inner life of Eleanor (who led an exceedingly public life). All of Mrs. Roosevelt’s accomplishments are covered—with excellent contextand the bonus here is coverage of her private struggles as a shy, “orphaned” child, then as a beloved wife (to a disloyal husband), her failures as a mother, and her apparently quasi-lesbian attraction to another woman, as well as an unusual attachment to her doctor. Not a simple story!

By Blanche Wiesen Cook,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The War Years and After as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

One of the New York Times's 100 Notable Books of 2016
One of NPR's 10 Best Books of 2016

"Heartachingly relevant...the Eleanor Roosevelt who inhabits these meticulously crafted pages transcends both first-lady history and the marriage around which Roosevelt scholarship has traditionally pivoted." -- The Wall Street Journal

The final volume in the definitive biography of America's greatest first lady.

"Monumental and inspirational...Cook skillfully narrates the epic history of the war years... [a] grand biography." -- The New York Times Book Review

Historians, politicians, critics, and readers everywhere have praised Blanche Wiesen Cook's biography of Eleanor Roosevelt as the essential…


Book cover of Mr. and Mrs. President: From the Trumans to the Clintons

Mary C. Brennan Author Of Pat Nixon: Embattled First Lady

From my list on why Pat Nixon was known (incorrectly) as Plastic Pat.

Why am I passionate about this?

I became a historian because I am nosy. I like to know what is going on in other people’s lives. I study politics because I am fascinated by power—who has it? How did they get it? I took up this project not knowing much about First Ladies or Pat Nixon. My quest to know more led to the correspondence between Pat and her closest friend. The letters in these files allowed me to hear Pat’s voice describe her life as a politician’s wife, as Second Lady, and as a regular citizen. I feel privileged to be able to share that with the world.

Mary's book list on why Pat Nixon was known (incorrectly) as Plastic Pat

Mary C. Brennan Why did Mary love this book?

Out of the myriad of books analyzing presidential marriages, this volume, in my opinion, does the best job of showing an in-depth view of the Nixons’ relationship. Troy acknowledges the stereotypes and caricatures of the couple, puts these misrepresentations in context, and then reveals a much more balanced view of the Nixon marriage. He never forgets that a marriage involves both partners!

By Gil Troy,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Mr. and Mrs. President as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The emergence of the presidential couple is one of the most contentious developments in US post-war political history. Reaction to the First Couple reflects the country's changing morality and attitudes. This work traces these shifts through ten presidential marriages, including the Clintons.


Book cover of Eleanor Makes Her Mark

Nina Nolan Author Of Mahalia Jackson: Walking with Kings and Queens

From my list on women who shaped history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a picture-book author who wrote about Mahalia Jackson so more people would feel the sense of awe about her that I do. When I first read how she was treated by our own country, I was furious. But her amazing grace allowed me to focus on the positive aspects of her life, like she did.

Nina's book list on women who shaped history

Nina Nolan Why did Nina love this book?

This delightful picture book opens with Eleanor Roosevelt’s firm footing in the White House. Then it transports us back to her childhood, where we see the foundation for that footing: Eleanor cultivating her own character, way before she met her husband. The wonderful backmatter asks children how they might make their own mark, to enhance their lives…and the world.

By Barbara Kerley, Edwin Fotheringham (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Eleanor Makes Her Mark as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 7, 8, 9, and 10.

What is this book about?

An inspiring true story about modeling good leadership and being the change you wish to see.

"A compelling celebration of Eleanor Roosevelt that will inspire children to follow in her footsteps." -- Kirkus Reviews

"A necessary source of inspiration." -- School Library Journal

All her life, Eleanor Roosevelt hoped to "leave some mark upon the world."

She was a shy child who found joy in helping others.

A passionate young adult who longed for adventure.

An independent young woman who formed her own opinions.

A trustworthy partner who worked tirelessly for change.

So when her husband became president and she…


Book cover of Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy

Steven Gillon Author Of America's Reluctant Prince: The Life of John F. Kennedy Jr.

From my list on the private lives of the Kennedy Family.

Why am I passionate about this?

My interest in the topic is both professional and personal. I spent four decades teaching about modern American history and the Kennedy presidency at Yale, Oxford, and the University of Oklahoma. A chance encounter with John F. Kennedy, Jr., at Brown University in the spring of 1981 led to a friendship that lasted until his tragic death in 1999. 

Steven's book list on the private lives of the Kennedy Family

Steven Gillon Why did Steven love this book?

A few months after President Kennedy’s assassination, Mrs. Kennedy sat down for a series of interviews with the historian and family friend Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. Her eight hours of tapes, which remained sealed until a few years ago, are riveting and full of intimate, powerful details.

It is most rewarding to hear her whispery voice as she offers often pointed observations about the people and events that shaped her husband’s presidency.   

By Caroline Kennedy, Michael Beschloss,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Jacqueline Kennedy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

To mark John F. Kennedy's centennial, celebrate the life and legacy of the 35th President of the United States.

In 1964, Jacqueline Kennedy recorded seven historic interviews about her life with John F. Kennedy. Now, for the first time, they can be read in this deluxe, illustrated eBook.

Shortly after President John F. Kennedy's assassination, with a nation deep in mourning and the world looking on in stunned disbelief, Jacqueline Kennedy found the strength to set aside her own personal grief for the sake of posterity and begin the task of documenting and preserving her husband's legacy. In January of…


Book cover of Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave: Emancipated from Bodily Servitude by the State of New York, in 1828
Book cover of Joan of Arc: The Image of Female Heroism
Book cover of Our Lady of the Rock: Vision and Pilgrimage in the Mojave Desert

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