Here are 76 books that The Personal Librarian fans have personally recommended if you like
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As an academic, activist, author, and a student of American women’s history, I’m passionate about recognizing the contributions of diverse American women. I graduated from Wellesley College, on the cusp of the 1970s women’s movement. My doctoral dissertation, a biography of suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton, in Her Own Right,hailed by both Oprah and theWall Street Journal, was the basis of Ken Burns’ documentary, Not for Ourselves Alone. My career centered on women: working to advance women’s rights, writing and teaching women’s history, and leading a girls’ school. As a cisgender white woman, I’m a member of the Society of American Historians and Veteran Feminists of America.
This pathbreaking work is the first in-depth biography of Terrell (1863-1954). It challenges common stereotypes about Black women and identifies common ground among women who struggle to balance work and family. Mary Church, born during the Civil War, had two white grandfathers, who impregnated enslaved women and then allowed their offspring to marry. After Emancipation, Molly’s father became a wealthy Memphis land developer, which allowed her to attend Oberlin, earn a master’s degree, and travel in Europe. She married a graduate of Harvard and Howard Law, whom Theodore Roosevelt named the first Black justice of the peace in Washington, DC. She did not allow her distrust of Susan B. Anthony to derail her fight for Black voting rights, before and after the Nineteenth Amendment passed. A founder and the first president of the National Association of Colored Women in 1896, Terrell used her lace and pearls and Republican connections…
Born into slavery during the Civil War, Mary Church Terrell (1863-1954) would become one of the most prominent activists of her time, with a career bridging the late nineteenth century to the civil rights movement of the 1950s. The first president of the National Association of Colored Women and a founding member of the NAACP, Terrell collaborated closely with the likes of Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells, and W. E. B. Du Bois. Unceasing Militant is the first full-length biography of Terrell, bringing her vibrant voice and personality to life. Though most accounts of Terrell focus almost exclusively on her…
T.K. Thorne became a police officer during the first decade of women policing in Birmingham, Alabama, retiring as a captain. Her background as a woman in a macho man’s world helped inform the writing of award-winning historical novels about completely unknown women in two of the world’s oldest and most famous stories—the tale of Noah’s flood and the burning of Sodom (Noah’s Wife and Angels at the Gate). An experienced speaker, T.K. shares the fascinating background research into the culture of those early civilizations, as well as the scientific discoveries behind the flood in the Mideast and first-hand information gained from her personal trips to the area.
My Dear Hamilton is a compelling novel of a Revolutionary woman who falls in love with a dashing man destined for greatness and tragedy.
Richly imagined and researched, Eliza’s story gives us, on one level, an in-depth understanding of one of American history’s founders. But it is also a story about strength, resilience, and forgiveness. I loved this story for the depth of Eliza’s character and her untold contribution to history and for what I learned about the details and dynamics of the era that so inform our own time.
From the New York Times bestselling authors of America's First Daughter comes the epic story of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton-a revolutionary woman who, like her new nation, struggled to define herself in the wake of war, betrayal, and tragedy. Haunting, moving, and beautifully written, Dray and Kamoie used thousands of letters and original sources to tell Eliza's story as it's never been told before-not just as the wronged wife at the center of a political sex scandal-but also as a founding mother who shaped an American legacy in her own right.
I'm fascinated with material culture – studying the things we make and use – and what they tell us about our history. My particular passion is for nineteenth-century Black material culture, often the only tangible history of enslaved and newly-emancipated Black lives. The books on my list educated me of the historical realities for African Americans, from emancipation to Jim Crow – providing critical context for deciphering the stories embedded in historical artifacts. Overall, the gendered (and harrowing) history these books provide on the contributions of African-American women to civil rights and social justice should be required reading for everyone.
This book details the engagement and impact African American women have made on race and gender issues throughout American history.
Paula Giddings uses first-person narratives to portray how generations of Black women have acted as “agents of change” to achieve political and economic progress. In researching the lives of two nineteenth-century Black female sculptors, I needed to understand the cultural and political environment that inspired them to tackle the controversial themes of race, gender, and social injustice in their art.
When and Where I Enter provided a gendered and historical framework to help me answer these critical questions.
“History at its best―clear, intelligent, moving. Paula Giddings has written a book as priceless as its subject”―Toni Morrison
Acclaimed by writers Toni Morrison and Maya Angelou, Paula Giddings’s When and Where I Enter is not only an eloquent testament to the unsung contributions of individual women to our nation, but to the collective activism which elevated the race and women’s movements that define our times. From Ida B. Wells to the first black Presidential candidate, Shirley Chisholm; from the anti-lynching movement to the struggle for suffrage and equal protection under the law; Giddings tells the stories of black women who…
Historical fiction inspired by the story of Mary Leakey, who carved her own path to become one of the world's most distinguished paleoanthropologists.
It's 1983 and seventeen-year-old Grace Clark has just lost her mother when she begrudgingly accompanies her estranged father to an archeological dig at Olduvai Gorge on the Serengeti plains of Tanzania. Here, seventy-year-old Mary Leakey enlists Grace to sort and pack her fifty years of work and memories.
Their interaction reminds Mary how she pursued her ambitions of becoming an archeologist in the 1930s by sneaking into lectures and working on excavations. When well-known paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey…
Historical fiction inspired by the story of Mary Leakey, who carved her own path to become one of the world's most distinguished paleoanthropologists.
It's 1983 and seventeen-year-old Grace Clark has just lost her mother when she begrudgingly accompanies her estranged father to an archeological dig at Olduvai Gorge on the Serengeti plains of Tanzania. Here, seventy-year-old Mary Leakey enlists Grace to sort and pack her fifty years of work and memories.
Their interaction reminds Mary how she pursued her ambitions of becoming an archeologist in the 1930s by sneaking into lectures and working on excavations. When well-known paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey…
I love being entertained while I read, but I equally love to learn something. That has led me to fall in love with the historical fiction genre, and is what also led me to write We Came Here to Shine and The Subway Girls. Part of being able to write good historical fiction is to learn from the masters in the genre. I am drawn to historical fiction that features ambitious women who were notable in their time for going against the strictures and conventions forced upon them, and I have chosen all of these books for you because they feature women like that. I hope you enjoy!
Davis is well-known for basing her meticulously researched stories in famous NYC buildings and The Address, set at The Dakota, the famed apartment building on the Upper West Side, is no exception. It’s the story of Sara Smythe who comes from London to work for the Camden family upon the opening of The Dakota in the late 1800s. Her station rises along with opportunities, and her relationship with her employer becomes more complicated. Davis alternates this story with one set in the 1980s and masterfully connects the two in a way the reader will not have seen coming.
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Lions of Fifth Avenue comes the compelling national bestselling novel about the thin lines between love and loss, success and ruin, passion and madness, all hidden behind the walls of The Dakota—New York City’s most famous residence.
When a chance encounter with Theodore Camden, one of the architects of the grand New York apartment house the Dakota, leads to a job offer for Sara Smythe, her world is suddenly awash in possibility—no mean feat for a servant in 1884. The opportunity to move to America. The opportunity to be the female…
I love being entertained while I read, but I equally love to learn something. That has led me to fall in love with the historical fiction genre, and is what also led me to write We Came Here to Shine and The Subway Girls. Part of being able to write good historical fiction is to learn from the masters in the genre. I am drawn to historical fiction that features ambitious women who were notable in their time for going against the strictures and conventions forced upon them, and I have chosen all of these books for you because they feature women like that. I hope you enjoy!
The Show Girl is a delicious and entertaining exploration of the life of a 1920s Ziegfield girl with authentic period details and Harrison’s trademark ability to plunge the reader deep into the experiences of her characters. I loved being along for the ride as Olive navigated her relationships and friendships, followed her dreams, and pursued the glamorous life—with all its attendant ups and downs—of a show girl. The Show Girl is a fast-paced and engaging read that will leave readers giving a standing ovation to Olive and to all women who choose to live life on their own terms.
It's 1927 when Olive McCormick moves from Minneapolis to New York City determined to become a star in the Ziegfeld Follies. Extremely talented as a singer and dancer, it takes every bit of perseverance to finally make it on stage. And once she does, all the glamour and excitement is everything she imagined and more-even worth all the sacrifices she has had to make along the way.
Then she meets Archie Carmichael. Handsome, wealthy-the only man she's ever met who seems to accept her modern ways-her independent nature and passion for success. But once she accepts his proposal of marriage…
I love book club.If I could make it a requirement for everyone in the universe to give it a try, I would. I was an English major in college, so that feeling of ending an amazing story and needing someone to discuss it with never fully went away. All book club books should be thought-provoking, but the best add that intricate and wholehearted understanding, I think, that only literature can. Why do the characters you least understood or felt a kinship with suddenly have your heart, what do they want, need, feel, think? I hope these novels help you better understand. The who and what are beside the point.
This book has everything a book club could ask for. Characters that you love, even when maybe you shouldn’t. Relationships that seem both familiar and endlessly fascinating. An epic dilemma that resonates and flourishes until the very end.It’ll definitely have you wondering,what would I do? At the end of the day, that question is all you really need for a lively book club discussion.
Brooklyn, 1947: in the midst of a blizzard, in a two-family brownstone, two babies are born minutes apart to two women. They are sisters by marriage with an impenetrable bond forged before and during that dramatic night; but as the years progress, small cracks start to appear and their once deep friendship begins to unravel. No one knows why, and no one can stop it. One misguided choice; one moment of tragedy. Heartbreak wars with happiness and almost but not quite wins.
As I’ve reached middle age, I’ve found that many books about this period are about trying to regain lost youth or the hardships that aging can bring. I want to read more books about women who have lived through some things and are more powerful (and funnier!) because of it. In my writing, I try to highlight the stories of women with a little bit of history behind them and show that a long life–if we’re lucky–is also a full one. I hope you enjoy the books on this list as much as I have!
This isn’t a book about middle age as much as it is a book about a middle-aged woman. Margery Benson, schoolteacher and spinster, has been overlooked and overworked. She’s ready for an adventure and to find the beetle she’s been obsessed with since childhood.
Margery doesn’t go on this adventure alone, and the friendship between Margery and the younger, flashier Enid Pretty is the real heart of this novel. Adventure, friendship, women finding their strength: it’s exactly what I want from a book.
WINNER OF THE WILBUR SMITH ADVENTURE WRITING PRIZE | BEST PUBLISHED NOVEL WOMAN & HOME BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR and A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
'The perfect escape novel for our troubled times.' PATRICK GALE
It is 1950. In a devastating moment of clarity, Margery Benson abandons her dead-end job and advertises for an assistant to accompany her on an expedition. She is going to travel to the other side of the world to search for a beetle that may or may not exist. Enid Pretty, in her unlikely pink travel suit, is not the companion Margery had in…
I’ve always fallen in love with endearing characters. I want to go home with them. For me, the best characters are as real as any other friends. So many good books start with an idyllic situation. Say, a family or group of friends who have strong bonds. Then, someone is killed, or war breaks out. The idyll is smashed so the adventure can begin. I also like the outsider perspective. The characters have to fight the powers that be. They must have a moral compass. Integrity. Why? I’m a Jewish woman. I was a Girl Scout in the Peace Corps, a poet, a social worker, and a therapist.
This book has so many of my favorite elements: believable friendships among three very different women, Bletchley Park during World War II, with spies, and characters I adored: the debutante, the working-class girl, and the girl we’d now say is “on the spectrum.” I loved this book so much that I read everything Kate Quinn wrote, but this one’s still the best.
When Beth is threatened with a lobotomy, the suspense was terrifying. I kept thinking of my aunt whose existence was a family secret for years. I laughed and cried over this book and the women who helped win the War but had to keep their work a secret, even if it cost them everything and everyone they loved.
The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over.
1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything-beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses-but she burns to…
My maternal grandmother was an unconventional woman and a feminist in every way that matters. Although she was raised according to Victorian norms when girls were expected to remain in patriarchal shadows, she was fiercely independent. She was my hero and encouraged me to forge my own future. She also nurtured in me a love of reading and writing, which led to me becoming a journalist and author. My grandmother and I shared a great love of animals. It’s no coincidence that my debut historical fiction, The Invincible Miss Cust is based on the true story of Britain and Ireland’s first female veterinary surgeon. I’m intrigued by strong, interesting women driven to follow their dreams.
Great Circle tells the story of Marian Graves who, born in 1914, falls in love with flight at a young age and, despite difficult circumstances, is determined to chart her own course in life as one of the world’s earliest female aviators.
I loved Marian’s passion for planes and flying and her determination to circumnavigate the world by flying over the North and South Poles. It’s an epic novel, which weaves in the present-day story of actor, Hadley Baxter who is cast to play Marian in a film about her disappearance in Antarctica.
I thoroughly enjoyed following the lives of the two very driven, liberated, and adventurous women, and was particularly fascinated—sometimes gobsmacked—by the history of female aviation.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK • The unforgettable story of a daredevil female aviator determined to chart her own course in life, at any cost: an “epic trip—through Prohibition and World War II, from Montana to London to present-day Hollywood—and you’ll relish every minute” (People).
After being rescued as infants from a sinking ocean liner in 1914, Marian and Jamie Graves are raised by their dissolute uncle in Missoula, Montana. There--after encountering a pair of barnstorming pilots passing through town in beat-up biplanes--Marian commences her lifelong love affair with flight. At fourteen she…
I have always loved exploring, whether it is on the shelves of the library or on a car trip. Growing up, we left our sheltered home in New England and piled into our dad’s car. We explored caves in Virginia and South Dakota, the ocean in Massachusetts and Maine, and museums from Chicago to Boston. In historical fiction, I see the boundaries of human experience, knowing people and places I could never in reality experience. I learn empathy, history, natural science, and political science in these pages. For me, a good historical novel is as good as a vacation, delving into the past, sight-seeing, window-shopping, and experiencing beyond the everyday.
A horse lover, I found the story of Lexington, a thoroughbred who saves his devoted and enslaved groom Jarret during the Civil War, rich and compelling. The archivist who discovers the horse’s bones in the Smithsonian is on a thrilling journey, as we are when we explore a past event.
"Brooks' chronological and cross-disciplinary leaps are thrilling." -The New York Times Book Review
"Horse isn't just an animal story-it's a moving narrative about race and art." -TIME
A discarded painting in a junk pile, a skeleton in an attic, and the greatest racehorse in American history: from these strands, a Pulitzer Prize winner braids a sweeping story of spirit, obsession, and injustice across American history
Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South. When the nation erupts in civil war, an…
