Here are 100 books that The Secret Diaries Of Miss Anne Lister fans have personally recommended if you like
The Secret Diaries Of Miss Anne Lister.
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I am a feminist author, having written about women’s history for nearly half a century. One phrase, "Dig where you stand," truly inspired me. Living in Oldham, I began researching the history of the radical suffragists across industrial Lancashire. Later, moving across the Pennines to Halifax, I gradually learned of Anne Lister of Shibden Hall—and became gripped by her diaries! Meanwhile, I worked in Adult Education at Leeds University & was a Reader in Gender History.
In 1973, this book broke daring new ground, inspiring me to become a feminist historian. Effortlessly, Sheila introduced readers to an extraordinary range of feminists—from C17th Mary Astell to Stella Browne, the C20th birth control campaigner.
No worries if you’ve not heard of these women: by the end, you’ll be as entranced as I was!
In this classic study of women in Britain from the Puritan revolution of the mid-seventeenth century to the 1930s, Sheila Rowbotham shows how class and sex, work and the family, personal life and social pressures have shaped and hindered women's struggles for equality.
She explores the different effects that changes in the process of production have on middle-class and working-class women; why birth control and the organisation of working women have been perceived as threatening to traditional male control of the family; how paid work and work in the home are intricately related and determine the social valuation of women…
I am a feminist author, having written about women’s history for nearly half a century. One phrase, "Dig where you stand," truly inspired me. Living in Oldham, I began researching the history of the radical suffragists across industrial Lancashire. Later, moving across the Pennines to Halifax, I gradually learned of Anne Lister of Shibden Hall—and became gripped by her diaries! Meanwhile, I worked in Adult Education at Leeds University & was a Reader in Gender History.
The story of a courageous working-class woman growing up in the 1870s near Manchester.
Young Hannah, with just a meagre "fortnight’s schooling," had everything against her. But she never stayed down for long: she joined the new Independent Labour Party (ILP), becoming a suffragette. Then, disillusioned with the Pankhursts, Hannah joined the Women’s Freedom League. Later, she became not only a councillor but also a magistrate.
She has an inspiring story of never giving up and always keeping her goals in sight.
“My readers may not find it a very thrilling story, but I hope it will reveal to them the early dreams, secret hopes and half-realized ambitions of one very ordinary woman...Looking back on my own life, I feel my greatest enemy has been the cooking stove — a sort of tyrant who has kept me in subjection.”
'The Hard Way Up' is a unique and absorbing social document — a first-hand account of the life and struggles of a working-class woman who became a leader of the Suffragette and Labour movements in the north of England.
I am a feminist author, having written about women’s history for nearly half a century. One phrase, "Dig where you stand," truly inspired me. Living in Oldham, I began researching the history of the radical suffragists across industrial Lancashire. Later, moving across the Pennines to Halifax, I gradually learned of Anne Lister of Shibden Hall—and became gripped by her diaries! Meanwhile, I worked in Adult Education at Leeds University & was a Reader in Gender History.
Anne Lister inherited Shibden Hall from her uncle in 1826, joining England’s landed gentry. But what was her historical context? Writing about Anne Lister's life in the 1830s, I grew fascinated by this impressive post-slavery research project led by eminent feminist historian Catherine Hall.
Although Anne herself never owned slaves, people in her circle did. You can search by name and locality on the UCL Legacies website. It opened my eyes to hypocrisy in British society then, and I’m sure it will startle you, too!
This book re-examines the relationship between Britain and colonial slavery in a crucial period in the birth of modern Britain. Drawing on a comprehensive analysis of British slave-owners and mortgagees who received compensation from the state for the end of slavery, and tracing their trajectories in British life, the volume explores the commercial, political, cultural, social, intellectual, physical and imperial legacies of slave-ownership. It transcends conventional divisions in history-writing to provide an integrated account of one powerful way in which Empire came home to Victorian Britain, and to reassess narratives of West Indian 'decline'. It will be of value to…
I am a feminist author, having written about women’s history for nearly half a century. One phrase, "Dig where you stand," truly inspired me. Living in Oldham, I began researching the history of the radical suffragists across industrial Lancashire. Later, moving across the Pennines to Halifax, I gradually learned of Anne Lister of Shibden Hall—and became gripped by her diaries! Meanwhile, I worked in Adult Education at Leeds University & was a Reader in Gender History.
This book tells the tale of the 1913 National Union of Women’s Suffrage Society (NUWSS) pilgrimage. I’ve always been irked by how the suffragettes and their arson campaign captured the headlines.
So here’s the other story. Suffragist pilgrims walked from all corners to London: down from Carlisle, up from Land’s End. This booktakes you with them, mile by mile—all for Votes for Women! Would you have taken part in 1913?
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Set against the colourful background of the entire campaign for women to win the vote, Hearts and Minds tells the remarkable and inspiring story of the suffragists' march on London.
1913: the last long summer before the war. The country is gripped by suffragette fever. These impassioned crusaders have their admirers; some agree with their aims if not their forceful methods, while others are aghast at the thought of giving any female a vote.
Meanwhile, hundreds of women are stepping out on to the streets of…
I am the author of the Sherlockiana duology My Dear Watson and Mrs. Watson: Untold Stories. I chose these books because they all have British women at the helm, involve detectives and/or investigative processes, and contain close-to-home scandals and intrigue. In that sense, these are “domestic” mysteries—books that contain puzzles related to everyday household drama. Miss Marple, Harriet Vane, and the women of Baker Street solve literal detective cases. The secret writings of Anne Lister and Constance Wilde show how they decoded the homosexual element in their lives, and used their writing to maintain a sense of self in oppressive societies. Each of them are women after my own heart.
A real-life figure played in the Gentleman Jack TV series by Suranne Jones, this biography investigates Anne Lister’s personal diaries to reveal a portrait of someone remarkable: a businesswoman landowner in the early 1800s, a world traveler, and a lover of women long before the word “lesbian” would have accurately described her.
Lister’s boldness seems ahead of her time, but perhaps only because women were so rarely free to express themselves. Lister’s numerous liaisons with women, her plans to make and grow her fortune, plus her documentation of her digestive health, all make her relatable over 200 years later.
This is an important piece of LGBT and gender studies history, a bright chronicle in the archives of feminist study, and an interesting read about an extraordinary person.
The extraordinary life of history's first modern lesbian who inspired the popular television series Gentleman Jack.
Anne Lister's journals were so shocking that the first person to crack their secret code hid them behind a fake panel in his ancestral home. Anne Lister was a Regency landowner, an intrepid world traveller ... and an unabashed lover of other women.
In this bold new biography, prizewinning author Angela Steidele uses the diaries to create a portrait of Anne Lister as we've never seen her before: a woman in some ways very much of her time…
I started in publishing at the Advocate magazine, twenty years ago in its heyday, then moved to Alyson Books, who first published Emma Donoghue among many others, offering a place for queer writers showcasing queer stories to find their audience. Afterwards, I became involved with Gertrude literary journal, a beloved, 25-year-old non-profit, LGBTQA journal that has now evolved to The Gertrude Conference. All the while, I read, wrote, and supported queer stories, like these gems!
This one was made into a long-short documentary (38 minutes) called Jeanne Cordova: Butches, Lies & Feminism that won the Grand Jury Prize at Outfest 2017 for Best Documentary Short, now I’d love to see this as a biopic feature!
Let’s watch Jeanne Cordova come to life—her old school get-er-done butch energy out there in the 1970s fighting for lesbian rights, starting the West Coast Lesbian Conference in 1971 and the first National Lesbian Conference in 1973. Imagine the drama bringing people together and setting the platform for lesbian rights when many were fired if outed.
Maybe Fortune Feimster could play a role!? Oh yes, yes she could.
A sweeping memoir, a raw and intimate chronicle of a young activist torn between conflicting personal longings and political goals. When We Were Outlaws offers a rare view of the life of a radical lesbian during the early cultural struggle for gay rights, Women’s Liberation, and the New Left of the 1970s.
Brash and ambitious, activist Jeanne Córdova is living with one woman and falling in love with another, but her passionate beliefs tell her that her first duty is to the revolution” to change the world and end discrimination against gays and lesbians. Trying to compartmentalize her sexual life,…
I’m a Pushcart-nominated writer of (mostly) young adult and adult horror and suspense. I primarily write about the fear of isolated and sparsely populated places, which makes sense: I grew up in the rural hinterlands of northeast Pennsylvania, steeped in dark cornfields, eerie quiet, and weird characters. I now live in the Philadelphia area with my husband and rescue dog in a creaky, century-old house, giving myself agita about the creepy crawlspace in the basement. I’m the author of two novels: A Misfortune of Lake Monsters (YA horror, July 2024) and The Trajectory of Dreams (adult psychological suspense, 2013).
Just after high school graduation, during the summer in which their adult lives begin, three girls who now require human flesh to survive (thanks, pandemic!) hit a music festival. But don’t worry; the world has found a way to satisfy their dietary requirements without anyone getting hurt…until someone at the festival starts dosing ghouls with an appetite stimulant, that is.
This book is a fun and campy mystery that gives me queer post-Mean Girls meets Scooby vibes and a fair amount of gore. Even though the book is light-hearted with a very sweet romance (hey, even horror fans like me get schmoopy now and then), it speaks to the heart of guilt and the trauma of recovery from substance use disorders (if cannibalism can be a stand-in for drugs and alcohol)—particularly when you’ve done something under the influence that has hurt or killed others, and that’s what made it so…
From the New York Times bestselling author of My Dearest Darkest comes another incredible sapphic horror. When four best friends with a hunger for human flesh attend a music festival in the desert they discover a murderous plot to expose and vilify the girls and everyone like them. This summer is going to get gory.
Five years ago, the melting of arctic permafrost released a pathogen of unknown origin into the atmosphere, causing a small percentage of people to undergo a transformation that became known as the Hollowing. Those impacted slowly became intolerant to normal food and were only able…
I knew in my early teens that I wasn’t straight, but back then, the thought of coming out was too scary. I waited until I was twenty-three to do so, and it was still scary even being ten years older! So I can relate to stories of women of all ages discovering their less-than-straight sexuality. It’s rarely easy, no matter how many years you’ve lived already. It still requires good support from the people who love you, and one thing in common in all of the books I’ve recommended is that family, or often found family, plays a crucial role in the newly-out woman feeling comfortable being themselves.
The first sapphic book I ever read, over 30 years ago, still holds a special place in my heart. The two women stumble into their attraction for each other in a way that is believable and tender, and they take a journey together that is still relevant to our times. While one woman, Lane, had previously thought a same-sex relationship could be a real possibility for her, the other, Diana, had literally no idea until she meets Lane and is swept off her feet by her feelings. Simply a lovely story that I’ve re-read many times.
The intimacy of a cabin at Lake Tahoe provides the combustible circumstances that bring Diana Holland and Lane Christianson together in this passionate novel of first discovery.
Candid in its eroticism, intensely romantic, remarkably beautiful, CURIOUS WINE is a love story that will remain in your memory.
As the author of several sapphic sports romances, I find sports world rife with passion, complexities, and inherent conflict. I’ve had the privilege of working with several professional athletes and Olympians, and I’m always drawn to their drive. Sports, especially high-level sports, function as a pressure cooker to reveal our real personalities for better or for worse. There’s something appealing about studying people who push their minds and bodies to the brink in pursuit of something bigger than themselves. I think in some small way that connects with who as I am a writer and my own drive to always improve.
This is a story about a personal trainer charged with helping a hockey star get back on the ice. While the focus is very much on the relationship rather than the hockey, I just adored the way Kris Bryant captures the ways an athlete puts so much of herself on the line both physically and emotionally. I love the way Kris writes this “all in” sort of character who charges after what she wants, both in and out of the arena. I think she captured the kind of personality we are all drawn to in people who have the drive to reach the pinnacle of their pursuits.
As the go-to therapist at Elite Therapy, Dr. Hayley Sims is the best in her field. It’s exactly why she’s just been assigned her most challenging patient yet, hockey player Elizabeth Stone. Not because Stone’s injury is complicated, but because she is intense to work with and needs someone to keep her in check. When Hayley’s personal life starts unraveling and she realizes she might be developing feelings for her patient, she’s torn between finishing her assignment and walking away to protect herself. Can Hayley get Stone back on the ice in one piece while keeping her heart from breaking?
At heart, I’m still just a girl. I don’t think I’ll ever grow out of wanting to experience the excitement of first kisses, first loves, and of coming out, when everything was new and exciting, and the world was full of promise. That’s why we return to YA even as adults. To feel the butterflies of a first crush, the fluttering of first love, and the agony of first loss. Those transformative books, the ones that change the trajectory of our lives, are usually young adult novels. I wrote The Space Betweento give readers a story to fall in love with and take with them the rest of their lives.
If you identify anywhere on the LGBTIQ2+ scale and haven’t heard of Sarah Waters, you’ve likely been living under a rock.
Her debut novel, Tipping the Velvet, is probably better known as the three-part BBC series, but the book is what truly makes the characters come to life. From naïve, small town, oyster-girl in Kent to the life of the London Stage, Waters takes you through Victorian-era England via the point of view of beloved heroine Nan Astley.
If you’re looking for a sexy, sensuous, and downright gritty novel about what life was truly like for a ‘tom’ growing up and coming out in the nineteenth century, this is thebook.
'Piercing the shadows of the naked stage was a single shaft of rosy limelight, and in the centre of this was a girl: the most marvellous girl - I knew it at once! - that I had ever seen.'
A saucy, sensuous and multi-layered historical romance set in the 'roaring' 1890s, Tipping the Velvet follows the glittering career of Nan King on her journey from Whitstable oyster-girl to music-hall star to cross-dressing rentboy to East End 'tom'.
