Books to Celebrate International Women's Day

February 28, 2020

In honor of International Women’s Day, we take the time to celebrate the achievements of all women, socially, culturally, economically, and politically. So, the best way to be informed is by reading stories of amazing women and some women authors throught history! 

However, there's still a lot of work to do in countries where gender discrimination is still widely practiced. Raise your words, not your voice... open a Book!

1 Hey Beautiful, You Are The Hope

Hey Beautiful, You Are The Hope

Santosh Jha | Self-Improvement

Rating:

An essay addressed to modern women of wisdom, aimed at empowering her consciousness to enhance her life-living wellness & personal excellence. As feminism enters its maturity-phase in new millennium, core ideas about true woman, her contemporary mind consciousness and fresh agenda need to be revisited. New-age women hold keys to sanity of humanity, as she is the ‘dominant gender’ in every sense.

2 The Second Sex

The Second Sex

Simone de Beauvoir | Gender Studies

Rating:

The Second Sex (French: Le Deuxième Sexe, June 1949) is one of the best-known works of the French existentialist Simone de Beauvoir. It is a work on the treatment of women throughout history and often regarded as a major work of feminist philosophy and the starting point of second-wave feminism. Beauvoir researched and wrote the book in about 14 months. She published it in two volumes and some chapters first appeared in Les Temps moderns. The Vatican placed it on its List of Prohibited Books.

3 A Mssiah

A Mssiah

Gurmeet Mattu | Drama

Rating:

This stage play script mixes feminism with the Christ mythos. At Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp in England in the 1980's a charismatic figure rises and gathers followers. Who is she? Does she even know herself?

4 Emma

Emma

Jane Austen | Fiction Classics

Rating:

The beautiful and intelligent Emma Wodehouse enjoys meddling in other people's love lives, but she can't seem to find a love of her own.

5 Agnes Grey

Agnes Grey

Anne Bronte | Fiction Classics

Rating:

Agnes is a poor girl who seeks to earn respect by becoming a governess for a rich family, but she is not given any authority by Mrs. Bloomsfield who spoils her children.

6 Jane Eyre: An Autobiography

Jane Eyre: An Autobiography

Charlotte Bronte | Romance Classics

Rating:

A poor, abused orphan named Jane uses her cleverness and perseverance to win the love of the man she loves.

7 Villette

Villette

Charlotte Bronte | Romance Classics

Rating:

With no family or money, Lucy moves to France and becomes a teacher at a school for girls where she finds love and independence.

8 The Awakening, and Selected Short Stories

The Awakening, and Selected Short Stories

Kate Chopin | Misc Classics

Rating:

The classic book, The Awakening, and Selected Short Stories, by Kate Chopin.

9 Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights

Emily Bronte | Fiction Classics

Rating:

A servant in the house at Wuthering Heights reveals the historic story of the love affair between Catherine and Heathcliff to a visitor who is currently staying there.

10 Orlando

Orlando

Virginia Woolf | Humanities and Arts

Rating:

A Biography is an influential novel by Virginia Woolf, first published on 11 October 1928. A semi-biographical novel based in part on the life of Woolf's lover Vita Sackville-West, it is generally considered one of Woolf's most accessible novels. The novel has been influential stylistically, and is considered important in literature generally, and particularly in the history of women's writing and gender studies. A film adaptation was released in 1992, starring Tilda Swinton as Orlando and Quentin Crisp as Queen Elizabeth I.

11 Tears of a Child

Tears of a Child

Louise Kinnear | Biography

Rating:

EDITOR'S NOTE: Scenes of a sexual nature included. For mature audiences only. Screaming, shouting and swearing are all I hear while hiding in a corner of my room. Tears rolling down my face knowing that there is nothing I can do to stop this. I will get shouted at by someone I love so dearly. Someone I appreciated and looked up to all my life. I can hear how he hits her. Every slap echoes through the house. The screams of torture erupt through the silence of the night. Tearing of clothes and making her believe she is worthless. What kind of monster is this? From a placid person, he would change into a monster.

12 Little Women

Little Women

Louisa May Alcott | Children's Classics

Rating:

The March sisters, Jo, Meg, Amy, and Beth, survive poverty and the absence of their father during the Civil War.

13 Fighting For Freedom (Fighting Series book 1)

Fighting For Freedom (Fighting Series book 1)

Cindy Diaz | Romance

Rating:

Jane has lived her whole life in a bubble full of lies, until she discovered her father's secret. Her whole life came crashing down. Everything she thought she knew was all a lie. Jane decides to leave everything she once knew and loved behind to start over. Now she is on her own taking charge of her life. She has everything planned until she meets Gabriel. He is a conceited, smart mouth know it all, but no matter how much she tries to avoid him there is something pulling her towards him. It doesn't help that he is the sexiest man she has ever met with the most amazing green eyes. Jane soon comes to learn that no matter how fast and far you run your past will always catch up to you.

14 Free Women

Free Women

Mike E. Chukwu | Educational

Rating:

No one deserves to be raped. The evil is growing worse but we can do something great and positive against it. Find out how in this book.

15 Are Women the Stronger Sex?

Are Women the Stronger Sex?

Josette Sona | Psychology

Rating:

Ladies, never stop believing that you have honor, integrity, and strength. This book confirms this, giving examples of why this is true. Women have had to endure abuse throughout history but have still remained strong; raising families, positively contributing to society (even though they often don't get credit for their accomplishments). This book, years in the making, gives girls and young women a better understanding of who they are and the kinds of people they may have to deal with in their lives. As we're not born knowing what is explained in this short book, hopefully it will provide wisdom, helping women to make wise choices in life. The understanding of a negative situation often helps us to make peace with it and experience forgiveness - which ultimately benefits everyone.

16 My Big Girl Dream

My Big Girl Dream

I May End Soon | Fiction

Rating:

The phenomenon of feminism and some women's dream for high status are some of the themes featured in this story.

17 Goodbye, Padania

Goodbye, Padania

Bryan Murphy | Drama

Rating:

A young woman strives to break free of her grim past and avoid a bloody future. Amid the death agonies of a pariah state, Daria Rigoletti transforms herself from contract killer to people-smuggler to cult leader, but circumstances combine against her attempts to break free of violence. Will the mysterious Mercurio help her – if she doesn’t kill him first? Can anyone else reignite her human feelings and her passion for love and life?

18 D for Daisy

D for Daisy

Nick Aaron | Mystery

Rating:

World War II. A Lancaster lands at its base in England after bombing Berlin, and a member of the crew is found dead. However, his young wife Daisy finds out that he has been murdered. But she is only a woman, blonde and pretty, and blind since birth: so who is going to listen to her? In the mayhem of the bombing campaign, who even cares? That is why she will have to find the murderer on her own. The trilogy is a story of crime, punishment, and redemption, and at the same time a portrait of the twentieth century as witnessed by a remarkable blind woman. In volume one Daisy Hayes takes us along with her through World War II. The second book brings us to the Swinging Sixties in London, and finally the third one to 1989, the year the Berlin wall came down.

19 I Trusted Him

I Trusted Him

Jennifer Smith | Biography

Rating:

Teen relationships are often controversial and severely misunderstood. In some cases these relationships can escalate into what is commonly known as domestic violence or intimate partner violence (IPV). The more tragic of these cases sometime lead to murder . As was the case for 16-year old Anna Lynn Hurd. This book, "I Trusted Him : The True Story of Anna Lynn Hurd," methodically documents the months and days leading up to her gruesome murder, a murder that no one in the small town of Northern St. Paul could have seen coming, or could they?