4 ms·

Turns out to be mainly a complaint about many book lists not containing enough female authors. Unfortunately the alternative "best books by women" list is pres

Turns out to be mainly a complaint about many book lists not containing enough female authors. Unfortunately the alternative "best books by women" list is presented in a way that doesn't really makes me want to read those books. Can anybody recommend some of them? Given that I find it generally difficult to find books worth reading, I couldn't care less about the gender of the author. But if there are hidden gems in that list of female authors, why not.

douche 10y ago
I've tried to read female authors. Outside of JK Rowling, and Ayn Rand, I haven't had much success. There's a fundamental disconnect in outlook and mentality that I struggle to bridge. I don't think anything like these female authors do, and their world is incredibly foreign to me.
- projektfu 10y ago
  Try In Sunlight, in a Beautiful Garden by Kathleen Cambor.
  - facepalm 10y ago
    Thanks, will do
- tempodox 10y ago
  Try Ricarda Huch. Or Barbara Tuchman.
  - facepalm 10y ago
    Thanks, I will
- ashark 10y ago
  Which ones have you tried? If you want to have something to talk about when people are talking about female authors and Austen inevitably comes up, I'd recommend Persuasion, and maybe Emma provided you are OK with imagining your own ending to make it the slow-motion soul-crushing tragedy it so clearly wanted to be. Persuasion wasn't given her final punch-up editing pass before she died, and so it lacks much of the "gosh I, the author, am so clever and my remarks so cutting!" tone that I've been unable to get past in her other books (save Emma) while still actually being reasonably clever. It's also quite short. Emma is kind of a take-down of that exact tendency in Austen herself, so it worked OK for me. Mind: if you're not OK with the prose, tone, and topics of 19th century English literature in general, you'll hate any of it regardless. Anyway, it can be a good thing to get a taste of the "foreign" in reading.
  - douche 10y ago
    Persuasion is fucking awful, and was enough to make me write off Austen entirely. There are so many good books, I don't see much point in wasting time on that kind of trash
    - ashark 10y ago
      Ah. OK, given that and listing Rand as one you connected with, I don't think I'll be able to help.
- facepalm 10y ago
  Apart from JK Rowling, I have also enjoyed reading Patricia Highsmith and Fred Vargas (she is a woman, despite of the name). Haven't read Rand yet. I also remember that I liked Earthsea, but don't remember the details. I think many of those "read more women" lists tend to be heavy on feminist topics, therefore less appealing. Of course in general good female authors exist. (Just remembered that as a teen I was also impressed by Virginia Wolf's "The Waves"). Edit: and of course Agatha Christie
cicero 10y ago
My two favorite female authors are Jane Austen and Dorothy Sayers, neither of whom are on this list. Austen's books definitely feel like they are written by a woman. She was a stickler for authenticity, so she never depicted a scene without women present because she did not know how men behaved without a woman present. They are about the complexity of human relationships in the aristocratic English culture in which she lived, but they speak to all of us because we are all human just like her characters were. Dorothy Sayers wrote a lot of mysteries. Her books do not feel as feminine to me as Austen's books, but like Austen, she does get into the depths of the human heart. She does this in the context of a murder rather than a love story, so her books may be more appealing to male authors. Like Austen, Sayers is also British, but she is early to mid 20th century.
cousin_it 10y ago
Ursula Le Guin and Shirley Jackson are classics, and great fun too. I loved Agota Kristof's "The Notebook". It's very hard boiled and chilling, kinda like Hammett's "The Glass Key" if it was written about children in wartime. The rest of the list I'm not familiar with. I should check some of them out. They definitely should have included Kathrine Taylor's "Address Unknown". It's a very influential short story from 1938, do yourself a favor and read it: http://www.acobas.net/teaching/textbook/address/addressunknown.pdf http://www.acobas.net/teaching/textbook/address/addressunkno...

douche 10y ago

I've tried to read female authors. Outside of JK Rowling, and Ayn Rand, I haven't had much success. There's a fundamental disconnect in outlook and mentality that I struggle to bridge. I don't think anything like these female authors do, and their world is incredibly foreign to me.

projektfu 10y ago
Try In Sunlight, in a Beautiful Garden by Kathleen Cambor.
- facepalm 10y ago
  Thanks, will do
tempodox 10y ago
Try Ricarda Huch. Or Barbara Tuchman.
- facepalm 10y ago
  Thanks, I will
ashark 10y ago
Which ones have you tried? If you want to have something to talk about when people are talking about female authors and Austen inevitably comes up, I'd recommend Persuasion, and maybe Emma provided you are OK with imagining your own ending to make it the slow-motion soul-crushing tragedy it so clearly wanted to be. Persuasion wasn't given her final punch-up editing pass before she died, and so it lacks much of the "gosh I, the author, am so clever and my remarks so cutting!" tone that I've been unable to get past in her other books (save Emma) while still actually being reasonably clever. It's also quite short. Emma is kind of a take-down of that exact tendency in Austen herself, so it worked OK for me. Mind: if you're not OK with the prose, tone, and topics of 19th century English literature in general, you'll hate any of it regardless. Anyway, it can be a good thing to get a taste of the "foreign" in reading.
- douche 10y ago
  Persuasion is fucking awful, and was enough to make me write off Austen entirely. There are so many good books, I don't see much point in wasting time on that kind of trash
  - ashark 10y ago
    Ah. OK, given that and listing Rand as one you connected with, I don't think I'll be able to help.
facepalm 10y ago
Apart from JK Rowling, I have also enjoyed reading Patricia Highsmith and Fred Vargas (she is a woman, despite of the name). Haven't read Rand yet. I also remember that I liked Earthsea, but don't remember the details. I think many of those "read more women" lists tend to be heavy on feminist topics, therefore less appealing. Of course in general good female authors exist. (Just remembered that as a teen I was also impressed by Virginia Wolf's "The Waves"). Edit: and of course Agatha Christie

cicero 10y ago

My two favorite female authors are Jane Austen and Dorothy Sayers, neither of whom are on this list. Austen's books definitely feel like they are written by a woman. She was a stickler for authenticity, so she never depicted a scene without women present because she did not know how men behaved without a woman present. They are about the complexity of human relationships in the aristocratic English culture in which she lived, but they speak to all of us because we are all human just like her characters were. Dorothy Sayers wrote a lot of mysteries. Her books do not feel as feminine to me as Austen's books, but like Austen, she does get into the depths of the human heart. She does this in the context of a murder rather than a love story, so her books may be more appealing to male authors. Like Austen, Sayers is also British, but she is early to mid 20th century.

cousin_it 10y ago

Ursula Le Guin and Shirley Jackson are classics, and great fun too. I loved Agota Kristof's "The Notebook". It's very hard boiled and chilling, kinda like Hammett's "The Glass Key" if it was written about children in wartime. The rest of the list I'm not familiar with. I should check some of them out. They definitely should have included Kathrine Taylor's "Address Unknown". It's a very influential short story from 1938, do yourself a favor and read it: http://www.acobas.net/teaching/textbook/address/addressunknown.pdf http://www.acobas.net/teaching/textbook/address/addressunkno...