New and Recommended Adult Nonfiction to Read During Women's History Month and Beyond

Updated March 2, 2026
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New and Recommended Adult Nonfiction to Read During Women's History Month and Beyond

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107 Days
Harris, Kamala
For the first time, and with surprising and revealing insights, former Vice President Kamala Harris tells the story of one of the wildest and most consequential presidential campaigns in American history. Your Secret Service code name is Pioneer. You are the first woman...
All the Way to the River : Love, Loss, and Liberation
Gilbert, Elizabeth
Paper Book
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AN OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK "A delicious mashup of narrative that's by turns harrowing and healing." -People "Entertaining, insightful, wrenching ... punch-to-the-gut powerful." -The Washington Post
Angelica: For Love and Country in a Time of Revolution
Beer, Molly
Paper Book
A women-centric view of revolution through the life of Angelica Schuyler Church, Alexander Hamilton's influential sister-in-law. Few women of the American Revolution have come through 250 years of US history with such clarity and color as Angelica Schuyler Church. She was Alexander...
The Aviator and the Showman: Amelia Earhart, George Putnam, and the Marriage That Made an American Icon
Shapiro, Laurie Gwen
In 1928, a young social worker and hobby pilot named Amelia Earhart arrived in the office of George Putnam, heir to the Putnam & Sons throne and hitmaker, on the hunt for the right woman for a secret flying mission across the Atlantic. A partnership - professional and soon otherwise - was born. The...
Awake: A Memoir
Hatmaker, Jen
Paper Book
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, OPRAH DAILY, GOODREADS, KIRKUS REVIEWS, AND MORE A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "I can't imagine any woman reading this without feeling seen, inspired, and totally empowered." -...
Black Bear: A Story of Siblinghood and Survival
Moyles, Trina
A dazzling memoir about one woman's coexistence with bears in the boreal forest and a singular meditation on sibling loss. When Trina Moyles was five years old, her father, a wildlife biologist known in Peace River as "the bear guy," brought home an orphaned black bear cub for a...
A Black women's history of the United States
Berry, Daina Ramey
Paper Book
The award-winning Revisioning American History series continues with this "groundbreaking new history of Black women in the United States" (Ibram X. Kendi)-the perfect companion to An Indigenous People's History of the United States and An African American and Latinx History of the...
The Bluestockings: A History of the First Women's Movement
Gibson, Susannah
Paper Book
In England in the 1700s, a woman who was an intellectual, spoke out, or wrote professionally was considered unnatural. After all, as the wisdom of the era dictated, a clever woman--if there were such a thing--would never make a good wife. But a circle of women called the Bluestockings did...
Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts
Atwood, Margaret.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD * NAMED A NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES AND THE WASHINGTON POST * How does the greatest writer of our time tell her own story? "The most spectacular,...
Bread of Angels: A Memoir
Smith, Patti
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A radiant new memoir from artist and writer Patti Smith, author of the National Book Award winner Just Kids A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: TIME, NPR, THE NEW YORKER "God whispers through a crease in the...
Brooke Shields Is Not Allowed to Get Old : Thoughts on Aging As a Woman
Shields, Brooke/ Bertsche, Rachel (CON)
Paper Book
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From generational icon Brooke Shields comes an intimate and empowering exploration of aging that flips the script on the idea of what it means for a woman to grow older Brooke Shields has spent a lifetime in the public eye....
Cancer Is Complicated: And Other Unexpected Lessons I've Learned
Shearer, Clea
Paper Book
In 2022, Clea Shearer thought: This is going to be the best year of my life. The Home Edit, the company she had cofounded and worked so hard to grow, was acquired by Hello Sunshine. She had just finished filming the second season of her Emmy-nominated show Get Organized with The Home Edit. She...
Care and Feeding: A Memoir
Woolever, Laurie
Paper Book
An Instant New York Times Bestseller! A candid, funny, and occasionally devastating culinary memoir of a woman making her way through the food world, navigating addiction, a cultural reckoning, and an unexpected tragedy In this moving, hilarious, and insightful...
Cekpa: A Memoir in Beaded Essays
Altman, Leah
For Leah Altman, growing up as an adoptee outside of her culture meant growing up without her cekpa, the Lakota connection to family and homeland. Now an adult, Leah departs her life in Portland, Oregon, to seek out her birth family and reconnect to her heritage--each chapter of her journey a...
A Change of Habit: Leaving Behind My Husband, Career, and Everything I Owned to Become a Nun
Sister Monica Clare
Paper Book
The soulful, hilarious memoir of a chronic people pleaser who surprised everyone in her life by abandoning an unfulfilling career and marriage to join a convent-and learned how much we stand to gain when we fully embrace our authentic selves "A Change of Habit follows...
Cher : The Memoir, Part One
Cher
Paper Book
***The Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller*** ***The Global #1 Bestseller*** The extraordinary life of Cher can be told by only one person . . . Cher herself. After more than seventy years of fighting to live her life on her own...
The Conjuring of America : Mojos, Mermaids, Medicine, and 400 Years of Black Women's Magic
Stewart, Lindsey
Kirkus Best Books of 2025 | BookRiot's Best Books of 2025 | NPR's New Books to Read | Ms. Magazine's Most Anticipated Feminist Book  A crucial telling of U.S. history centering the Black women whose magic gave rise to the rich tapestry of American culture, wellness,...
A Danger to the Minds of Young Girls: Margaret C. Anderson, Book Bans, and the Fight to Modernize Literature
Morgan, Adam
Paper Book
"Wholly transportive and spellbinding." --Ling Ma, bestselling author of Severance and Bliss Montage "Exquisitely researched, deeply felt, and poignant. This one belongs on your shelf." --Sarah Rose Etter, author of Ripe "A fascinating account of a...
A Different Kind of Power: A Memoir
Ardern, Jacinda
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * From the former prime minister of New Zealand, then the world's youngest female head of government and just the second to give birth in office, comes a deeply personal memoir chronicling her extraordinary rise and offering inspiration to a new generation of...
The Dry Season: A Memoir of Pleasure in a Year Without Sex
Febos, Melissa
Paper Book
From Melissa Febos, the national bestselling author of Girlhood, comes an examination of the solitude, freedoms, and feminist heroes she discovered during a year of celibacy and a wise and transformative look at relationships and self-knowledge. "Only Melissa Febos could...
Finding My Way: A Memoir
Yousafzai, Malala
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! | A USA TODAY BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR "A remarkably intimate and insistently human chronicle of a moral authority's coming of age." --The New York Times This is not the story you think you know...
A flower traveled in my blood : the incredible true story of the grandmothers who fought to find a stolen generation of children
Cohen Gilliland, Haley
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2025 * THE WASHINGTON POST'S 5 BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF 2025 * THE ATLANTIC'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF 2025 * THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY'S BEST BOOKS OF 2025 * TIME MAGAZINE'S BEST BOOKS OF 2025 * NPR'S BEST BOOKS...
Fly, Wild Swans: My Mother, Myself and China
Chang, Jung
The magnificent follow-up to Wild Swans, the multimillion copy, internationally bestselling sensation that traces the history of modern China through the true stories of three generations of courageous women in one family. "AT THE AGE OF FIFTEEN MY GRANDMOTHER became the concubine of a...
Getting Naked: The Quiet Work of Becoming Perfectly Imperfect
Bertinelli, Valerie
From beloved actress and New York Times bestselling author Valerie Bertinelli, her most vulnerable book yet offering wisdom hard-won through divorce, menopause, and generational pain, with a powerful message of self-acceptance and embracing the past with compassion. ...
Girl Warrior: A Coming of Age Handbook
Harjo, Joy
Paper Book
"To know ourselves is the most profound and difficult endeavor. Though we are all made of the same questions, we have individual routes to the answers, or to reframing the questions. Why is there evil in the world? Why do people suffer, and some more than others? Why are we here? What are we...
The harder I fight, the more I love you : a memoir
Case, Neko
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AN APPLE BEST BOOK OF THE MONTH Singer-songwriter Neko Case paints a vivid portrait of an extraordinary life--one forged through a poverty-stricken childhood, obsessive desire, bursts of comedy, and...
How to Be a Rich Old Lady: Your Guide to Easy Investing, Building Wealth, and Creating the Wild, Beautiful Life You Want
Holden, Amanda
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * A life-changing path to the financial freedom we all deserve: How to Be a Rich Old Lady is filled with humor, heart, and real-world perspective. Amanda Holden spent years working in investment management, where she saw exactly who gets access to the...
A Hymn to Life: Shame Has to Change Sides
Pelicot, Gisele
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "A rousing feminist manifesto." - The New York Times Book Review "Staggering . . . a lyrical book about monstrous events, a compelling exploration of what it feels like to hold two existences in your brain at once." -...
I Identify as Blind: A Brazen Celebration of Disability Culture, Identity, and Power
Lachi
Lachi is an award-winning musician and an unapologetic activist who awakens the world to this truth: Disability is an identity worth brazenly celebrating. In her book, Lachi spotlights how disabled people have to be driven, persistent, perceptive, and highly adaptable just to get through any given...
Joan of Arc : a life transfigured
Harrison, Kathryn.
Paper Book
The profoundly inspiring and fully documented saga of Joan of Arc, the young peasant girl whose "voices" moved her to rally the French nation and a reluctant king against British invaders in 1428, has fascinated artistic figures as diverse as William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Voltaire, George...
Joyride : A Memoir
Orlean, Susan
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY NPR, TIME, OPRAH DAILY, KIRKUS REVIEWS, GOODREADS, AND MORE "Brilliant...A high-spirited, exhilarating memoir." --The Wall Street Journal * "In Joyride, the takeaway often has as...
Judy Blume: A Life
Oppenheimer, Mark
The highly anticipated biography of one of the world's most treasured literary voices, showcasing a life as triumphant and inspiring as the stories she crafted. To know the name Judy Blume is to know and love literature. Her influential novels turned classics--including Are...
Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!
Minnelli, Liza
Global icon Liza Minnelli shares her inspiring story: stepping out from the long shadow of a mega-star mother and legendary film director father, fighting a lifetime battle with addiction, and emerging from it all to become a once-in-a-lifetime...
Language as Liberation: Reflections on the American Canon
Morrison, Toni
Paper Book
Nobel laureate and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Beloved Toni Morrison investigates Black characters in the American literary canon and the way they shaped the nation's collective unconscious. In a dazzling series of lectures from her tenure as a professor at Princeton...
Listening to the law : reflections on the court and constitution
Barrett, Amy Coney
From Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a glimpse of her journey to the Court and an account of her approach to the Constitution Since her confirmation hearing, Americans have peppered Justice Amy Coney Barrett with questions. How has she adjusted to the Court? What is it...
The Look
Obama, Michelle
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * WINNER OF THE NAACP IMAGE AWARD * Beautifully illustrated with more than 200 photographs, including never-before-seen images, The Look is a stunning journey through Michelle Obama's style evolution, in her own words for the first time. ...
La Lucci
Lucci, Susan
The moving follow-up to Susan Lucci's New York Times bestseller, All My Life, this stunning new memoir includes nearly one hundred never-before-seen photos. The long-running Queen of Daytime television, Susan Lucci--who has gone by the endearment, La Lucci, since her earliest days on the...
A marriage at sea : a true story of love, obsession, and shipwreck
Elmhirst, Sophie
THE RUNAWAY NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER & ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2025 A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK OF 2025 ALSO NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2025 BY NPR, VOGUE, TIME MAGAZINE, THE NEW YORKER, AND MORE "This is nonfiction that...
Matriarch: A Memoir
Knowles, Tina
Paper Book
INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A glorious chronicle of a life like none other--enlightening, entertaining, surprising, empowering--and a testament to the world-changing power of Black motherhood "A beautiful and brave story of strong women, fierce mothering, and the...
Memorial days
Brooks, Geraldine
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER · A National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist A New York Times Notable Book of 2025 · A Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2025 · A Time Best Memoir of 2025 · Named a Best Book of 2025 by NPR,...
The missing thread : a women's history of the ancient world
Dunn, Daisy
Paper Book
One of The Smithsonian's 10 best history books of 2024 One of BBC History Magazine's best books of 2024 "Thoroughly researched and sprightly.... a complete history of the [Mediterranean world] with the women added back in, as they always should have been."<...
Mother Mary Comes to Me
Roy, Arundhati.
Named One of The New York Times Book Review's Top Ten Books of the Year Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Kirkus Prize One of the best-reviewed books of the year, a raw and deeply moving memoir that "pulses with...
Nobody's Girl : A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice
Giuffre, Virginia Roberts
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The unforgettable memoir by the late Virginia Roberts Giuffre, the woman who dared to take on Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell "Make no mistake: this is a book about power, corruption, industrial-scale sex abuse and the way in which...
North of Ordinary: How One Woman Left It All Behind for Wilderness and Wonder in Alaska's Frozen Frontier
Aikens, Sue
When the wild strips everything away, what's left is who you are. In the raw, untamed wilds of Alaska--where the wind howls, predators hunt, and the sun disappears for months--only a rare few figure out how to survive. Sue Aikens, the breakout star of National Geographic's long-running TV...
Notes on Heartbreak: A Memoir
Lord, Annie
"Arresting and vivid, raw and breathtaking . . . told with stunning originality. Annie Lord is a phenomenal talent." ―Dolly Alderton, author of Everything I Know About Love "An electrifying debut." ―Caroline O'Donoghue, author of The Rachel Incident With the incisive wit...
The Official We Do Not Care Club Handbook: A Hot-Mess Guide for Women in Perimenopause, Menopause, and Beyond Who Are Over It
Sanders, Melani
New York Times Bestseller We. Do. Not. Care. Hop aboard the Hot Mess Express, Sisters, and welcome to the club! Do you wake up with night sweats at 3:26 a.m., overstimulated, mad at anything breathing, and ready to put the world on notice?
On Her Game: Caitlin Clark and the Revolution in Women's Sports
Brennan, Christine
Instant New York Times Bestseller! A news-making and electrifying portrait of sports phenomenon Caitlin Clark, whose dramatic ascendance in college basketball and now in the WNBA has captured the attention of media and fans unlike any other female team-sport athlete in...
The Other Side of Change: Who We Become When Life Makes Other Plans
Shankar, Maya
Paper Book
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER, AS FEATURED ON NBC TODAY SHOW, CBS MORNINGS, ON PURPOSE WITH JAY SHETTY, AND MORE! "A rare combination of beautiful storytelling, cognitive science, and wholehearted wisdom. --Brené Brown A revelatory exploration...
Paper Girl: A Memoir of Home and Family in a Fractured America
Macy, Beth
Paper Book
Urbana, Ohio, was not a utopia when Beth Macy grew up there in the '70s and '80s-certainly not for her family. Her dad was known as the town drunk, which hurt, as did their poverty. But Urbana had a healthy economy and thriving schools, and Macy had middle-class schoolmates whose families became her...
Positive Obsession: The Life and Times of Octavia E. Butler
Morris, Susana M
Paper Book
A magnificent cultural biography that charts the life of one of our greatest writers, situating her alongside the key historical and social moments that shaped her work.  As the first Black woman to consistently write and publish in the field of science fiction, Octavia...
The radium girls : the dark story of America's shining women
Moore, Kate (Writer and editor)
Paper Book
A New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Amazon Charts Bestseller! "The glowing ghosts of the radium girls haunt us still." --NPR Books  Discover the gripping and inspiring true story of The Radium Girls, a groundbreaking work by acclaimed author Kate Moore....
Rebel of the Regency: The Scandalous Saga of Caroline of Brunswick, Britain's Queen Without a Crown (Original)
Foster, Ann
*A Washington Post Notable Book for February!* The dramatic, absolutely outrageous story of Caroline of Brunswick, a beloved icon of the Regency era, who uplifted the voice of the public and unabashedly defied society's expectations, yet was shockingly robbed of...
The ride of her life : the true story of a woman, her horse, and their last-chance journey across America
Letts, Elizabeth
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER .The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Horse and The Eighty-Dollar Champion presents a "heartwarming and engaging folk-hero biography" (Kirkus Reviews) of a woman who fulfilled her lifelong wish to see the Pacific Ocean by riding...
Saving five : a memoir of hope
Nguyen, Amanda
Paper Book
An Instant New York Times Bestseller and a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. Natalie Portman's Book Club Pick for March. "Amanda's story--innovatively told by versions of herself at different ages--underscores the lasting power of speaking...
Simply More: A Book for Anyone Who Has Been Told They're Too Much
Erivo, Cynthia
Paper Book
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER In this vulnerable and enlightening book of life lessons, globally renowned performer Cynthia Erivo draws from her singular experience to show us how to embrace being "too much" and to live up to the fullest iteration of...
Sister wife : a memoir of faith, family, and finding freedom
Woolley, Christine Brown
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From TLC's Sister Wives star Christine Brown Woolley, a groundbreaking and heartfelt memoir about living in a family like no other and finding the strength to leave polygamy--and the only life she's known--behind.
The sisterhood / The Secret History of Women at the CIA
Mundy, Liza
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * A "rip-roaring" (Steve Coll), "staggeringly well-researched" (The New York Times) history of three generations at the CIA, "electric with revelations" (Booklist) about the women who fought to become operatives, transformed spycraft, and tracked down Osama bin...
The Sisterhood of Ravensbruck: How an Intrepid Band of Frenchwomen Resisted the Nazis in Hitler's All-Female Concentration Camp
Olson, Lynne
Paper Book
The extraordinary true story of a small group of Frenchwomen, all Resistance members, who banded together in a notorious concentration camp to defy the Nazis--from the New York Times bestselling author of Madame Fourcade's Secret War "At once heartbreaking and...
The Six : The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts
Grush, Loren
Paper Book
"Vivid." --The Guardian * "Engrossing." --Booklist * "Suspenseful, meticulously observed, enlightening." --Margot Lee Shetterly, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Figures In this account of America's first women astronauts "Grush...
Spitfires : The American Women Who Flew in the Face of Danger During World War II
Aikman, Becky
Paper Book
"Lively and entertaining . . . Those fearlessly determined female pilots are the professional forebears of the women who would slowly break down barriers in the U.S. military in the decades that followed . . . And what forebears those women were." -The Washington Post
Star of the Show: My Life on Stage
Parton, Dolly
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A stunning celebration of Dolly Parton's iconic career as a performer, featuring entertaining personal stories alongside more than 500 full-color photographs, including exclusive images and ephemera from her archive, and an eight-page gatefold listing her...
Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage
Burden, Belle
INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * "Burden's searing, probing memoir explores . . . what she learned about intimacy and her own spirit."--People​​ "A beautifully written instant classic. Strangers is gripping and heartbreaking and a must...
That's a Great Question, I'd Love to Tell You
Myers, Elyse
Writer, comedian, and content creator Elyse Myers gets real about life's awkward moments in her bold, funny, and unfiltered debut book Elyse Myers is known to her twelve million followers as "The Internet's Best Friend," sharing her relatable stories and comedic sketches and...
Two Women Living Together: The Bestselling Korean Memoir
Hana, Kim
Paper Book
The big-hearted, bestselling South Korean memoir co-written by two best friends flouting gender norms and societal expectations with their decision to grow old together under one roof. When most of their peers were moving in with romantic partners and having children, Kim Hana and Hwang...
We should all be feminists
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The highly acclaimed, provocative essay on feminism and sexual politics--from the award-winning author of Americanah "A call to action, for all people in the world, to undo the gender hierarchy." --Medium<...
WE THE WOMEN : the hidden heroes who shaped america
O'DONNELL, NORAH.
A vivid portrait of the unsung American women from 1776 to today who changed the course of history in their fight for freedom and helped shape a more perfect union "This terrific book reveals the central, though often hidden role that women have played at every stage of our...
When women ruled the world : six queens of Egypt
Cooney, Kara
Paper Book
This riveting narrative explores the lives of six remarkable female pharaohs, from Hatshepsut to Cleopatra--women who ruled with real power--and shines a piercing light on our own perceptions of women in power today. Female rulers are a rare phenomenon--but thousands of years ago...
Winning the Earthquake: How Jeannette Rankin Defied All Odds to Become the First Woman in Congress
Rinehart, Lorissa
Paper Book
The first major biography of Jeannette Rankin, a groundbreaking suffragist, activist, and the first American woman to hold federal office. "Few members of Congress have ever stood more alone while being true to a higher honor and loyalty." --President John F. Kennedy...
A woman of no importance : the untold story of the American spy who helped win World War II
Purnell, Sonia
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Chosen as a BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR by NPR, the New York Public Library, Amazon, the Seattle Times, the Washington Independent Review of Books, PopSugar, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, BookBrowse, the Spectator...
Women in white coats : how the first women doctors changed the world of medicine
Campbell, Olivia
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! For fans of Hidden Figures and Radium Girls comes the remarkable story of three Victorian women who broke down barriers in the medical field to become the first women doctors, revolutionizing the way women receive health care. ...
Writing Creativity and Soul
Kidd, Sue Monk.
INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER * From the bestselling author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Book of Longings: an intimate work on the mysteries, frustrations, and triumphs of being a writer, and an instructive guide to awakening the soul. When Sue Monk Kidd...
You with the sad eyes : a memoir
Applegate, Christina
Unflinchingly honest and darkly funny, You with the Sad Eyes unveils a side of Christina Applegate we've never seen, forever cementing her formidable and iconoclastic legacy.  Christina Applegate came of age on sets and stages, expected to be...
Your Last First Date: Secrets from a Hollywood Matchmaker
Samuels Kuba, Jaydi
Here's a secret: Hollywood insiders aren't better at dating than the rest of us. They just have elite help. The age-old art of matchmaking meets Hollywood as Jaydi Samuels Kuba, founder of LJMatchmaking, takes us behind the scenes of her work as a matchmaker and date coach for...
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