500 Great Books By Women discussion

Here are the options I'm considering for this year. Dates/checks on what I've read.

B
1. Published in the 1900s
✅Journal of a Solitude (August 15) — May Sarton
2. Science Fiction
Afterland — Lauren Beukes
3. Author Born in Latin America
✅Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions (Aug. 18) — Valeria Luiselli
4. Queer Theme and/or Author
✅Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (Aug. 16) — Alison Bechdel
✅Rubyfruit Jungle (Jan. 12) — Rita Mae Brown
5. Potential Classic Published after 1969
✅The Crow Eaters (March 30) — Bapsi Sidhwa

I
1. Translated from Language Other than English
The Alexiad — Anna Comnena
The Little Virtues — Natalia Ginzburg
2. Play
The God of Carnage — Yasmina Reza
The Heidi Chronicles — Wendy Wasserstein
3. Disability as Theme and/or Disabled Author
✅On Being Ill (March 25) — Virginia Woolf
4. Published in the pre-1800s
Selected Writings — Hildegard of Bingen
Selected Philosophical and Scientific Writings — Émilie Du Châtelet
5. Novella (Less than 200 Pages)
✅Sexing the Cherry (Oct. 2) — Jeanette Winterson

N
1. Published in the 2000s
✅Where I Was From (Dec. 1) — Joan Didion
2. Long Read (More than 600 Pages)
Black Lamb and Grey Falcon — Rebecca West
3. Free Space
✅Slow Days, Fast Company: The World, the Flesh, and L.A.: Tales (Sept. 14) — Eve Babitz
4. Less than 1,000 Ratings on Goodreads
✅Work Optional: Retire Early the Non-Penny-Pinching Way (March 10) — Tanja Hester
5. Fantasy
Saddlebag — Bahíyyih Nakhjavání

G
1. Published in the 1800s
✅Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 (Aug. 18) — Margaret Fuller
2. Nobel Laureate Author (Not Just for Lit)
Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action — Elinor Ostrom
Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty — Esther Duflo
3. Author Born in Africa
✅Country of My Skull: Guilt, Sorrow, and the Limits of Forgiveness in the New South Africa (Nov. 24) — Antjie Krog
4. Less than 5,000 Ratings on Goodreads
✅Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming (Aug. 27) — Naomi Oreskes
5. Mystery/Thriller
The Talented Mr. Ripley — Patricia Highsmith

O
1. Less than 10,000 Ratings on Goodreads
✅Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter (Sept. 20) — Simone de Beauvoir
2. Author Born in Asia
✅An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire (May 17) — Arundhati Roy
3. Poetry
✅Plainwater: Essays and Poetry (Feb. 2) — Anne Carson
4. Nonfiction
✅Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (Nov. 16) — Mary Roach
5. Short Story Collection
Subtly Worded — Teffi

Welcome, Nell! Any port in the COVID-19 storm ;)

In any case, you have a lot of good possibilities there (Christa Wolf, Arundhati Roy, and Simone de Beauvoir alone are all favorites of mine), so I hope this challenge goes well for you.

Aubrey wrote: "Welcome, Nell! Any port in the COVID-19 storm ;) ..."

Thanks, Aubrey!

Stressful times for lots of folks, and not a bad time to seek out good reads. Time will tell how ambitious I can get, but I am liking this year's categories!

And I think I have you to thank for encouraging me to prioritize de Beauvoir's autobiographies last year. One of several reads I'm thinking will be quite good.

Such interesting titles, Nell. I had to add The Alexiad. Enjoy your challenge!

Welcome, Nell. Once things settle down I’m going to try to find some of your books at the library. Have fun with the challenge.

Well here we are, close to the end of the year! I've done a lot less reading this year than my norm, despite the Covid of it all, but I will say of this year's challenge I have focused more on seeking out topics and studies that were specific to interests I've had, and I've found it more fulfilling. Of my challenge so far this year, high recommendations for Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, Plainwater, Merchants of Doubt, Country of My Skull, Where I Was From, Tell Me How It Ends, An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire and Journal of a Solitude. I'm eager to read more of Simone de Beauvoir's autobiographical works in the coming year, and also dig into more world literary nonfiction!