Each year, in honor of Women's History Month, we like to pull together some kind of curated collection featuring nonfiction books on women's history and associated topics. It is, as you might imagine, a tall order. There are a lot of good books out there.

To keep things manageable, this time around we've narrowed the focus to relatively recent books. The books collected below have publication dates from the beginning of 2024 to March 2026—right about now. We've further sorted the books into two general stacks: History & Biography and General Nonfiction. As always, these designations can get slippery, and you may spot some outliers and crossovers. Some random highlights and starting points might include 2025 Goodreads Choice nominee Jane Austen's Bookshelf, author Rebecca Romney's exploration of women writers who inspired the legendary author. Film scholars should appreciate Eleanor Johnson's Scream With Me, which explores issues of feminism, gender, and oppression through the lens of classic horror films—think The Shining, The Exorcist, or Rosemary's Baby. Science fiction readers may want to flag Positive Obsession, author Susana M. Morris' new biography of pioneering sci-fi author Octavia E. Butler.

The range of subjects and themes is really quite astonishing for a two-year window of recent books. Browse around a bit and you'll find books on unsung Motown songwriters, the history of lesbian bars, women in the ancient world, toxic beauty culture, covert World War II campaigns (several, actually), and the eternal glory that is Dolly Parton.

Click on the book covers for more information about each title, and feel free to add anything that looks interesting to your Want to Read shelf.
 

History & Biography