A Bob’s Goals & Challenges

[Julie]

Sounds like a great idea Bob - I love reading through every body elses picks and being inspired to read authors I've never heard of before

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Tammy wrote: "Who are some of your favorite female authors?"

Since I don't have a large list of women authors, here are a few I admire.

Daphne du Maurier
Edith Wharton
Elizabeth Gaskell
Shirley Jackson
Nevada Barr
Agatha Christie

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Brina wrote: "Bob, I think this is a great idea. I’m not doing the challenge this year either but I’m the opposite - I don’t need a challenge to be motivated to read women authors...."

I looked at your most read author list, your most read authors are 56% female, while mine is only 25%. It can do me no harm to try and increase that percentage. Who knows, maybe I will discover women are equal to men. :)

[Brina]

I’m actually looking forward to discovering new male authors next year.

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Julie wrote: "Sounds like a great idea Bob - I love reading through every body elses picks and being inspired to read authors I've never heard of before"

Me too, the best parts of our challenges is seeing what others pick and discovering new books. I am always amazed when I find lists that I have not only never heard of the book, but I've never heard of the author either. Such a good group for learning.

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

*Newly Read Women Authors, Authors I've never read before 1/1/19

Why did I read these? Mostly because I heard positive comments about them on Goodreads. Some are group reads, some I learned about from reading posts and reviews and found interesting.

*Newly Read-Women authors I've never read before 1/1/19
Lilian Smith *
Strange Fruit

Amy Tan *
The Joy Luck Club

Dorothy Parker *
Big Blonde and Other Stories

Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston *
Farewell to Manzanar

Octavia E. Butler *
Kindred

Dee Borgoyn *
28 Ways of Compassion: A Guide to Transformation and Leadership for a Relationship-Centric Healthcare Culture

Sara Steger *
Moving On

Marilynne Robinson *
Gilead

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

*TBR***Books I Own by Women Authors I've Never Read Before

Most were impulse buys, because I heard of them on Goodreads or it was on the bargain rack at the bookstore, and I liked it. I purchase new books mostly from brick and mortar stores, some on line but the largest number of my books come from used books stores. If I recognize the title or author I'l grab it. Will I read all the TBR***? Who knows,

Caroline Alexander
The Bounty: The True Story of the Mutiny on the Bounty***

Jean M. Auel
The Clan of the Cave Bear***
The Valley of Horses***
The Mammoth Hunters***

Dorothy Allison
Bastard Out of Carolina***

Geraldine Brooks
People of the Book***

A.S. Byatt
Possession***

Anita Diamant
The Red Tent***

Marguerite Duras
The Lover***

Kim Edwards
The Memory Keeper's Daughter***

Tana French
In the Woods***

Shirley Ann Grau
The Keepers of the House***

Lisa Gray
Thin Air***

Kathleen Grissom
The Kitchen House***

Helene Hanff
84, Charing Cross Road***

Lorraine Hansberry
A Raisin In The Sun***

Elin Hilderbrand
Barefoot***

Zora Neale Hurston
Their Eyes Were Watching God***

Ngaio Marsh
Alleyn and Others: The Collected Short Fiction of Ngaio Marsh***
Died In The Wool***

Madeline Miller
The Song of Achilles***

Megan Miranda
All the Missing Girls***

Malika Oufkir
Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail***

Katherine Anne Porter
Ship of Fools***

Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
The Yearling***

Marilynne Robinson
Gilead***

Tatiana de Rosnay
Sarah's Key***

Arundhati Roy
The God of Small Things***

Lisa Scottoline
Running from the Law***

Alice Sebold
The Lovely Bones***

Dodie Smith
I Capture the Castle***

Donna Tartt
The Goldfinch***

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

TBR-# Books I Don't Own by Women Authors I've Never Read Before, But I'm Interested In Reading

Most of the following books choices were made using the authors provided by a few group members. I have read about the authors and the book synopsis. This is more planning than I usually do. Most of the books I currently own were bought on impulse. This list is a wish list and I will have to secure a chosen book to read it. Truth is I will most likely read more of these because of the research done.

Edna Ferber
So Big#

Elena Ferrante
The Days of Abandonment#

Clarice Lispector
The Hour of the Star#

Zadie Smith
White Teeth#

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

All the Women Authors I've Read prior to 1/1/19

Why did I read these? Most were impulse buys, because I heard of them on Goodreads or it was on the bargain rack at the bookstore, and I liked it. I purchase new books mostly from brick and mortar stores, some on line but the largest number of my books come from used books stores. If I recognize the title or author I'l grab it. Will I read all the TBR***? Who knows,

A Spoiler is used to hide four or more books
TBR-***Books I own.
TBR-# Books I would like to read someday but I don't have a copy of.
Authors Enjoyed Enough to Read Again**

All the Women authors I've read in the last 10-15 years and all before 1/1/19

A-H
Louisa May Alcott
Little Women

Isabel Allende
The House of the Spirits

Maya Angelou
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Margaret Atwood
The Handmaid's Tale
The Blind Assassin***

Jane Austen
(view spoiler)[ Mansfield Park
Sense and Sensibility
Northanger Abbey
Pride and Prejudice
Emma
Persuasion
Lady Susan (hide spoiler)]

Nevada Barr**
(view spoiler)[ Hunting Season
High Country
Endangered Species
Borderline
Track of the Cat
Liberty Falling
Flashback
Winter Study (hide spoiler)]
13½***
Burn***
Deep South***
TBR-Books I plan to read someday #
(view spoiler)[ A Superior Death
Ill Wind
Firestorm
Blind Descent
Blood Lure
Hard Truth
The Rope
Destroyer Angel
Boar Island (hide spoiler)]

Aimee Bender
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake

Jenna Blum**
Those Who Save Us

Nellie Bly
Ten Days in a Madhouse

Marion Zimmer Bradley
The Firebrand

Anne Brontë
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Agnes Grey

Charlotte Brontë
Jane Eyre
Villette
The Professor

Emily Brontë
Wuthering Heights

Sandra Brown
Envy
Smash Cut

Pearl S. Buck**
The Good Earth
Mandala: A Novel of India***

Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Secret Garden

Dia Calhoun
Firegold

Willa Cather**
Death Comes for the Archbishop
The Garden Lodge
The Professor's House***
My Antonia***

Kate Chopin**
The Story of an Hour
The Awakening

Agatha Christie**
(view spoiler)[ And Then There Were None
The Murder on the Links
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
Witness for the Prosecution
A Holiday for Murder
Murder at the Vicarage
Murder on the Orient Express
The Secret Adversary (hide spoiler)]
Death on the Nile***
Hallowe'en Party***
The Secret of Chimneys***
Mrs. McGinty's Dead***
N or M?***
The Body in the Library***
Dead Man's Folly***
Murder in Retrospect***
The ABC Murders***
Death in the Clouds***
TBR-Books I plan to read someday #-Anything written by Christie

Sandra Cisneros
The House on Mango Street

Mary Higgins Clark
Where Are You Now?
Kitchen Privileges: A Memoir
On the Street Where You Live

Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games
Catching Fire
Mockingjay

Patricia Cornwell
(view spoiler)[ At Risk
Cause of Death
Point of Origin
Book of the Dead
The Front (hide spoiler)]
From Potter's Field***
Scarpetta***
Blow Fly***
Hornet's Nest***

Daphne du Maurier
(view spoiler)[ Rebecca
The House on the Strand
Classics of the Macabre
Jamaica Inn
The Scapegoat
My Cousin Rachel (hide spoiler)]
Rule Britannia***
Frenchman's Creek***

Jennifer Egan
A Visit from the Goon Squad

George Eliot**
Silas Marner
The Mill on the Floss
Middlemarch***

Fannie Flagg
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Gillian Flynn
Gone Girl
Dark Places***

Anne Frank
The Diary of a Young Girl

Elizabeth Gaskell**
North and South
Ruth
Cranford

Stella Gibbons
Cold Comfort Farm

Charlotte Perkins Gilman
The Yellow Wall-Paper

Susan Glaspell**
A Jury of Her Peers
Trifles

Sue Grafton
T is for Trespass

Sara Gruen
Water for Elephants

Paula Hawkins
The Girl on the Train

Laura Hillenbrand
Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption

Alice Hoffman**
The Dovekeepers

Susan Howatch
Glittering Images

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

All the Women Authors I've Read prior to 1/1/19

Why did I read these? Most were impulse buys, because I heard of them on Goodreads or it was on the bargain rack at the bookstore, and I liked it. I purchase new books mostly from brick and mortar stores, some on line but the largest number of my books come from used books stores. If I recognize the title or author I'l grab it. Will I read all the TBR***? Who knows,

A Spoiler is used to hide four or more books
TBR-***Books I own.
TBR-# Books I would like to read someday but I don't have a copy of.
Authors Enjoyed Enough to Read Again**

All the Women authors I've read in the last 10-15 years and all before 1/1/19

I-P
Shirley Jackson**
The Lottery
We Have Always Lived in the Castle
The Haunting of Hill House

Sarah Orne Jewett**
The Country of the Pointed Firs
A White Heron

Helen Keller
The Story of My Life

Frances Parkinson Keyes
Blue Camellia

Laurie R. King
Keeping Watch

Barbara Kingsolver
The Poisonwood Bible
The Bean Trees***

Madeleine L'Engle
A Wrinkle in Time

Ursula K. Le Guin
The Left Hand of Darkness
A Wizard of Earthsea
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas

Harper Lee
To Kill a Mockingbird

Doris Lessing**
The Cleft
The Golden Notebook***

Lois Lowry**
The Giver
Gathering Blue***
Messenger***

Katherine Anne MacLean
The Snowball Effect

Hilary Mantel
Wolf Hall

Kamala Markandaya
Nectar in a Sieve

Carson McCullers**
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Clock Without Hands
A Tree, a Rock, a Cloud
Collected Stories: Including The Member of the Wedding and The Ballad of the Sad Café***
The Member of the Wedding***

Grace Metalious
Peyton Place

Caroline Miller
Lamb in His Bosom

Jacquelyn Mitchard
Two If by Sea

Margaret Mitchell
Gone With the Wind

L.M. Montgomery
Anne of Green Gables
Christmas at Red Butte

Erin Morgenstern
The Night Circus

Toni Morrison
Beloved
The Bluest Eye

Flannery O'Connor**
A Good Man Is Hard to Find
Revelation
The Complete Stories***

Emmuska Orczy
The Scarlet Pimpernel

Ann Patchett
Bel Canto

Katherine Paterson
Bridge to Terabithia

Elizabeth Peters
Lord of the Silent
The Laughter of Dead Kings

Marge Piercy**
Gone to Soldiers

Sylvia Plath
The Bell Jar

Annie Proulx
The Shipping News

Elizabeth Brown Pryor
Reading the Man: A Portrait of Robert E. Lee Through His Private Letters

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

All the Women Authors I've Read prior to 1/1/19

Why did I read these? Most were impulse buys, because I heard of them on Goodreads or it was on the bargain rack at the bookstore, and I liked it. I purchase new books mostly from brick and mortar stores, some on line but the largest number of my books come from used books stores. If I recognize the title or author I'l grab it. Will I read all the TBR***? Who knows,

A Spoiler is used to hide four or more books
TBR-***Books I own.
TBR-# Books I would like to read someday but I don't have a copy of.
Authors Enjoyed Enough to Read Again**

All the Women authors I've read in the last 10-15 years and all before 1/1/19


Q-Z
Ayn Rand**
Atlas Shrugged
Anthem
The Fountainhead***
We the Living***

Jean Rhys
Wide Sargasso Sea

Anne Rice
Interview with the Vampire

Luanne Rice
Stone Heart

Emilie Richards
Prospect Street

Veronica Roth
Divergent

J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Diane Setterfield**
The Thirteenth Tale

Anna Sewell
Black Beauty

Mary Ann Shaffer
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Frankenstein

Helen Simonson**
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

Betty Smith
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Beatrice Sparks
Go Ask Alice

Johanna Spyri
Heidi

Chevy Stevens
Never Knowing

Mary Stewart**
This Rough Magic

Kathryn Stockett
The Help

Elizabeth Strout
Olive Kitteridge

Kay Thompson
Eloise in Paris

P.L. Travers
Mary Poppins

Alice Walker
The Color Purple

Amanda Eyre Ward
Close Your Eyes

Rebecca West**
The Return of the Soldier
Indissoluble Matrimony

Edith Wharton**
(view spoiler)[ Ethan Frome
The Age of Innocence
The House of Mirth
Summer
Xingu
Sanctuary (hide spoiler)]
Old New York: Four Novellas***
The Glimpses of the Moon***

Margery Williams Bianco
The Velveteen Rabbit

Jeanette Winterson
Written on the Body

Virginia Woolf
Mrs. Dalloway
A Room of One's Own
To the Lighthouse

Gabrielle Zevin
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Saved for the future

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

Looking for suggestions about women authors I haven't read before. The above three posts list all the women authors I have read. Message #61 is a list of women I have not yet read and the books by them I already own.

I wanting to build a list of potential authors and their books for the future. Any help is appreciated. Preferably authors and books you really enjoyed, four and five star reads. Thanks!

TBR-# Books I Don't Own by Women Authors I've Never Read Before, But I'm Interested In Reading

Edna Ferber
So Big

[Darren]

all from my favorites shelf:
Elizabeth Taylor (Angel)
Penelope Fitzgerald (The Beginning of Spring)
Barbara Pym (Excellent Women)
Sigrid Undset (Kristin Lavransdatter)
Elsa Morante (Arturo's Island)
Sylvia Townsend Warner (Lolly Willowes)
Nancy Mitford (The Pursuit Of Love)
Iris Murdoch (Under The Net)
Isak Dinesen (aka Karen Blixen) (Babette's Feast)
Beryl Bainbridge (The Bottle Factory Outing)
Leonora Carrington (The Hearing Trumpet)
Anita Brookner (Look At Me)
Marjane Satrapi (Persepolis)

[Terry]

These come first to mind:

Colette
Edna O’Brien
Anne Tyler

[Laurie]

Of the books you own, the ones I have really liked:
In the Woods
84, Charing Cross Road
A Raisin in the Sun
The God of Small Things

And some of my favorite books/authors I don't see on your list:
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (her best is Half of a Yellow Sun)
Louise Penny (start with the first in the series Still Life)
Yaa Gyasi - Homegoing
Jan Karon - Mitford series
Edna Ferber - So Big
Shirley Ann Grau - The Keepers of the House

[Terry]

Some of these authors are on my TBR. Some may already be on your list.

Dorothy Parker
Edna Ferber
Colleen McCullough
Jodi Picoult
Emma Cline
Gene Stratton Porter
Anais Nin
grace Livingston Hill
Margaret Wilson
Margaret Kennedy
Julia Peterkin
Margaret Ayer Barnes
Caroline Pafford Miller
Josephine Johnson
Enid Bagnold
Elizabeth Bowen
Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
Rachel Field
Dorothy Whipple
Marguerite Steen
dawn Powell
Clarice Lispector
Ellen Glasgow
Mary Jane Ward
Nancy Mitford
Josephine Tey
Simone de Beauvier
Mary McCarthy
Shirley Ann Gau
Mary Stewart
Victoria Holt
Jean Stamford
Eudora Welty
Belva Plain
Nora Ephron
Alison Lurie
Barbara Taylor Bradford
Jean M. Aul (? A woman?j
Julie Garwood
Carol Shield
Danielle Steele
Maeve Binchy
Tess Uriza Holthe
Olive Ann Burns
Lisa See
Geraldine Brook
Zola Neale Hurston

I am going to stop here. There are more recent authors, some of which I have already mentioned, but this brings us up to about 10-12 years ago.

[Terry]

And
Harriet Beecher Stowe

[Terry]

Jean Kerr
Lillian Hellman

[Terry]

That was Jean Kerr.

[MK]

Medieval detective series -
Ellis Peters - A Morbid Taste for Bones

All of it, everything, or so says JK Rowling and a few other authors ;-) -
E. Nesbit

And, THIS ONE!!!
The Gray House, by Mariam Petrosyan
A one-book author, 20+ yrs in the making, think To Kill a Mockingbird, think Gone With the Wind, no really, it's THAT good. If 'the house will let you in' ;-).
A great book club/blog about the book - https://silviacachia.wordpress.com/ca...

[MK]

Edit - a recent author, writes under two names -

Seanan McGuire

Mira Grant



AND, this one!, no really, it's incredible, you should read it. The author has a few books written, but only one published (so far, that I know of) -

Sara Steger

[Kathleen]

Bob, I’m looking at your TBR’s from the books you own, and there are three I think you definitely don’t want to miss:
1. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
If you enjoy this, she has other great books that could be in store for you.
2. 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff. This is quick and just so much fun to read.
3. A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry. She was such a talented writer, and I think this is a masterpiece.

My personal favorite on your list is Their Eyes Were Watching God, but people tend to love or hate this and I'm not sure where you'd fall in that line. Same goes for three other favorites of mine, Isabel Allende,Arundhati Roy and Penelope Lively.

Everyone likes Barbara Pym though, don't they?

Lastly, I don't think I saw Margaret Laurence on your list. Her book The Stone Angel was fantastic.

Have fun finding new female authors to love!

[Bob, Short Story Classics]

I’m overwhelmed at the great response I’ve received to my author request. It reaffirms my belief that the membership of this group is the reason we’re the best on Goodreads.

I have to confess my ignorance. While many of the authors names listed I recognize, I’m shocked at how many I’ve never heard of before. You all have given me a great gift and I will enjoy researching these new authors and building/adding too, my new author TBR. Thank you!!

[Ila]

These women don't really write conventional classics but history/historical fiction. I can personally vouch for their exceptional quality from what I have read so far.

Madeline Miller for The Song of Achilles and Galatea

Mary Renault for Fire from Heaven

Helen Rappaport

Oh and Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden was phenomenal as well. Its an lgbt classic.

Hope this helps

[Terry]

I thought of two more:

Katherine Ann Porter
Kathleen Windsor

I didn’t give you book titles, because my list was so long. Most of these women have written either best sellers or notable books, and range from the nineteenth through the twentieth century, with a few more recent ones. I will let you enjoy the discovery of figuring out which books are of interest to you. Have fun!

If someone wanted to curate a list of books to read, say one a month, I would opt in. Although I have read a lot of women authors, there are a lot to go!

And then there is the backlist. For example, I have always loved The Secret Garden by Francis Hodgson Burnett, and have read it to my daughter and my granddaughter, but until this year, I had never read anything else by her. This year, I read a The Shuttle, and really enjoyed it.

[Cynda]

Impressive Bob. With a little help from your friends, you have created a resource! I will have to return to see these lists on a larger screen.

[Katy, Quarterly Long Reads]

Hope to see more from you on this thread, Bob. Keep up the good work.