Resistance: Ten Books for International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month

Happy International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month! To celebrate, we’ve gathered a list of ten groundbreaking books by exceptionally talented women. Writing has always been a form of resistance, and these powerful books carry on that tradition by challenging notions of what it means to be a woman while embracing intersectionality and transcending literary form and style. Book*hug is proud to support these writers and their vital stories. They inspire us every day to carry on with our mission. Read on for more details!

Junie by Chelene Knight

1930s, Hogan’s Alley—a thriving Black and immigrant community located in Vancouver’s East End. Junie is a creative, observant child who moves to the alley with her mother, Maddie: a jazz singer with a growing alcohol dependency. Junie quickly makes meaningful relationships with two mentors and a girl her own age, Estelle, whose resilient and entrepreneurial mother is grappling with white scrutiny and the fact that she never really wanted a child. As Junie finds adulthood, exploring her artistic talents and burgeoning sexuality, her mother sinks further into the bottle while the thriving neighbourhood—once gushing with potential—begins to change. As her world opens, Junie intuits the opposite for the community she loves.

It Begins with the Body by Hana Shafi

It Begins With The Body by Hana Shafi explores the milestones and hurdles of a brown girl coming into her own. Shafi’s poems display a raw and frank intimacy and address anxiety, unemployment, heartbreak, relationships, identity, and faith.

Her Body Among Animals by Paola Ferrante

In this genre-bending debut collection merging horror, fairy tales, pop culture, and sci-fi, women challenge the boundaries placed on their bodies while living in a world “among animals,” where violence is intertwined with bizarre ecological disruptions.

Monsters, Martyrs, and Marionettes: Essays on Motherhood by Adrienne Gruber

Monsters, Martyrs, and Marionettes is a revelatory hybrid collection that subverts the stereotypes and transcends the platitudes of family life to examine motherhood with blistering insight.

Elevator in Sài Gòn by Thuận, Tr. by Nguyễn An Lý

From the acclaimed author of Chinatown comes a personal and political journey through Hanoi, Sài Gòn, Paris, Pyongyang, and Seoul. Elevator in Sài Gòn is part detective story, part historical romance, part postcolonial ghost story, and a biting satire of life in a communist state.

Caesaria by Hanna Nordenhök, translated by Saskia Vogel 

From Hanna Nordenhök comes a gothic tale set at the dawn of modern gynecology, when the female body appears as a cryptic landscape and male hubris reigns.

Nauetakuan, a silence for a noise by Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, Tr. by Howard Scott

A timely, riveting story of reclamation, matriarchies, and the healing power of traditional teachings, Nauetakuan, a silence for a noise affirms how reconnecting to lineage and community can transform Indigenous futures.

As the Andes Disappeared by Caroline Dawson, translated by Anita Anand

This expansive coming-of-age autobiographical novel probes the plurality of identity, elucidating the interwoven complexities of immigrating to a new country. As the Andes Disappeared tenderly reflects the journey of millions and is a beautiful ode to family commitment and the importance of home—however layered that may be.

The Singularity by Balsam Karam, translated by Saskia Vogel

Lyrical and devastating, The Singularity is a breathtaking study of grief, migration, and motherhood from one of Sweden’s most exciting contemporary novelists.

 

These Songs I Know By Heart by Erin Brubacher

Through a three-day canoe trip, chance encounters, fierce female friendship, step-parenting, IVF, isolation, and quiet moments between humans, These Songs I Know By Heart weaves vignettes of everyday mythology into an absorbing and honest meditation on the connections in our lives. With razor-sharp reflection, humour, and most of all love, we are reminded that there’s no formula to life and that instead, we must celebrate what makes the small moments of our lives extraordinary.