It’s time to celebrate Women’s History Month, and to do so we’re highlighting a few must-read titles from Soho Press’s women authors. These books are a powerful reminder of how important it is to read female voices—in every genre. From fiction, to YA, to crime, women are shaping the literary world, one word at a time.
Smaller and Smaller Circles
F.H. Batacan
Soho Crime
Smaller and Smaller Circles, by F.H. Batacan, tells the story of two Jesuit priests, forensic anthropologist Father Gus Saenz and his protégé, Father Jerome Lucero, as they set out to uncover the murders that have been happening in their town, and take the matter of protecting their flock into their own hands. Widely regarded as the first Filipino crime novel, Smaller and Smaller Circles is a poetic masterpiece of literary noir, and is the winner of the Philippine National Book Award. Read more…
The Widows of Malabar Hill
Sujata Massey
Soho Crime
The Widows of Malabar Hill, by Sujata Massey, takes us back to 1920s India. Perveen Mistry, Bombay’s first female lawyer, is investigating a suspicious will on behalf of three Muslim widows living in full purdah when the case takes a turn toward the murderous. Inspired in part by the woman who made history as India’s first female attorney, The Widows of Malabar Hill is a richly wrought story of multicultural 1920s Bombay as well as the debut of a sharp and promising new sleuth. Read more…
What My Body Remembers
Agnete Friis
Soho Crime
Ella Nygaard was seven years old when her father murdered her mother, a night she does not remember, which has left her suffering from incapacitating panic attacks. In Agnete Friis’s What My Body Remembers, we follow Ella’s journey to her grandmother’s cottage, where she’s forced to confront the demons of her childhood. Twisty and brimming with the emotional power of beautifully drawn characters, What My Body Remembers is a brooding and atmospheric thriller that sets a young mother on a collision course with her past in order to save her son’s future. Read more…
Love, Hate & Other Filters
Samira Ahmed
Soho Teen
In Love, Hate & Other Filters, by Samira Ahmed, American-born seventeen-year-old Maya Aziz is torn between worlds: her dream world, her parents’ world, and the real world. In this unforgettable debut novel and New York Times bestseller, an Indian-American Muslim teen copes with Islamophobia, cultural divides among peers and parents, and a reality she can neither explain nor escape. Read more…
Razorhurst
Justine Larbalestier
Soho Teen
In Justine Larbalestier’s Razorhurst, we’re taken back to the neighborhood of Razorhurst, 1932. Gloriana Nelson and Mr. Davidson, two ruthless mob bosses, have reached a fragile peace — one maintained by “razor men.” Kelpie, orphaned and homeless, is blessed (and cursed) with the ability to see Razorhurst’s many ghosts. They tell secrets that the living can’t know, about the cracks already forming in the mobs’ truce. Read more…
Dancer, Daughter, Traitor, Spy
Elizabeth Kiem
Soho Teen
Daughter, Dancer, Traitor, Spy is Elizabeth Kiem’s YA thriller about a Bolshoi ballerina trapped by family secrets and a legacy of espionage. Marina is born into privilege. A talented young dancer with Russia’s Bolshoi Ballet at the height of the Cold War, she seems destined to follow in the footsteps of her mother Svetlana, a Soviet Artist of the People. But when Svetlana disappears without explanation, Marina and her father have to get out, now. Read more…
Sonora
Hannah Lillith Assadi
Soho Press
Sonora, by Hannah Lillith Assadi, is a fevered, lyrical debut about two young women drawn into an ever-intensifying friendship set against the stark, haunted landscape of the Sonoran desert and the ecstatic frenzy of New York City. It tells the story of Ahlam, the daughter of a Palestinian refugee and his Israeli wife, and her tempestuous counterpart Laura. The two fall into infatuated partnership, experimenting with drugs and sex, and watching helplessly as a series of mysterious deaths claim high school classmates. Read more…
Breath, Eyes, Memory
Edwidge Danticat
Soho Press
Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat is an established classic that evokes the wonder, terror, and heartache of Haiti—and the enduring strength of Haiti’s women. At the age of twelve, Sophie Caco is sent from her impoverished Haitian village to New York to be reunited with a mother she barely remembers. There she discovers secrets that no child should ever know, and a legacy of shame that can be healed only when she returns to Haiti. Read more…
Nine Months
Paula Bomer
Soho Press
Paula Bomer’s Nine Months is a bold, unapologetic first novel about Sonia, a young Brooklyn mother shaken by her unexpected (third) pregnancy. In order to search for an identity separate from her family, she abandons her husband and kids and takes off on a cross-country odyssey. Nine Months is a fierce, daring page-turner of a novel, as well as an unflinching look at the choices women face when trying to balance art and family. Read more…