18 Books Women Should Read in Mini Bites

Check this…I found this from the Huffington Post…a slide show showing the eighteen books that women should read.

And let me go down the list about the ones I’ve read:

1. Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye

I remember The Bluest Eye the summer after I completed the first semester college. What made me want to read this book was the adolescent black girl on the cover it.

The Bluest Eye was one of my life changing force stories. When I thought that I was a fucking misfit with a dysfunctional family….when I thought that I was the only one in the world, here’s Pecola. A character I completely related to.

it is not liberating to relate to a character who had a shit life. What is liberating is that I didn’t feel alone. I didn’t know that a character existed who was similar to me.

Pecola Breedlove feels unloved. She feels like a freak. Most of all, she is the pariah—the outsider—and the misfit. What is tragic about this tale is that no one tells Pecola that she is beautiful…that her life matters. She doesn’t have the resilient strength to come undone and actually discover that she has a purpose. That she gets to choose her destiny. And this is what takes me breath away. That The Bluest Eye haunts me and reminds me that I have an obligation to little girls like Pecola and me. Pecola didn’t’ survive, but I did. In that survival, I have an obligation to show those lost little girls that it is will get better. To hang on…that you feel like a train wreck internally, but you will get through it. Because you are NOT a train wreck. You are someone who is deserving. Deserving to live over a hundred. Deserving of knowledge, truth, and beauty. That you will strike the iron hot and make a huge different, and you will be over a hundred surrounded by these younger generations…telling them your wisdom. That you broke the mold of being an old sage…and that wisdom and old age matter…you are proof of it mind, sound, and body at over a 100.

1. Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar

I have not read this book, but it has been in vision for a long time. After reading what I need to read, it’s definitely on my list.

1. Shelia Heti’s How Should I Be a Person

I haven’t heard of this one, but I will put it on my reading list.

1. Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret

I read this in middle school, and it made a huge impression of me. Yet, it has been so long that I haven’t read it. It’s definitely on my reading list for a re-read list.

1. Janet Finch’s White Oleander
   This has been on my reading list for a long time, and I’ve seen parts of the movie. It’s time to get it right with reading the novel, Yo.

2. Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird

This is one I gots to read. It is a prominent novel, and it is just not Lee’s one hit wonder. From what I’ve read, it is ranked one of the best novels…EVER.

1. Madeline L’Engle A Winkle in Time

I am putting this on my list.

1. Emily Dickinson’s The Complete Poetry of Emily Dickinson

Okay, gots to read this.

1. Anais Nin’s The Diary of Anais Nin
   I got the entire volume. On the list.

2. Sue Monk Kidd’s The Secret Life of Bees

On the list. Gots to read it.

1. Louise May Alcott’s Little Women

On the list. Gots to read it.
12. Marilyn French’s The Women’s Room

On the list. Gots to read it.

1. Patricia C. Wrede’s Dealing with Dragon

On the list now.

1. Anita Diamant’s The Red Tenant

On the list.

1. Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre

I am reading that now, and I must say that I am spellbound. British Literature rules hands down.
16. Tori Amos’s and Anne Power’s Tori Amos: Piece by Piece

I just got that on Kindle, and I am reading that. I love the Amos. She is most excellent.
17. Boston’s Women Health Collective, Our Bodies, Ourselves

I don’t know if I have that one in my collection, but I better get moving.

And….18. Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted
I don’t think I have this one in my collection, but I better get moving.

I am so ignorant on this situation. I better get up to date on this situation.

Cheers,
S