I’ve come to realize that the one common thread between all my favorite books is that there is a woman and she is in a situation. Which I know at first sounds like basically every book BUT I don’t think that’s true. Here’s some examples:
Parable of The Sower by Octavia E. Butler: Lauren (woman) becomes displaced from her home and family after climate-change related fires (situation).
The Wall by Marleen Haushofer: Unnamed woman (woman) is last person left on earth after everyone suddenly disappears and has to learn how to fend for herself (situation).
I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman: Unnamed woman (woman) is suddenly freed (situation) after spending her life underground surrounded by male guards.
Severance by Ling Ma: Candace (woman) realizes she completely missed that the apocalypse happened and now has to join a dysfunctional group of survivors (situation).
You may be thinking oh so you just like dystopias and apocalypses? Well, yes, but that is not a prereq to be a Woman In A Situation. Jane Eyre for example is a WIS in my opinion.
I think Woman In A Situation fiction is just when a woman has to figure some shit out. Bonus points if it’s in a world/time that isn’t our own. So all that’s to say: recommendations for Woman In A Situation fiction?
by OkPlace7834
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You might enjoy The Husbands by Holly Gramazio
The Doloriad: a woman survives an apocalypse and decides to repopulate the Earth.
Play It As It Lays: a listless, out of work actress stares into the abyss.
Shards of Honor followed by Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold (SF)
This is also one of my favorite genres.
I think (hope) you will love The Wilderness of Girls (teen girl finds wild feral teen girls in the woods who believe they are princesses) and Women Talking (secluded Mennonite women have suffered abuse and are deciding what to do about it.)
Wilderness of Girls, I Who Have Never Known Men, and Women Talking are like my ultimate woman-focused trifecta.
The Vegetarian by Han Kang, Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy, Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
Trigger warning: >!rape/men being abusive in all three of these!<
If you like paranormal horror, you might like *Slewfoot* by Brom: a young widow Abatha (woman) has to make bank to avoid servitude to her brother in law (situation) and turns to a strange forest being for help.
*The Hacienda* by Isabel Canas is basically a retelling of *Rebecca* set in Mexico, about a new young bride who moves to her husband’s estate, with strange happenings in the night.
*The Seventh Veil of Salome* by Silvia Moreno-Garcia hops between three different women in situations – the Biblical Salome, and two women on the set of a movie about Salome in 1950s Hollywood. Not paranormal. You might like Moreno-Garcia’s most famous novel, *Mexican Gothic*, which is paranormal.
*The Underground Railroad* by Colson Whitehead is about an enslaved Black woman who escapes captivity through an actual underground railroad, and travels the South looking for freedom and safety.
*The Unworthy* by Augustina Bazterrica is about a young woman living in a strange, isolated convent at the end of the world. Not paranormal.
Ok these are a little more action/thriller, but this is exactly how I would describe No Exit and The Last Word by Taylor Adams, both of which I loved