Fiction inspired by real women's lives
One way of acknowledging women whose lives have had little or no recognition in the history books is to write about them in a fictional setting – imagining, and in some cases, reimagining, what their lives might have been like. We've chosen some wonderful books inspired by the lives of a few famous, and many less so, female figures.
✒️ Studious women
Rapture by Emily Maguire
The motherless child of an English priest living in ninth-century Mainz, Agnes is a wild and brilliant girl with a deep, visceral love of God. At eighteen, to avoid a future as a wife or nun, Agnes enlists the help of a lovesick Benedictine monk to disguise herself as a man and devote her life to the study she is denied as a woman.
So begins the life of John the Englishman: a matchless scholar and scribe of the revered Fulda monastery, then a charismatic heretic in an Athens commune and, by her middle years, a celebrated teacher in Rome. There, Agnes (as John) dazzles the Church hierarchy with her knowledge and wisdom and finds herself at the heart of political intrigue in a city where gossip is a powerful-and deadly-currency.
The Naturalist of Amsterdam by Melissa Ashley
Historical fiction based on the true story of Maria Sibyilla Merian, one of the greatest naturalists in Europe. She collected species of insects and kept them to study their life cycles. From the jungles of South America to the bustling artists' studios of Amsterdam, Melissa Ashley charts an incredible period of discovery. With stunning lyricism and immaculate research, The Naturalist of Amsterdam gives voice to the long-ignored women who shaped our understanding of the natural world – both the artists and those who made their work possible.
Also by Melissa Ashley: The Bee and the Orange Tree, which is set in the salons of Paris during the reign of the Sun King Louis XIV and is based on the life of Baroness Marie Catherine D'Aulnoy and her friend, socialite and heiress Madame Nicola Tiquet; and The Birdman's Wife based on the life of nature artist Elizabeth Gould, and told in her own voice. Elizabeth was married to British ornithologist John Gould, and produced hundreds of scientific illustrations for his works.
🗳️ Women and politics
American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld
In the year 2000, in the closest election in American history, Alice Blackwell’s husband becomes president of the United States. Their time in the White House proves to be heady, tumultuous, and controversial. But it is Alice’s own story – that of a kind, bookish, only child born in the 1940s Midwest who comes to inhabit a life of dizzying wealth and power – that is itself remarkable. Loosely based on events in the life of Laura Bush, wife of former US president George W. Bush.
Also by Curtis Sittenfeld is Rodham, a story that asks what if Hillary Rodham hadn't married Bill Clinton?
Jackie: A Novel by Dawn Tripp
When Jackie meets charismatic congressman Jack Kennedy, she is twenty-one and dreaming of a life in Paris. She has won an internship at Vogue and thinks Kennedy is 'Too American. Too good-looking'. Yet, she is drawn to his mind, his humour, his drive and the chemistry between them is undeniable. Soon she's Kennedy's lady – and then America's.
The intimate life story of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, one of the world's most iconic women, told from the point of view of Jackie herself.
🎨 📚 🎼 Women in creative arts
Peggy by Rebecca Godfrey & Leslie Jamison
Venice, 1958. Peggy Guggenheim, heiress and now legendary art collector, sits in the sun at her white marble palazzo on the Grand Canal. She's in a reflective mood, thinking back on her thrilling, tragic, nearly impossible journey from her sheltered, old-fashioned family in New York to here, iconoclast and independent woman.
With intellect and style, Rebecca Godfrey brings to life a woman who helped make the Guggenheim name synonymous with art and genius, recasting her as, in the words of novelist Jenny Offill, 'a feminist icon for our times.'
The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
Paris 1919. Young, bookish Sylvia Beach knows there is no greater city in the world than Paris. But when she opens an English-language bookshop on the bohemian Left Bank, Sylvia can’t yet know she is making history. Many leading writers of the day, from Ernest Hemingway to Gertrude Stein, consider Shakespeare and Company a second home. Here some of the most profound literary friendships blossom – and none more so than between James Joyce and Sylvia herself.
When Joyce’s controversial novel Ulysses is banned, Sylvia determines to publish it through Shakespeare and Company. But the success and notoriety of publishing the most infamous book of the century comes at deep personal cost as Sylvia risks ruin, reputation and her heart in the name of the life-changing power of books.
The Instrumentalist by Harriet Constable
Anna Maria may have no name, no fortune, no family. But she has her ambition, and her talent. Her best hope lies in her teacher, Antonio Vivaldi. Soon she is his star pupil.
But as Anna Maria's star rises, not everyone is happy. Because Anna Maria's shining light is threatening to eclipse that of her mentor. She will leave her mark, whatever it takes. And her story will be heard.
The Instrumentalist brings to life the true story of Anna Maria della Pietà, a Venetian orphan and violin prodigy who studied under Antonio Vivaldi and ultimately became his favoured and star musician – and his biggest rival
🌍 Female adventurers
Saltblood by Francesca de Tores
In a rented room outside Plymouth in 1685, a daughter is born as her half-brother is dying. Her mother makes a decision: Mary will become Mark, and Ma will continue to collect his inheritance money.
Breathing life into the Golden Age of Piracy, Saltblood is a wild adventure, a treasure trove, weaving an intoxicating tale of gender and survival, passion and loss, journeys and transformation, inspired by the story of Mary Read, one of history's most remarkable figures.
🔍 Women in crime
The Death of Dora Black: A Petticoat Police Mystery by Lainie Anderson
Summer, Adelaide, 1917. The impeccably dressed Miss Kate Cocks might look more like a schoolmistress than a policewoman, but don't let that fool you. She's a household name, wrangling wayward husbands into repentance, seeing through deceptive clairvoyants, and rescuing young women with the help of a five-foot cane and her sassy junior constable, Ethel Bromley.
When shop assistant Dora Black is found dead on a city beach, Miss Cocks and Ethel are ordered to stay out of the investigation and leave it to the men. But when Dora's workmate goes missing soon after, the women suspect something sinister, and determine to take matters into their own hands.
In 1915, Fanny Kate Boadicea Cocks became the first policewoman in the British Empire employed on the same salary as men. This novel is a rich exploration of that little-known chapter of Australian history.
Iris by Fiona Kelly McGregor
Who is Iris Webber? A thief, a fighter, a wife, a lover. A scammer, a schemer, a friend. A musician, a worker, a big-hearted fool. A woman who has prevailed against the toughest gangsters of the day, defying police time and again, yet is now trapped in a prison cell. Guilty or innocent?
Rollicking through the underbelly of 1930s sly-grog Sydney, Iris is a dazzling literary achievement from one of Australia’s finest writers. Based on actual events and set in an era of cataclysmic change, here is a fierce, fascinating tale of a woman who couldn’t be held back.
Based on the real-life story of Iris Eileen Mary Webber (née Shingles), a petty criminal in 1930s Sydney.
Burial Rites by Hannah Kent
In northern Iceland, 1829, authorities condemn Agnes Magnusdottir to death for her part in the brutal murder of two men. Agnes is sent to the farm of District Officer Jon Jonsson and his family to await execution. She is shunned by all, except the young reverend appointed as her spiritual guardian. As the summer months yield to a bitter winter, Agnes's story begins to emerge. And as her execution draws closer, the question burns more fiercely: did she or didn't she commit murder?
Based on a true story, Burial Rites is a profoundly moving novel about the ultimate price of freedom and the risks we take for love.
Also by Hannah Kent is The Good People, inspired by a mid–19th century Irish woman called Anne Roche who was tried for the murder of a young boy.
Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
In 1843, a 16-year-old Canadian housemaid named Grace Marks was tried for the murder of her employer and his mistress. The sensationalistic trial made headlines throughout the world, and the jury delivered a guilty verdict. Yet opinion remained fiercely divided about Marks – was she a spurned woman who had taken out her rage on two innocent victims, or was she an unwilling victim herself, caught up in a crime she was too young to understand? Some believe Grace is innocent; others think her evil or insane.
In Alias Grace, Margaret Atwood reconstructs Marks's story in fictional form. Her portraits of nineteenth-century prison and asylum life are chilling in their detail. The author also introduces Dr. Simon Jordan, who listens to the prisoner's tale with a mixture of sympathy and disbelief. In his effort to uncover the truth, Jordan uses the tools of the then rudimentary science of psychology.
