Women’s Agenda readers are here to help.
When we polled almost 1000 of you earlier this week about what kind of year 2017 was for women, we also threw in some questions about your year: including how many of you got new jobs, promotions and pay rises.
On top of that, we asked you to share which women you believe set the agenda this year (results here).
We also asked your favourite book of the year (fiction or non fiction). The results indicated some clear trends.
It’s clear female, non-fiction authors were in demand, especially those with something to say about women and work.
Clementine Ford’s Fight Like A Girl led the count, but Tracey Spicers Good Girl Stripped Bare, Jamilla Rizvi’s Not Just Lucky and Catherine Fox’s Stop Fixing Women were also all up there.
Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, first published in 1985, was second on the list. The book’s themes were fitting in the first year of Donald Trump’s presidency, while the novel also saw a resurgence following the release of a television series by the same name.
Interestingly, Scott Pape’s The Barefoot Investor was also in the top ten.
Before we get to it, it’s worth mentioning we also received plenty of responses to this question including, ‘Who has time to read?’, ‘I had a baby, no books’, ‘too busy’ and ‘I can’t remember’.
So if you didn’t get time to read this year, you’re not alone. But the below list may help you catch up.
It’s also worth noting this isn’t a list of books published this year, but rather one one of books that were read this year.
The 25 Best books, according to Women’s Agenda readers and followers.
Starting with the top ten, in order.
- Fight Like A Girl, Clementine Ford
- The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood
- Not Just Lucky, Jamila Rizvi
- Good Girl Stripped Bare, Tracey Spicer
- The Barefoot Investor, Scott Pape
- Stop Fixing Women, Catherine Fox
- The Dry, Jane Harper
- Big Little Lies, Liane Moriarty
- The Wife Drought, Annabel Crabb
- Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls, Elena Favilli
The remaining 15 are books that were nominated multiple times, these are in no particular order.
- The Subtle Art of Not Giving A Fuck, Mark Manson
- The Whole Brain Child, Dr Dan Siegel
- Braving The Wilderness, Brene Brown
- A Little Life, Hanya Yanagihara
- The Life to Come, Michelle de Krester
- First We Make the Beast Beautiful, Sarah Wilson
- The Good People, Hannah Kent
- Work Strife Balance, Mia Freedman
- The Choke, Sofie Laguna
- How to be a woman, Caitlin Moran
- Unbreakable: Women Share Stories of Resilience and Hope, Jane Caro
- The Natural Way of Things, Charlotte Wood
- Get Your Shit Together, Sarah Knight
- Talking to My Country, Stan Grant
- Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman