To celebrate Women’s History Month, we’re going to look at influential female authors of the past, those impacting the present, and those expected to make a big splash in the industry. This list highlights a few authors from each time period—if I could, I’d make this list sixty pages long! Each one of these female authors has shaped my writing and continue to inspire me. Perhaps they’ll leave a lasting impression on you, too.
Past
It’s hard to think of past female authors without having Jane Austen come to mind first. She’s a classic author known for her timeless novels of love, family, and scandal. If we take a deeper look into her books, such as Pride & Prejudice, Emma, and Sense & Sensibility, we find so much more than romance. Austen did something rather daring for her time; she used her platform as a critique on high society of the English countryside in the 18th century. Austen pointed out inequalities and strange traditions society forced women into, which in some ways, are still relevant today. She truly was a trailblazer when it came to subliminal messaging and English literature as a whole.
Mary Shelley is a staple of most high school English curricula, including my own. Her novel Frankenstein was released in 1818, one year after Austen’s death in 1817. Many credit Jules Verne as the founder of the science fiction genre, or Edgar Allan Poe as the pioneer of gothic horror. However, when Frankenstein was released, Poe was only nine years old while Verne wasn’t yet born. Frankenstein precedes these sci-fi, gothic “founders” but is often overlooked. In my opinion, without Mary Shelley, Poe and Verne wouldn’t have found the attentive audience they did when they released their own work.
Moving forward a century, Toni Morrison is seen as a pioneer of the 20th century for Black feminism and anti-racism. Her writings received national acclaim for their unabashed look into the lives of Black women in America and the struggles of lower-class families of color during the 1950s and the Civil Rights Movement. Notably, she was the first Black female editor at Random House in New York City in the late 1960s. Morrison’s Beloved won the Pulitzer Prize in 1987, and she also won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993. With an expansive and impressive career, it would be remiss not to include her on this list for her work within literature and American politics.
Present
Women now dominate the literary space, in publishing, writing, and editing with some female authors standing out as major influencers. To start, Carmen Maria Machado is a Cuban American writer known for her poignant, raw works of both fiction and nonfiction. Her work in the magical realism realm pays homage to the subgenre’s credited founder, Gabriel Garcia Marquez. She also brings light on queer relationships and their dynamics in her memoir In the Dream House. This book is easily one of my favorites and a favorite among queer and literary spaces alike. Along with her other collections and stories, her memoir has won numerous awards and placed her on a pedestal of modern classic writers.
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When readers hear the name Sally Rooney, they immediately think of BookTok, the community on TikTok dedicated to bookworms and writers. Rooney is famous amongst current literary spaces for her character analysis in her novels Normal People and Conversations with Friends. Though her novels may not be driven by plot, their strength lies in the depth of her characters— their complexity, their emotions, and their questionable actions. All of them are a callback to what beatnik writers in the 20th century focused on: the character arc. Her characters are resemblant of Holden Caufield (Catcher in the Rye), Frank and April Wheeler (Revolutionary Road), and the Joad family (Grapes of Wrath). She is the shining star of literary fiction, and I don’t expect her to leave her post anytime soon.
The “beach read” is one of the most popular and most successfully selling genres in the publishing world. And Elin Hildebrand is the queen of the genre. Not only is her work well known, but it sells astronomically well. She has published over 25 novels and sold roughly 10 million copies of her books in total (wow!). She’s also a New York Times bestselling author. Hildebrand resides in Nantucket and all of her novels are based there. This gives her stories a rich and authentic atmosphere that pulls readers in. I can’t recommend her enough to make it through your week-long family vacation.
Rising
This section is, perhaps, the most exciting one to write. Here, we’ll highlight three female authors “on the rise.” This means they’ve recently hit success and have taken the writing world by storm, even if their books were published many years ago. Something I noticed, when curating this list, is the nationalities of the authors. A lot of popular female authors are from either the United States or the UK, catering to an English-speaking audience. However, with a rise in translations and access through e-books and audiobooks, readers are getting to experience a wider range of multicultural literature than ever before.
When thinking of rising authors, Sayaka Murata comes to mind. Murata first made her way onto the literary scene in 2016 with her hit novel Convenience Store Woman. From then, we’ve seen a rise in translated Japanese literature in the American and European markets. Murata, known for her bold and unconventional ideas, can be an acquired taste—so take this as a fair warning. Nonetheless, if you like strange and surreal literature with a slight magical nature, Murata is releasing her next novel on April 15th of this year. Preorder is available now (yes, I’ve ordered my copy already).
It’s impossible not to see the influence fantasy has had on the literary world within the past few years. A lot of the credit can be given to Sarah J. Maas for this influence. Within the past two years, Maas’ series A Court of Thorns and Roses has launched to the forefront of fantasy and romance readers. With its gripping tensions and scandals, reading communities across all platforms have named this book series the foundation of romantasy as we know it in modern times. It is rumored there will be a sixth book to the ACOTAR series, but no release date or name has been confirmed (stay tuned!). Her newest series, Cresent City, has also received many accolades. With almost 40 million copies of her books sold since the start of her career, Maas is one of the biggest names in publishing right now.
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Finally, I hold this last author near and dear to my heart. Though I doubt she will publish another book any time soon, I’m holding out hope. Michelle Zauner made ripples in the writing community after her debut memoir Crying in H Mart released in 2021. Oddly enough, Zauner is not known as a writer. Instead, her claim to fame is in music, as the leading vocals in the Philadelphia-based band Japanese Breakfast. While her music is beautiful and full of heart, I never expected her book to be the same. Let’s be honest, celebrity memoirs are hit or miss. But Zauner received critical acclaim for her raw tale about growing up as an Asian American woman in Eugene, Oregon. She dissects her complicated relationship with her Korean mother, who ended up passing away in 2014 from pancreatic cancer. Though I haven’t heard anything about Zauner writing again, I truly hope she does.
I hope this non-exhaustive list opens your eyes to the influence female authors have had on the writing and publishing world and continue to have. As the years go on, we get to experience more international and diverse titles—how awesome is that? In the words of Matt Bell, author of Refuse to be Done: How to Write and Rewrite a Novel in The Drafts, “keep yourself fed, keep your diet varied, keep putting enough art in so that art keeps flowing back out.” So, keep reading, keep writing, and keep going!
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1 Comment
Love this comprehensive article, Syd! Thanks for sharing these fantastic female authors!