Fiction
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie GarmusIn the early 1960s, chemist and single mother Elizabeth Zott, the reluctant star of America's most beloved cooking show due to her revolutionary skills in the kitchen, uses this opportunity to dare women to change the status quo.
The Only Woman in the Room by Marie BenedictA beautiful woman escapes her Austrian arms-dealer husband to become Hollywood legend Hedy Lamarr while hiding a secret double life as a Jewish scientist and sharing vital information about the Third Reich.
The Other Einstein : A Novel by Marie BenedictA tale inspired by the first wife of Albert Einstein follows the experiences of Mitza Mari, a female physics student at an elite late-nineteenth-century school in Zurich, where she falls in love with a charismatic fellow student who eclipses her contributions to his theory of relativity.
Remarkable Creatures by Tracy ChevalierMarked for greatness after being struck by lightning in infancy, Mary Anning discovers a fossilized skeleton near her 19th century home that triggers attacks on her character and upheavals throughout the religious, scientific, and academic communities.
The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth GilbertA multi-generational saga of the Whittaker family, whose progenitor makes a fortune in the quinine trade before his daughter, a gifted botanist, researches the mysteries of evolution while falling in love with an utopian artist against a backdrop of the Age of Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution.
Nonfiction
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall KimmererAs a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces the notion that plants and animals are our oldest teachers. In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer brings these two lenses of knowledge together to take us on "a journey that is every bit as mythic as it is scientific, as sacred as it is historical, as clever as it is wise."
Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II by Liza MundyRecruited by the U.S. Army and Navy from small towns and elite colleges, more than 10 thousand women served as codebreakers during World War II. While their brothers and boyfriends took up arms, these women moved to Washington and learned the meticulous work of code-breaking. Their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and gave them access to careers previously denied to them. A strict vow of secrecy nearly erased their efforts from history; now, through research and interviews with surviving code girls, Liza Mundy brings to life this riveting and vital story of American courage, service, and scientific accomplishment.
Hidden Figures : The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee ShetterlyAn account of the previously unheralded but pivotal contributions of NASA's African-American women mathematicians to America's space program describes how they were segregated from their white counterparts by Jim Crow laws in spite of their groundbreaking successes.
Lab Girl by Hope JahrenAn illuminating debut memoir of a woman in science; a moving portrait of a longtime friendship; and a stunningly fresh look at plants that will forever change how you see the natural world.
My Remarkable Journey : A Memoir by Katherine G JohnsonThe woman at the heart of the New York Times bestseller and Oscar-winning film "Hidden Figures" shares her personal journey from child prodigy in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia to NASA human computer and her integral role in the early years of the U.S. space program.
Silent Spring by Rachel CarsonFirst published by Houghton Mifflin in 1962, "Silent Spring" alerted a large audience to the environmental and human dangers of indiscriminate use of pesticides, spurring revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water.
The Radium Girls : The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate MooreRecounts the struggles of hundreds of women who were exposed to radium while working factory jobs during World War I, describing how they were misled by their employers and became embroiled in a battle for workers' rights.