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Books we believe will matter to you as much as they matter to us.
Although standing firmly in the new year, I still feel the past year tugging at me. It was a year filled with intense caregiving, losses, moves, graduations, and nest emptying. Still, despite it all—the good, bad, and in between—I’m working to reorient my gaze forward rather than solely staring into the rearview.
I always spend the early part of the new year musing on the books I want to finish before the ball drops again in Times Square. Given the largely craptastic nature of my last 12 months, I’m embracing the practice a little tighter and invite you to do the same.
Recommendations from friends, students, and even strangers at the coffee shop mean the most to me. In that spirit, the PROVOKED team was asked to share the titles they recommend over and over again and why. What they’ve come up with is a list that offers a longer shelf life, pun intended, than the hard sell gym memberships and promises of new year, new you.
Here are our titles for the same great ever-evolving you—books that help inspire, encourage, challenge, comfort, and, of course, provoke, as you prepare to traverse, embrace, and devour life.
Narratives That Anchor
Ever since I got my first library card, I’ve scoured the shelves for books filled with fabulous female characters—not ones that have supporting roles, but women who are the core of the narratives. Better yet, women who shake up that narrative and make it their own. Thankfully there are many more choices than there were back in the day.
Here are two heroines-of-their-own-stories titles to help inspire you to be the star of your story.
by Madeline Miller
Recommended by PROVOKED Founder and Editor-in-Chief Susan Dabbar
Why: On these pages ancient myths and modern feminism can share the same spellbook. Madeline Miller takes a woman who appears as a footnote in a male epic and gives her the full, complicated life she deserves. Exile becomes her lab for self‑invention. Circe feels like Greek mythology rewritten from the margins.
Perfect for: If you’ve ever been intrigued by a certain scheming queen in Westeros whose name sounds suspiciously like Circe.
by Lauren Groff
Recommended by Beth Kanter
Why: I keep this book on my nightstand so that no matter what else I’m reading, I can revisit the imagined life story of 12th-century poet Marie de France, who transforms a struggling English abbey into a female-led utopia.
Perfect for: Literary fiction lovers.
Loss, Time, Becoming
Despite how forward-looking you begin a year, anyone who has gotten to this stage of life knows it’s impossible to predict or avoid challenges, hurt, and grief. But reading how others navigate the hardest patches can feel like a friend taking your hand. These books do just that.
by Gabrielle Zevin
Recommended by Melissa Gould
Why: Elsewhere came out years before the unexpected loss of my husband, and it helped both me and our young daughter process our grief. It depicts a world where those who have died are still connected to those they left behind.
Perfect for: When grief and loss hit.
by Allen Levi
Recommended by Margie Zable Fisher
Why: I read this a few months ago and it’s already one of my top five books of all time. Theo feels like a beautiful companion right now because so much of the story is about time and how healing can arrive quietly, even late in life.
Perfect for: Book clubs.
Power, Pleasure, Appetite
No year, no matter how it’s treating you, should be without female power, pleasure, and appetite. Here are three books that embrace that trifecta for you to read and re-read.
by Ruth Reichl
Recommended by Abby Heugel
Why: Drawing on her years as a food critic for The New York Times and as Editor-in-Chief of Gourmet magazine, Reichl blends fearless reinvention with the honesty, wit, and the hard-won wisdom of someone who refuses to shrink her voice—or her appetite.
Perfect for: Women who are hungry for good food and good stories.
Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good
by Adrienne Maree Brown
Recommended by Melanie Lockert
Why: This book changed the way I think about satisfaction and how I engage in the world.
Perfect for: Readers interested in pleasure, social justice, and community care.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
by Maya Angelou
Recommended by Nina Malkin
Why: It opened my eyes and my heart when I was given it ages ago, and I’ve returned to it since.
Perfect for: Anyone seeking to understand the evil and injustice in this country today.
What Matters to You Matters to Us
As we all step deeper into the year, imagine deliberately seeking out narratives that aren’t just good reads, but blueprints for the life and change you’re craving right now. Stories, heroines, and points of view that remind you to not only challenge expectations, but that you’ve earned the right to crush them.
So what are the books that you’ll devour while trailblazing this year? We want to hear about the ones too fascinating, too important not to share, and the ones pushing you toward fierce change—and radical acceptance of all you desire and deserve.
Thank you for this. I just finished “Theo of Golden.” It’s a quiet respite and escape into the possibilities of loving kindness. I fee like it’s more of a balm than it is a book. Also, I love that’s it’s a debut novel by 71-year-old author Allen Levi.
Thank you, Linda!