Top 16 Books For Women In Their 20s Updated 04 /2024

Your 20s are a time to figure out who you are, make a lot of mistakes, and learn about the world around you.

Women who have been there before you, who are going through the same thing, and who have something to teach you are great books to read now.

Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid

Such A Fun Age is Kiley Reid's first book. It's about race, privilege, and the lies we tell ourselves about ourselves.

It tells the story of Alix Chamberlain, a wealthy, white lifestyle blogger and the mother of two-year-old Briar. And Emira Tucker, the young African-American woman Alix hires as her nanny is also there.

It is humiliating for Emira when she is accused of taking Briar from a fancy store at night. And Alix wants to make things right.

But the two women don't know that they have a connection that could bring both of them down.

Wild by Cheryl Strayed.

 

Wild by Cheryl Strayed, which came out in 2012, inspired a lot of women to throw out the rules and find themselves in the most unexpected places.

At 22, Cheryl thought she had lost everything and would never get anywhere. Her mother had died, her family had split up, and her own marriage was breaking up, too.

It was four years later. She didn't have any experience or training, and she was only guided by her own blind will when she decided to walk the Pacific Trail - from the Mojave Desert to Washington State - on her own.

Wild tells the story of how she went on a hike, how she overcame obstacles, and how the journey made her stronger and better.

A Lonely Girl Is A Dangerous Thing by Jessie Tu

Once, Jena Lin was an extremely talented child. She now uses sex to fill the void left by fame, and she does it all the time.

With new friends and a new boyfriend, her days are full of rehearsals as well as boozy nights out.

It looks like Jena's dream life is about to start when the New York Philharmonic gives her an internship. But when Trump is elected, New York changes forever, and Jena changes with it, too.

A Lonely Girl Is A Dangerous Thing is a clever, sarcastic look at female desire and the danger of wanting too much and not getting it. It's also very funny.

Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton

In just a few years, Dolly Alderton became one of the world's best-known young people.

Her columns and podcast, The High Low, became the voice of a lot of young women who were trying to figure out what to do with their lives.

This is what she wrote about in her memoir: her teens and twenties. It's about the people she was friends with, how she had relationships with other people and had heartbreaks, and how those things made them unique.

It's like looking at your 20s through the glossy pages of a well-written book.

The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris

The Devil Wears Prada meets Get Out has been called The Other Black Girl.

The first book by Zakiya Dalila Harris tells the story of 26-year-old editorial assistant Nella Rogers, who is fed up with being the only black employee at Wagner Books in New York City.

During the day, Nella feels like she's the only person who can relate to the small things that happen to her. When Hazel starts working in the cubicle next to her, Nella thinks she'll finally have someone who understands.

Now, on her desk, there is a note that reads: LEAVE WAGNER NOW.

With twists that will keep you guessing until the last page, The Other Black Girl will keep you on your toes.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

At school, Connell and Marianne act like they don't know each other, but they do know each other very well. A popular boy is the star of the school soccer team, but a lonely girl is proud, proud, and a little bit of a loner.

Then, when their paths cross, they fall in love. They try to keep their relationship a secret. One year later, when they both go to Trinity College in Dublin, Marianne has found her place in a new social world, while Connell is shy and uncertain.

They keep going around each other for years, making each other worse.

It looks at the kind of relationships that most people have in their 20s. The relationships that tie us together and break us, but also make us, are what make us.

Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes

Marian Keyes has been writing stories about women that are both honest and funny for almost 30 years now.

When Rachel wrote her book, Rachel's Holiday, it's likely that many of her readers still think about it.

The book tells the story of 27-year-old Rachel Walsh, who has been sent to Cloisters, Dublin's answer to the Betty Ford Clinic.

In her time at Cloisters, Rachel learns how to face her demons and get her life together. When Phoebe Waller-Bridge wrote Fleabag, she was a young woman who lived in a small town in the United States. Twenty years before that, she was an Irish woman.

They show how it feels to think you've messed up your whole life, and how it takes time to piece it back together.

Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes

At twenty, Violet has a dead-end job, is broke and broke, and has broken up with her best friend.

Finally, Violet meets Lottie, who looks like the kind of woman Violet wants to be when she grows up. She met her at a party. With Violet's help, Lottie is going to start a new business. Lottie and her husband Simon are going to be a big part of Violet's new life.

Daisy Buchanan's first book was described as funny and dirty by two of my favorite writers, and they were right.

That's not all. Insatiable is more than that, as well, It's about a woman who learns to love her body, learns about her own worth, and figure things out. It's about being alone in your twenties and going on a different path. It's a story about a sexual coming of age that is full of funny, laugh out loud jokes.

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

The Bell Jar tells the story of a woman's descent into madness.

It looks like Esther Greenwood is going to fall apart for the last time. She's brilliant, beautiful, very talented, and very successful, but she's going down.

Esther worked at a national magazine in New York City during the summer. She is on the brink of her future at the time. Then, too, she is on the edge of a dark place that makes her world seem less real, but also more real.

To make The Bell Jar a classic American book, Sylvia Plath takes the reader inside the human mind. Every woman in her 20s should read it.

We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

TEDx talk: "We should all be feminists." This essay is based on that talk, and it's very good.

Adichie writes an essay that is both personal and powerful. In it, she gives readers a new definition of feminism for the 21st century, one that is based on inclusion and awareness.

It's about what it means to be a woman today and why we should all be feminists.

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