Ten Books Every Feisty Female Should Read

Before we look at Ten Books Every Feisty Female Should Read, I think it’s worth taking a moment to consider the word ‘feisty’.

Personally, I have always taken the descriptor ‘feisty’ as a compliment, and so have been quite perturbed hearing it used in a disparaging context more and more lately.  As a late 70s baby and young girl in the 80s to have pluck or spunk (oh dear, there’s another word that’s been misappropriated since) and having the confidence to express your opinions was seen as a quality to be admired.

feisty, adjective, informal
1. (of a person, typically one who is relatively small) lively, determined, and courageous.
“a love story with a feisty heroine who’s more than a pretty face”
2. touchy and aggressive.
“he got a bit feisty and tried to hit me”

When I say feisty female I mean the former rather than the latter definition.

So let’s swap stroppy for strong, and petulant for persuasive… celebrate the feisty in each of us and enjoy books that do also.

10 Books Every Feisty Female Should Read

• Assassin by Tara Moss (and the previous novels in her Makedde Vanderwall series) – crime-detective, action-thriller
• We Ate The Road Like Vultures by Lynnette Lounsbury – literary road trip, old soul in the body of late teen
• Resistance is Futile by Jenny T Colgan – sci-fi-fantasy, humour, romance, mystery, adventure

• The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley – literary, classic child sleuth
• Nancy Wake by Peter FitzSimons – biography, historical, adventure
• The Curse of the Pharaohs by Elizabeth Peters – adventure, action-thriller, humour
• The Discovery of Jeanne Baret by Glynis Ridley – first woman to circumnavigate the globe

• Murder on a Midsummer Night by Kerry Greenwood (or any Phryne Fisher novel) – historical, crime-detective
• The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert – historical fiction, literary epic
• Ghost Girls by Cath Ferla – crime, contemporary thriller

What other titles would you recommend we feisty females read?