Alte FriedmanNow that the weather’s warming up, and spring travels are on the horizon, our list of books to read on the beach, plane, or lounging in our backyard is growing, and we’re reaching for page turners to inspire us. We’re not tossing our fiction novels anytime soon, but every now and then like to opt for something that offers a takeaway for our well being mind, body, and soul. Are you with us? If the answer is yes, than you should start here, with these 11 empowering books every individual should read, in our opinion!
1. From the Trade Paperback and Ebook edition
Written by author E L James, who is also a New York Times bestselling author, Fifty Shades of Grey is the first book in the Fifty Shades trilogy. This series has been one of the most popular, and has been translated into over forty languages. This classic erotic romance tells the story of recent college graduate, Anastasia Steele, who gets caught up in a budding relationship with the handsome and intriguing young billionaire CEO, Christian Grey. Grey has a sexual penchant for BSDM, which appeals to Steele, but is dismissive of emotional ties. The two fall in love, conflicting with Grey’s intended plans for a strictly sexual relationship. Fifty Shades of Grey does contain some explicit material that would be considered NSFW.
2. A Confident Heart
“To live a full and joyful life, you do not have to be someone else or have a different set of circumstances. You can be the woman you are right now.” –Devorah Heller
A Confident Heart guides women to lose the emotional baggage they accumulated from mistreatment and trauma, find their way back to God and their joy, and make their own happy ever after.
3. Georgie’s War
“A compassionate, heartbreaking debut about a mother’s love for her son. Written with empathy and tact, it’s a book that will linger long after the final page is turned.”–Jodi Picoult, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Wendy Holden takes us into the heart of the everyday practicalities of living with a child who has nothing to lose. Parents will identify with the fear, even though Carl’s situation is far from typical.
4. Love Rehab
Vicki Courtney is a product of The Me Generation. She embodies all the best and worst characteristics of that prototype: self-centered, self-indulgent, self-absorbed, addicted to vanity, and in love with loving herself. The other side of the coin is enjoyment and delight in the splendor, beauty, and pleasures of life. From the beginning of her life, it has been one hedonistic pursuit of pleasure after another.
But there’s a problem. Her enjoyment of life comes at a high price—the misery and pain of all those involved with her.
5. The Hawk and the Dove
“For anyone who has ever lost a love–or is waiting to find one–Toni Morrison has written a wise, wonderful, and beautiful book.” —Pat Conroy
From Nobel Prize winner and “our best novelist” (The New Yorker), A Mercy is the quintessential Toni Morrison, a multigenerational story of a young woman striving to escape history and find her own freedom.
6. State of Wonder
A magnificent new novel by the author of the number-one New York Times bestseller Bel Canto.
Ann Patchett’s new novel is a dazzling narrative about the far-reaching discoveries of science, the power of tradition, and the search for meaning in lives shaped by ambition, desire, and loss.
7. Bossypants
Fey turns her keen eye on herself, revealing a talent even most fanatic “Saturday Night Live” fans don’t know about. Ranging from the late night wars to doing her own stunts, Fey is both hilarious and sharp as she delivers a funny memoir that combines her singular brand of comedy with her off-screen personality.
8. The Glass Castle
Jeanette Walls’s beloved memoir of a shocking childhood—a New York Times bestseller for more than nine years—now published in paperback with a special new afterword
From an early age, Jeannette Walls had a knack for getting into trouble. “If you wanted a definition of spirit,” she says, “here it was in the flesh.” In her remarkable, true-life memoir, she chronicles the remarkable journey of her family: her spellbinding, eccentric, and frighteningly charming parents and her three brothers, who took her from poverty-stricken rural West Virginia, with its rattlesnakes and coal dust, to the far reaches of the globe and back.
9. The Girls’ Guide to Love and Supper Clubs
With her signature smart, funny storytelling, Burns (The Liar’s Club) delivers a fresh, inspiring collection of essays to make readers laugh, cry, and, most notably, embrace their inner girl.
Composed of ten stories, the narrative runs from the author’s early years as a self-proclaimed “girly girl” at a Southern military boarding school to her journey of personal growth and strength forged at a troubled, conservative college. Each of the ten vignettes captures a pivotal point in the author’s life with raw honesty.
10. Sisterland
Pulitzer Prize finalist Curtis Sittenfeld delivers a captivating, whip-smart novel about identical twin sisters and what happens when one of them has a brush with the extraordinary.
11. The Friday Night Knitting Club
The novel The Friday Night Knitting Club, is a very well know novel. It is all about the importance of family and friends and the sense of community that really exists in the world. Kate Jacobs, the author is the member of a knitting club. So, the expectations are very high for her to bring something extraordinary. Kate Jacobs have really pulled it off with her novel by weaving it around the protagonist and around some
