According to the website Wordsrated, the average American adult reads five books per year. 51.6 percent of Americans don’t finish a single book in a year. Therefore, I am pretty optimistic when I say we should be reading these eight female authors. Don’t get me wrong. Men can be fine writers. It’s just that these women are particularly relevant to this moment in history when authoritarianism is knocking at American’s door.

Jane Mayer If you read only one book this year, make it Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right. From the dust jacket: “…a network of exceedingly wealthy people with extreme libertarian views bankrolled a systemic, step-by-step plan to alter the American political system.”

Nancy MacLean Ever hear of James McGill Buchanan? Maybe not but you should learn about his influence in altering the rules of democratic governance. MacLean tells this story in Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America.

Naomi Oreskes Beginning with Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, Oreskes and co-author Erik M. Conway analyzed issues related to advertising and deceiving the public for private gain. Their latest book, The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market is timely and relevant. Oreskes also wrote Why Trust Science?

Alice Miranda Ollstein Ollstein is a health care reporter for POLITICO, covering Capitol Hill. Her beat includes women’s reproductive rights and she is at the top of the game in covering the issue. Follow her here.

Anne Nelson Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. From the dust jacket: “This chilling story of the covert group masterminding the radical right’s ongoing assault on America’s airwaves, schools, environment, and, ultimately, its democracy.”

Dahlia Lithwick Lady Justice: Women, the Law, and the Battle to Save America is the story of women lawyers from around the country, independently of each other, fighting the good fight to hold the line as Trump, McConnell, and the Republican party did everything in their power to remake the judiciary in their own conservative image.

Barbara McQuade Attack from Within: How Disinformation is Sabotaging America, comes at a perfect time for this presidential election year. It is relevant, engaging, and necessary in its discussion of misinformation and disinformation in American society. It is part explainer and part map for addressing these issues. You’ll want to read this one straight through.

Elizabeth Cronise McLaughlin One of the co-founders of Indivisible, McLaughlin is a former New York Attorney (a federal court securities fraud litigator) who is covering the Trump trials and other relevant legal news from her home in Southern California. A main activity is her daily 30-minute YouTube broadcast called #ResistanceLive. Find it here. Not only does she report and interpret the news from a progressive viewpoint, she is funny, energetic, and intelligent. She encourages viewers to get involved with the 2024 election.

Please enter a comment with authors you believe progressives should be reading. You may be tempted to read some male authors and that’s fine… after you read these women.

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