A new collection highlights memoirs by female authors that explore love, marriage, identity, grief and family history. The list includes both well-known titles and lesser-known works that have resonated with readers.
On Love, Marriage, and What We Don’t See Coming
Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage by Belle Burden recounts the author’s 20-year marriage that ended without warning during the pandemic. Her husband left with no explanation. The memoir examines how women can diminish themselves within marriage and what happens when one woman decides to stop.
Left on Tenth: A Second Chance at Life by Delia Ephron begins when the author receives a leukemia diagnosis. A man she dated decades earlier contacted her after reading one of her essays. Their love story unfolds in hospital waiting rooms and remission celebrations.
Trying by Chloé Caldwell starts as a fertility story but takes a turn that reshapes what Caldwell thought she knew about her marriage and identity. The book balances heartbreak with humor.
On Reinvention and Reclaiming Your Story
Love, Pamela by Pamela Anderson is a personal account of a woman reclaiming her own narrative. Anderson writes about her life in her own words, covering her public persona and private experiences.
Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton covers the author’s twenties, including bad dates, friendships and the work of becoming oneself.
Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten is a career memoir that also gives a candid account of a complicated marriage. Garten writes about luck as something one prepares for rather than waits for.
More Than Enough by Elaine Welteroth describes the author’s rise to become the second youngest editor-in-chief of Teen Vogue. The book covers ambition, race and breaking barriers.
On Inner Life, Grief, and Learning to Rest
Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times by Katherine May weaves the author’s personal story with natural history and mythology. When May’s life came to a sudden halt, she chose to rest rather than push through.
The Many Lives of Mama Love by Lara Love Hardin tells the story of a suburban mother whose opioid addiction led to a conviction for 32 felonies. The book examines the gap between the life people show others and the life they are actually living.
A Living Remedy by Nicole Chung covers the loss of both parents within two years. Her father died after years of precarity and a failing healthcare system. Her mother died from cancer during the COVID-19 pandemic. The book addresses grief and the guilt of upward mobility in America.
Drinking: A Love Story by Carolyn Knapp is an older title that describes the author’s relationship with alcohol. Knapp writes with a novelist’s precision about addiction.
On Family, History, and the Stories We Inherit
Feeding Ghosts by Tessa Hulls won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for memoir. It is a graphic memoir that traces three generations of Chinese women. Hulls’s grandmother survived the Communist revolution and fled to Hong Kong. Her mother inherited that silence. Hulls spent nearly a decade drawing and writing to understand her family’s history.
The Wildcard
Paris: The Memoir by Paris Hilton examines the persona Hilton created as armor and the boarding school abuse at the center of her story. The book is about survival and self-invention.
