Passes the "Bechdel Test" Public

Created and curated by Phil in SF

This list contains books that:

  • have at least two women in them,
  • who talk to each other,
  • about something other than a man.

Wikipedia has a decent intro on the origins of the metric: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bechdel_test

Beware that this test is very limited in probative value. "The Bechdel test only indicates whether women are present in a work of fiction to a certain degree. A work may pass the test and still contain sexist content, and a work with prominent female characters may fail the test." This is just one thing a person may want to consider in their reading. There are many others.

I (@kingrat@sfba.club) track this in my reading as a check to make sure I am including reading that includes non-token female characters because American publishing often overly focuses on men's stories, and that is quite often reflected even more strongly in what American men choose to read.

  1. Phil in SF says:

    Story is about a generation ship that is crewed entirely by characters who can bear children. Several are non-binary or trans-men, but the largest portion of the crew are women.

  2. The Traitor by  (Alias Emma, #2)

    3 stars

    British spy Emma Makepeace goes undercover on a Russian oligarch’s superyacht, where she’s one wrong move away from a watery …

  3. Station Eternity by  (The Midsolar Murders, #1)

    3 stars

    Amateur detective Mallory Viridian’s talent for solving murders ruined her life on Earth and drove her to live on an …

  4. Blanche on the Lam by  (Blanche White, #1)

    4 stars

    Blanche White is a plump, feisty, middle-aged African-American housekeeper working for the genteel rich in North Carolina. But when an …

  5. The Relentless Moon by  (Lady Astronaut, #3)

    5 stars

    It's 1963, and riots and sabotage plague the space program. The climate change caused by the Meteor is becoming more …

  6. The Consuming Fire by  (The Interdependency, #2)

    4 stars

    The Interdependency—humanity’s interstellar empire—is on the verge of collapse. The extra-dimensional conduit that makes travel between the stars possible is …

  7. Little (Grrl) Lost by 

    4 stars

    Fourteen-year-old T.J. and her new friend, sixteen-year-old Elizabeth, a six-inch-high "Little" with a big chip on her shoulder, help one …

  8. Hollow Beasts by  (Jodi Luna, #1)

    3 stars

    After a long stint in academia, Jodi Luna leaves Boston for the wilds of New Mexico to start a new …

  9. The Last Emperox by  (The Interdependency, #3)

    3 stars

    The collapse of The Flow, the interstellar pathway between the planets of the Interdependency, has accelerated. Entire star systems—and billions …

  10. The City Inside by 

    3 stars

    The City Inside, a near-future epic by the internationally celebrated Samit Basu, pulls no punches as it comes for your …

  11. All That Is Mine I Carry with Me by 

    4 stars

    One afternoon in November 1975, ten-year-old Miranda Larkin comes home from school to find her house eerily quiet. Her mother …

  12. Sing Her Down by 

    4 stars

    No Country for Old Men meets Killing Eve in this gritty, feminist Western thriller from the award-winning author of These …

  13. Relentless Melt by 

    4 stars

    Stranger Things meets the Golden Age of Detective fiction in a rollicking supernatural detective thriller that introduces Artie Quick, a …

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