Passes the "Bechdel Test" Public

Created 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 …

  1. The Guest by 

    No rating

    “Alex drained her wineglass, then her water glass. The ocean looked calm, a black darker than the sky. A ripple …

  2. The Unkillable Frank Lightning by 

    No rating

    Catherine Coldbridge is a complicated woman: A doctor, an occultist, and, briefly, a widow.

    In 1879, Private Frank Humble, …

  3. Money Shot by  (Angel Dare, #1)

    No rating

    THEY THOUGHT SHE’D BE EASY. THEY THOUGHT WRONG.

    It all began with the phone call asking former porn star …

  4. San Diego 2014 by 

    No rating

    A Newflesh novella from the New York Times bestselling author that brought you Feed, Mira Grant.

    It was the …

  5. Just Out of Jupiter's Reach by  (The Far Reaches Collection, #5)

    No rating

    A revolutionary experiment in space opens a woman’s eyes to the meaning of solitude in a thought-provoking short story by …

  6. Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution by 

    No rating

    Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal. 1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, …

    Phil in SF says:

    Babel is told from the perspective of a young man named Robin, so the narrative can only see the conversations of women when Robin is there for them. However, Robin does get to witness his friends Letty and Victoire discuss balls and translation and probably a few other things I haven't got to yet.

  7. The Rose Code by 

    No rating

    1940- As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley …

  8. Choke Hold by  (Angel Dare, #2)

    Angel Dare went into Witness Protection to escape her past—not as a porn star, but as a killer who took …

  9. The Get Off by  (Angel Dare, #3)

    Tagged as a cop killer when a mission of vengeance goes wrong, Angel Dare finds herself on the run, with …

  10. Ponies by 

    If you want to be friends with The Other Girls, you're going to have to give something up; this is …

  11. Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous by 

    Katie Price is known in every living room in America. A small-town Wisconsin girl who became an A-list star, she …

    Phil in SF says:

    Five pages in. Four female characters, no male characters. All talking to each other, none of it about men.

  12. The Original by ,

    Hugo Award–winning authors Brandon Sanderson and Mary Robinette Kowal team up in this exclusive audio-firstproduction of The Original, a sci-fi …

  13. Beautiful Children by 

    One Saturday night in Las Vegas, twelve-year-old Newell Ewing goes out with a friend and doesn’t come home. In the …

  14. Lessons in Chemistry by 

    No rating

    Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that …

  15. Persons Unknown by  (Manon Bradshaw, #2)

    No rating

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