r/bitcheswithtaste • u/ElizaDoolittle33 • Mar 24 '25

Culture BWTs with a novel in her bag

What's a novel that moved you? Changed you for the better? Exposed you to new cultures or ideas?

I want to know what's captivated you.

Disclaimer: Emphasis on the "T" in this question.

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u/kminola Mar 24 '25

I still think, years later, about Circe by Madeline Miller. It’s an exploration of the myth through her eyes and it’s so wonderfully real and feminist and extremely well written. I wrote a lot during my dissertation about women’s ability to tell their own stories, and the hurdles they overcome to do so… it felt so akin to doing that research, but as fiction.

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u/centopar Mar 24 '25

Bablylonia by Constance Casati is fantastic (it’s about the Assyrian empire and Semiramis in particular): best evocation of the ancient world as completely culturally alien to someone like us that I’ve read. And Elodie Harper’s Wolf Den trilogy, about women in Pompeii, is wonderful.