October 2025 Reads for the Rest of Us

Note: This article was originally published by Ms. magazine on Oct. 7, 2025.

Hello, feminist reader friends! Each month, I provide Ms. readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups. The aims of these lists are threefold:

1. I want to do my part in the disruption of what has been the acceptable “norm” in the book world for far too long—white, cis, heterosexual, male;
2. I want to amplify indie publishers and amazing works by writers who are women, Black, Indigenous, Latinx, APIA/AAPI, international, queer, trans, nonbinary, disabled, fat, immigrant, Muslim, neurodivergent, sex-positive or of other historically marginalized identities—you know, the rest of us; and
3. I want to challenge and encourage you all to buy, borrow and read them! 

Each month, as we compile these lists, we’re excited and proud to share the new titles we’ve chosen. Not because we’ve done such a great job, but because of the wealth of new books by writers of the global majority that are so accessible, reflective, original and compelling. Don’t get me wrong, writers from marginalized communities have always been on the leading edge and rarely received the attention they deserved; this is nothing new. But this month, when considering the books being released, we noticed an urgency and a commitment to truth-telling that we found essential to highlight. 

Is this just us? These books may have reached us at a sensitive time, when we are more awake or raw than usual. Perhaps we’re seeking an explanation for the terrifying number of atrocities occurring right now, a glimmer of hope, a light at the end of the tunnel.

It could just be a matter of timing in publishing. Genocides in Palestine and Sudan have been raging for two years, and famines and humanitarian crises in Uganda, Myanmar, Yemen and others continue unabated. The effects of increased violence and threats to life and liberty from the far right in the U.S. and abroad have caused marginalized groups to come together as they have in the past. As time passes, writers reflect on and share their experiences. 

Perhaps the general public is now catching on to what’s been happening to marginalized people in this country, well, forever, but more openly and brazenly without shame since 2016. In only 200 days of their second go-round, the current U.S. regime has managed to harm almost every person in this country by threatening the free press, imposing unwarranted tariffs and increasing costs for average consumers, cutting vital food programs to children, assaulting the rights and humanity of trans individuals, ignoring due process and violating the First Amendment (among others). As people’s eyes are opening to the rise of authoritarianism in this country, perhaps they, too, are looking for an explanation or some semblance of clarity. 

Whatever the reason, the books we list this month are all essential. From historical and speculative fiction that provide us lenses into past lessons and future possibilities to imperative research and sharp testimonials, to the experimental and original melding of form and function, everything here is extraordinary.        

In a time when we need it the most, these 20 books will provide the knowledge, respite, ideas, empathy and rage we need right now to continue the work of liberation.

Gaza: The Story of a Genocide

Edited by Fatima Bhutto and Sonia Faleiro. Verso. Out Oct. 7.

This crucial anthology offers firsthand accounts of the genocide in Gaza and reflects on the importance of storytelling, particularly in life’s most challenging moments. Enraging and heartbreaking to read, it’s imperative we bear witness to the atrocities and act upon the glimmers of hope.     

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The Hong Kong Widow

By Kristen Loesch. Berkley. Out Oct. 7.

A page-turning, spellbinding story that follows Mei throughout her lifetime as she confronts love, loss, and lots of ghosts. Weaving three timelines together and leaving lots of room for suspense, Kristen Loesch crafts an impeccable tale of revenge, motherhood, and the search for identity. 

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If the Dead Belong Here: A Novel

By Carson Faust (Edisto Natchez-Kusso Tribe). Viking. Out Oct. 7.

Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, Carson Faust’s extraordinary debut centers on a missing girl and her family’s struggle with intergenerational violence and trauma. Full of chilling gothic and supernatural elements, this literary horror pulls from Indigenous stories and the author’s own family history. 

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A Moon Will Rise from the Darkness: Reports on Israel’s Genocide in Palestine

By Francesca Albanese. Pluto Press. Out Oct. 7.

Since May of 2022, Francesca Albanese has served as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967. In that time, she has written three major reports and spoken out endlessly about Israel’s egregious violations of Palestinian human rights and the West’s complicity in the genocide. This volume compiles those reports, along with additional information and an introduction written by Albanese. If you read no other book this month, read this one. 

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A Mouthful of Dust (The Singing Hills Cycle, 6)

By Nghi Vo. Tordotcom. Out Oct. 7.

This is the sixth book in the Singing Hills Cycle, a standout series of standalone novellas filled with queer characters, cruel twists, and phenomenal feminist fantasy. Nghi Vo is a writer of unique voice and extraordinary talent. 

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The Salvage: A Novel

By Anbara Salam. Tin House Books. Out Oct. 7.

Suspenseful, eerie, and fully leaning into the tempestuous ocean backdrop, this thrilling novel follows Marta as she grapples with the haunting figures of her past. Set on an isolated island with judgmental locals and shadows at every turn, this moody mystery is an exploration of prejudice and ostracization, and a warning against living in the past.

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Wild Song

By Candy Gourlay. Carolrhoda Lab. Out Oct. 7. 

This powerful coming-of-age YA novel centers on an Indigenous teen from the Philippines who travels to the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis, where she and others are “exhibited” to gaping attendees. Written from the Filipina perspective, this nuanced story sensitively grapples with colonialism, racism, exploitation and identity. 

*

As the Earth Dreams: Black Canadian Speculative Stories

Edited by Terese Mason Pierre. Spiderline. Out Oct. 14.

This mesmerizing collection of stories imagines the seemingly impossible, while grappling with the fact that if it can be imagined, it can be reality. Centering themes of motherhood, family, love and perseverance, this anthology captures the fleeting nonsensicality of the present and comforting uncertainty of the future.

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Intemperance: A Novel

By Sonora Jha. HarperVia. Out Oct. 14.

Sassy, satirical, and oh-so-scintillating, this one-of-a-kind feminist novel is a meditation on marriage, masculinity, midlife, and everything in between. With a captivating narrator and a cast of loveable characters, Sonora Jha provides the perfect satirical escape.

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My Name Means Fire: A Memoir

By Atash Yaghmaian. Beacon Press. Out Oct. 14.

In her debut memoir, writer and psychotherapist Atash Yaghmaian describes her abusive childhood in war-torn Iran and the dissociative identity disorder (DID) that ultimately saved her life. Far from seeing DID as a curse, Yaghmaian shares how she used her condition as a tool for protection, resilience and hope against violence, sexual abuse, misogyny and oppressive religious traditions. 

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We Are Each Other’s Liberation: Black and Asian Feminist Solidarities

Edited by Rachel Kuo, Jaimee A. Swift and TD Tso. Haymarket Books. Out Oct. 14.

A collaborative project between Black Women Radicals and the Asian American Feminist Collective, this groundbreaking anthology features essays, interviews, poetry, and more from writers, organizers, artists and others. Full of depth and breadth, this volume is one to learn from, sit with and act on. 

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Yoga as Embodied Resistance: A Feminist Lens on Caste, Gender, and Sacred Resilience in Yoga History

By Anjali Rao. North Atlantic Books. Out Oct. 14.

By examining the history and hierarchies of yoga through a critical feminist lens, yoga educator and podcaster Anjali Rao presents an accessible and timely intervention that all practitioners and teachers should read. Rao engages readers from the deconstruction of existing colonial and oppressive power dynamics to a practice of embodied yoga for collective resistance.

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Beneath the Skin of Sorrow: Improvisations on Loss

By Nnenna Freelon. Duke University Press. Out Oct. 21.

Celebrated jazz vocalist and composer Nnenna Freelon was hit with the trifecta of loss in a period of only six months when her husband, her sister and her dog all passed away. This volume is a gift of prose, poetry and compositions for all who’ve had to improvise life and healing in the face of unimaginable grief.

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Gathering Together, We Decide: Archives of Dispossession, Resistance, and Memory in Ndé Homelands

Edited by Margo Tamez (Lipan Apache (Ndé)), Cynthia Bejarano and Jeffrey P. Shepherd. University of Arizona Press. Out Oct. 21.

When the U.S. government took some of Margo Tamez’s family land to build the border wall, she fought back. Focused on the Ndé homelands on the border of what is now known as Texas and Mexico, this anthology contains a multitude of lessons on community and creativity, as well as women-led resistance and collective action. 

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Poppy State: A Labyrinth of Plants and a Story of Beginnings

By Myriam Gurba. Timber Press. Out Oct. 21.

The latest by writer and activist Myriam Gurba is a raw yet delightful lesson for our time. Gurba masterfully blends ecofeminism, memoir, humor, candor, plant love and Indigenous knowledge into one of the most unique and captivating books I’ve read this year. 

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This Is the Only Kingdom: A Novel

By Jaquira Díaz. Algonquin Books. Out Oct. 21.

In her first novel, Jaquira Díaz has proven that her mettle with fiction is as strong as that of memoir. Longlisted for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Award, This Is the Only Kingdom explores the intersection of poverty, loss, and racism, and celebrates friendship, acceptance, and love.     

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Fearless, Sleepless, Deathless: What Fungi Taught Me about Nourishment, Poison, Ecology, Hidden Histories, Zombies, and Black Survival

By Maria Pinto. University of North Carolina Press. Out Oct. 28.

Writer and mycophile (look it up – I had to!) Maria Pinto has somehow made fungi fun, engaging and understandable, even to a non-science person like me. Not only that, but this captivating debut connects the science with historical and current Black life and experience. 

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The Genocide Continues: Population Control and the Sterilization of Indigenous Women

By Karen Stote. Fernwood Publishing. Out Oct. 28.

I first became aware of Karen Stote’s work after the publication of her first book, An Act of Genocide: Colonialism and the Sterilization of Aboriginal Women (Fernwood, 2015), a slim but powerful examination into what some called conspiracy theory. Stote is back with further evidence that control over land and resources has and continues to drive the forced and coercive sterilization of Indigenous women.   

*

On Wholeness: Anishinaabe Pathways to Embodiment and Collective Liberation

By Quill Christie-Peters (Anishinaabe). Ambrosia. Out Oct. 28. 

By explaining settler colonial disembodiment as a central tactic used to subjugate, oppress and attempt to eradicate Indigenous peoples, Quill Christie-Peters makes plain the fear settlers have of the Anishinaabe experience of embodied wholeness. With clarity and patience, Christie-Peters examines wholeness and its necessity for collective liberation. 

* 

The Water Remembers: My Indigenous Family’s Fight to Save a River and a Way of Life

By Amy Bowers Cordalis (Yurok). Little, Brown and Company. Out Oct. 28.

Part memoir, part history, this fascinating and beautifully written debut by attorney and activist Amy Bowers Cordalis is centered on the fight to save the Klamath River, the salmon that inhabit it and the Yurok people bound to protect it. 

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Also releasing this month:

And I’ll Take Out Your Eyes: A Novel
By A. M. Sosa. Algonquin Books. Out Oct. 7.

Mothers: A Novel
Written by Brenda Lozano. Translated by Heather Cleary. Catapult. Out Oct. 7.

Queers at the Table: An Illustrated Guide to Queer Food (with Recipes)
Edited by Alex D. Ketchum and Megan J. Elias. Arsenal Pulp Press. Out Oct. 7.

Who Gets to Be Indian?: Ethnic Fraud, Disenrollment, and Other Difficult Conversations About Native American Identity
By Dina Gilio-Whitaker (Colville Confederated Tribes). Beacon Press. Out Oct. 7.

Little F
By Michelle Tea. Feminist Press. Out Oct. 14.

Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present (Revised and expanded edition)
By Robyn Maynard. Duke University Press. Out Oct. 14.

We Gon’ Be Alright: Resistance and Healing in Black Movement Spaces, 2012­–2021
By Stephanie M. Crumpton. University of Arizona Press. Out Oct. 14.

Black Women’s Art Ecosystems: Sites of Wellness and Self-Care
By Tanisha Jackson. University of Illinois Press. Out Oct. 21.

Criminalization of Women: Abortion, Inequity, and Resistance in Chile
By Michele Eggers-Barison. University of Illinois Press. Out Oct. 21.

The Isle in the Silver Sea
By Tasha Suri. Orbit. Out Oct. 21.

Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy
By Julia Ioffe. Ecco. Out Oct. 21.

My Seven Mothers: Making a Family in the Danish Women’s Movement
Written by Pernille Ipsen. Translated by Tina Nunnally. University of Minnesota Press. Out Oct. 21.

Racebook: A Personal History of the Internet
By Tochi Onyebuchi. Roxane Gay Books. Out Oct. 21.

When They Burned the Butterfly: A Novel
By Wen-yi Lee. Tor Books. Out Oct. 21.

The Bone Thief
By Vanessa Lillie (Cherokee). Berkeley. Out Oct. 28.

Cry, Voidbringer
By Elaine Ho. Bindery Books. Out Oct. 28.

Unexploded Ordnance: What She Felt. What They Feared. How They Survived. What They Saw.
By Catharina Coenen. Restless Books. Out Oct. 28.

Lessons in Drag: A Queer Manual for Academics, Artists, and Aunties
By Kareem Khubchandani. Brandeis University Press. Out Oct. 29.