In honor of Women’s History Month, each day Social Justice Books features a children’s book we recommend to highlight grassroots women’s history in the United States: Women’s History Month: A Book Every Day
Titles that we recommend are featured below. The ones with reviews are noted with an asterisk (*). Some titles are recommended with a caveat.
Elementary | Upper Elementary | Middle School | HS Fiction | HS / Adult Nonfiction
Ablaze with Color: A Story of Painter Alma Thomas
By Jeanne Walker Harvey and Loveis Wise (Illustrator)
Abuela's Weave *
By Omar S. Casteneda, Enrique O. Sanchez (Illustrator)
Recommended with caveat. See review: Abuela's Weave Review
Amelia to Zora: Twenty-Six Women Who Changed the World
By Cynthia Chin-Lee, Megan Halsey (Illustrator), Sean Addy (Illustrator)
Beautiful Shades of Brown: The Art of Laura Wheeler Waring
By Nancy Churnin and Felicia Marshall (Illustrator)
Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers' Strike of 1909
By Michelle Markel, Melissa Sweet (Illustrator)
Dorothea Lange: The Photographer Who Found the Faces of the Depression
By Carole Boston Weatherford and Sarah Green (Illustrator)
Drum Dream Girl: How One Girl's Courage Changed Music*
By Margarita Engle, Rafael Lopez (Illustrator)
Go Forth and Tell: The Life of Augusta Baker, Librarian and Master Storyteller
By Breanna J. McDaniel
Ida B. Wells, Voice of Truth: Educator, Feminist, and Anti-Lynching Civil Rights Leader
By Michelle Duster and Laura Freeman (Illustrator)
Keep Climbing, Girls
By Beah E. Richards, Lisagay Hamilton (Introduction by), R. Gregory Christie (Illustrator)
The Lion Queen: Rasila Vadher, the First Woman Guardian of the Last Asiatic Lions
By Rina Singh and Tara Anand (Illustrator)
The Little Piano Girl: The Story of Mary Lou Williams, Jazz Legend
By Ann Ingalls, Maryann Macdonald, and Giselle Potter
Make a Pretty Sound: A Story of Ella Jenkins – The First Lady of Children's Music
By Traci N. Todd and Eleanor Davis (Illustrator)
Mama in Congress: Rashida Tlaib's Journey to Washington
By Rashida and Adam Tlaib and Olivia Aserr (Illustrator)
Mamie on the Mound: A Woman in Baseball's Negro Leagues
By Leah Henderson, George Doutsiopoulos (Illustrator)
Miss Mary Reporting: The True Story of Sportswriter Mary Garber
By Sue Macy, C. F. Payne (Illustrator)
Me Llamo Celia/My Name Is Celia: La Vida de Celia Cruz/The Life Of Celia Cruz
By Monica Brown, Rafael Lopez (Illustrator)
Nasreen's Secret School: A True Story from Afghanistan
By Jeanette Winter, Jeanette Winter (Illustrator)
Nour's Secret Library
By Wafa' Tarnowska and Vali Mintzi (Illustrator)
One Wish: Fatima Al-Fihri and the World's Oldest University *
By M. O. Yuksel and Mariam Quraishi (Illustrator)
Only Passing Through: The Story of Sojourner Truth
By Anne Rockwell, R. Gregory Gregory Christie (Illustrator)
Planting the Trees of Kenya: The Story of Wangari Maathai
By Claire A. Nivola, Claire A. Nivola (Illustrator)
Rachel Carson: Preserving a Sense of Wonder (Images of Conservationists)
By Joseph Bruchac, Thomas Locker
Sharice's Big Voice: A Native Kid Becomes a Congresswoman *
By Sharice Davids, Nancy K. Mays, and Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley (Illustrator)
She Sang for India: How M.S. Subbulakshmi Used Her Voice for Change
By Suma Subramaniam and Shreya Gupta (Illustrator)
She Stood for Freedom: The Untold Story of a Civil Rights Hero, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland
By Loki Mulholland, Angela Fairwell, Charlotta Janssen (Illustrator)
She Was the First! The Trailblazing Life of Shirley Chisholm
By Katheryn Russell-Brown and Eric Velasquez (Illustrator)
Someday Is Now: Clara Luper and the 1958 Oklahoma City Sit-ins
By Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich, Jade Johnson (Illustrator)
So Tall Within: Sojourner Truth's Long Walk Toward Freedom
By Gary Schmidt, Daniel Mintor (Illustrator)
Stitch by Stitch: Elizabeth Hobbs Keckly Sews Her Way to Freedom
By Connie Schofield-Morrison and Elizabeth Zunon (Illustrator)
That's Not Fair!/No Es Justo!: Emma Tenayuca's Struggle for Justice/La Lucha de Emma Tenayuca Por La Justicia
By Carmen Tafolla, Sharyll Teneyuca, Terry Ybanez (Illustrator)
To Boldly Go: How Nichelle Nichols and Star Trek Helped Advance Civil Rights
By Angela Dalton and Lauren Semmer (Illustrator)
What Do You Do with a Voice Like That? The Story of Extraordinary Congresswoman Barbara Jordan
By Chris Barton, Ekua Holmes (Illustrator)
Wilma Unlimited: How Wilma Rudolph Became the World's Fastest Woman
By Kathleen Krull, David Diaz (Illustrator)
The Women Who Caught The Babies: A Story of African American Midwives*
By Eloise Greenfield, Daniel Minter(Illustrator)
Call Me Miss Hamilton: One Woman's Case for Equality and Respect *
By Carole Boston Weatherford and Jeffery Boston Weatherford (Illustrator)
Choosing Brave: How Mamie Till-Mobley and Emmett Till Sparked the Civil Rights Movement *
By Angela Joy and Janelle Washington (Illustrator)
Fannie Never Flinched: One Woman's Courage in the Struggle for American Labor Union Rights*
By Mary Cronk Farrell
How Do You Spell Unfair? MacNolia Cox and the National Spelling Bee *
By Carole Boston Weatherford and Frank Morrison (Illustrator)
Jump at the Sun: The True Life Tale of Unstoppable Storycatcher Zora Neale Hurston
By Alicia D. Williams and Jacqueline Alcántara (Illustrator)
Let It Shine: Stories of Black Women Freedom Fighters
By Andrea Davis Pinkney, Stephen Alcorn, Stephen Alcorn (Illustrator)
Lizzie Demands a Seat! Elizabeth Jennings Fights for Streetcar Rights
By Beth Anderson and E. B. Lewis (Illustrator)
Mae Makes a Way: The True Story of Mae Reeves, Hat & History Maker
By Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich and Andrea Pippins (Illustrator)
Mother Jones: Labor Leader
By Connie Colwell Miller, Steve Erwin (Illustrator), Charles Barnett III (Illustrator)
Peggy Flanagan: Ogimaa Kwe, Lieutenant Governor *
By Jessica Engelking and Tashia Hart (Illustrator)
She Stood for Freedom: The Untold Story of a Civil Rights Hero, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland
By Loki Mulholland, Charlotta Janssen (Illustrator)
Shirley Chisholm Dared: The Story of the First Black Woman in Congress
By Alicia D. Williams and April Harrison (Illustrator)
A Strong Right Arm: The Story of Mamie "Peanut" Johnson
By Michelle Y. Green, Kadir Nelson (Illustrator)
Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer: The Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement*
By Carole Boston Weatherford
What Your Ribbon Skirt Means to Me: Deb Haaland's Historic Inauguration
By Alexis Bunten and Nicole Neidhardt (Illustrator)
Deb Haaland: First Native American Cabinet Secretary *
By Matthew J. Martinez and Jill Doerfler
Iraqigirl: Diary of a Teenage Girl in Iraq
By Iraqigirl
Mighty Justice: The Untold Story of Civil Rights Trailblazer Dovey Johnson Roundtree
By Dovey Johnson Roundtree and Katie McCabe
Never Caught, the Story of Ona Judge: Young Readers Edition*
By Erica Armstrong Dunbar and Kathleen Van Cleve
Passenger on the Pearl: The True Story of Emily Edmonson's Flight from Slavery *
By Winifred Conkling
Pauli Murray: The Life of a Pioneering Feminist and Civil Rights Activist
By Terry Catasús Jennings, Rosita Stevens-Holsey, and Ashanti Fortson (Illustrator)
This Promise of Change: One Girl’s Story in the Fight for School Equality*
By Jo Ann Allen Boyce, Debbie Levy
Rad American Women A-Z: Rebels, Trailblazers, and Visionaries Who Shaped Our History . . . and Our Future!
By Kate Schatz, Miriam Klein Stahl (Illustrator)
Rad Girls Can: Stories of Bold, Brave, and Brilliant Young Women
By Kate Schatz, Miriam Klein Stahl (Illustrator)
Rad Women Worldwide: Artists and Athletes, Pirates and Punks, and Other Revolutionaries Who Shaped History*
By Kate Schatz, Miriam Klein Stahl (Illustrator)
The Autobiography of Maria Elena Moyano: The Life and Death of a Peruvian Activist
By Diana M. Tupac (Editor), Patricia Taylor Edmisten (Translator)
Bitchfest: Ten Years of Cultural Criticism from the Pages of Bitch Magazine
By Lisa Jervis (Editor), Andi Zeisler (Editor)
Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism
By Daisy Hernandez (Editor), Bushra Rehman (Editor), Cherrie Moraga (Foreword by)
Fighter in Velvet Gloves: Alaska Civil Rights Hero Elizabeth Peratrovich
By Annie Boochever and Roy Peratrovich Jr
Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights
By Tananarive Due and Patricia Stephens Due
Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC
By Faith S. Holsaert (Editor), Martha Prescod Norman Noonan (Editor), Judy Richardson (Editor)
I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World
By Malala Yousafzai, Patricia McCormick (With)
Lighting the Fires of Freedom: African American Women in the Civil Rights Movement
By Janet Dewart Bell
Mary McLeod Bethune in Washington, D.C.: Activism and Education in Logan Circle
By Ida E. Jones, Elizabeth Clark-Lewis (Foreword by)
#NotYourPrincess: Voices of Native American Women *
Edited by Lisa Charleyboy and Mary Beth Leatherdale
Persistence: Evelyn Butts and the African American Quest for Full Citizenship and Self-Determination
By Kenneth Cooper Alexander
The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks: Young Readers Edition *
By Jeanne Theoharis and Brandy Colbert
Revolutionary Women of Texas and Mexico: Portraits of Soldaderas, Saints, and Subversives
Edited by Kathy Sosa, Ellen Riojas Clark, and Jennifer Speed
Selma, Lord, Selma: Girlhood Memories of the Civil Rights Days
By Frank Webb Sikora
Spíləx̣m: A Weaving of Recovery, Resilience, and Resurgence *
By Nicola I. Campbell
Tell Me a Riddle, Requa I, and Other Works
By Tillie Olsen, Laurie Olsen (Foreword by), Rebekah Edwards (Introduction by)
This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color
Edited by Cherríe Moraga and Gloria Anzaldúa
Turning 15 on the Road to Freedom: My Story of the 1965 Selma Voting Rights March
By Lynda Blackmon Lowery
Teaching Story from a D.C. Educator: Turning 15 on the Road to Freedom
Warriors Don't Cry: The Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate Little Rock's Central High
By Melba Pattillo Beals
We Don't Need Another Wave: Dispatches from the Next Generation of Feminists
By Melody Berger (Editor)
