My Must Reads for Every Woman Entering Their 20’s
One thing my friends always ask me? Book recommendations—specifically, the ones they ask have impacted me. That list? Still a work in progress. But these are the books I’ve been most drawn to over the past few years, the ones that shaped me when I needed them most. The ones that, in some way, changed my life.
From friendship fallouts, one god-awful breakup, a situationship (or two), my parents divorce, its been a rougher start to my twenties than I’d like to admit. And trust me, I’m still in therapy once a week. But outside of therapy I love to read.
This list is completely subjective, but each of these books found me at just the right moment. They carried weight, meaning, and purpose the second I picked them up. If I could go back and talk to my 19-year-old self about what 21 looks like, I’d tell her she simply has to hold on and live through it. These books—written by women—feel like conversations with an older sister. And the best part? They’re books you can read and reread at any time in your twenties—or even beyond.
1.Eleanor Oliphant is Completley Fine - Gail Honeyman
My favorite novel in high school, and honestly, still one of my favorites today. I recommend this book to anyone and everyone who hasn’t checked it off their list yet.
Eleanor is… complicated. But oddly enough I identified with her so profoundly. Quirky, painfully lonely, and stuck in her rigid routines, she believes she’s perfectly fine—until a series of unexpected events force her to confront the deep isolation she’s been living in. Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is about survival, about the quiet ache of loneliness, and about how human connection—no matter how awkward or unexpected—can change everything. Sometimes, in the saddest moments.
To this day, this book remains one of the most impactful I’ve ever read. It’s a reminder of how easy it is to convince yourself you’re “fine” when, in reality, you’re just getting by. Going through the motions. And sometimes, it takes the right people, the right moments, and the right words to crack that open.
2. Everything I Know About Love - Dolly Alderton
I first read this book at 19—right before my first serious relationship, right before my first real college friendship fallout, and in what would be the final months of my parents' marriage. And man, does Dolly know heartbreak.
This book isn’t just about love in the romantic sense—it’s about friendships, heartbreak, growing up, and figuring out who you are when everything around you feels like it’s shifting beneath your feet. The funny thing is, I think you could read this book at any point in your twenties and take away something different each time. Dolly Alderton writes with such honesty and humor that it feels like an older sister passing down wisdom over a long, wine-fueled dinner.
At 19, I read this book with wide eyes, underlining passages like they were little pieces of advice meant just for me. Now, at 21, I look back at it with a different kind of knowing—a bittersweet recognition of lessons learned the hard way. And I can attest, it was the hard way.
Some books feel like time capsules, holding versions of yourself within their pages. Everything I Know About Love is exactly that for me. Relationships end. Letting go is never easy. But if there’s one thing this book made me realize, it’s that sometimes, there’s nothing you can do except surrender to what is—and grow because of it.
3. Normal People - Sally Rooney
Normal. People. I honestly can’t put into words just how much this book has meant to me. And while you might think I’m exaggerating, these characters have lived rent-free in my mind (and on my TikTok FYP) for years. This is definently my favorite book on the list.
On my most recent reread, I realized something: I’ve been both Marianne and Connell at different points in my life. But if I’m being honest, I’m mostly Marianne. Without spoiling the ending, I think I’ll always be a Marianne at heart. The novel follows a ‘‘situationship.’’ Showing just how incredibly painful—the unspoken words, the near-misses, the way two people can love each other yet never quite get it right. Normal People captures that ache so perfectly, it’s almost unbearable. Sally Rooney just gets it—the way people fumble through love, the way timing can be both everything and nothing at all.
This book is the kind you finish and immediately want to start over, just to feel it all again.
4. The Idiot - Elif Batuman
Unfortunately, the person who added this book to my collection was, well just that… an idiot. I’m pretty sure it was just the first book grabbed off the front table of the bookstore. To his luck (and mine), it truly turned out to be an incredible book, one I still keep on my nightstand to this day.
The Idiot follows Selin, a first-year Harvard student in 1995, as she navigates love, language, and identity. Her journey is a messy, thoughtful exploration of self-discovery—the kind that feels both deeply personal and universally chaotic. The years right before your twenties truly take off feel like that: a blur of experiences that shape you in ways you don’t even realize at the time. They say there’s something about falling in love for the first time at 19, and I believe it.
My copy of The Idiot is filled with nostalgia and immense heartbreak, and that’s just the book itself—not even the story inside. When I first got it, I read it immediately. Now, some days, I can’t even look at it. It sits under a white vase that I move around my room, almost like I’m trying to avoid it. It’s the most symbolic book on this list, proof of just how much I’ve changed—just how much I’m still changing. This book changed my life. And, in a way, so did the person who gave it to me.
5. Just Kids - Patti Smith
‘‘Never let go of that fiery passion called desire.’’
Few books capture the raw, electric energy of youth, art, and love like Just Kids. Patti Smith writes about her early years in New York, her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe, and their relentless pursuit of art with a kind of poetry that makes you ache for a life lived on the edge of creation.
This book isn’t just a memoir—it’s a love letter to art, to passion, to the kind of hunger that drives you to create even when you have nothing. It explores what it means to dedicate yourself to a craft, to live in the tension between survival and self-expression, and to find kindred spirits along the way.
Reading Just Kids feels like stepping into a world where art and love are inseparable, where every moment is drenched in meaning, even the painful ones. It reminds me that creativity isn’t just about talent—it’s about devotion, about showing up for your work and for the people who believe in you.
Patti and Robert’s story is beautiful and heartbreaking, a testament to the sacrifices and rewards of chasing something bigger than yourself. And if there’s one thing this book teaches, it’s that true artists never stop reaching for more.
6. My Year my Rest of Relaxation - Ottessa Moshfegh
Ottessa Moshfegh is witty—in the kind of sharp, unapologetic way that makes you laugh and cringe at the same time. I’d be lying if I wrote I didn’t think the idea was genius. (fucked up, but this is a safe space)
And while I certainly wouldn’t take a page out of her book (literally or figuratively), there’s something about this novel that lingers. It follows a wealthy, disillusioned young woman who decides to spend an entire year sedated, attempting to sleep away her existence. It’s dark, absurd, and strangely hypnotic.
In some ways, I see parallels between My Year of Rest and Relaxation and Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine. Both have isolated, deeply flawed protagonists. Both explore loneliness and self-destruction. But where Eleanor is searching for connection, Moshfegh’s narrator is actively rejecting it. At its core, this book isn’t just about depression—it’s about detachment, privilege, and the strange ways we cope with grief and emptiness.
It’s not for everyone, but for those who get it, they get it. And whether you find it disturbing, hilarious, or uncomfortably relatable, it’s the kind of book that sticks with you long after you’ve turned the last page.
BTW: Fashion girlies, Moshfegh teamed up with Prada for their Spring/Summer 2025 campaign, crafting Ten Protagonists—a series of ten short stories inspired by Carey Mulligan's character in the campaign's visuals. Here’s a link!
7. The Light We Lost – Jill Santopolo
Some loves are meant to last forever. Others are meant to change you forever. The Light We Lost is about the latter.
This book follows Lucy and Gabe, two people whose lives keep colliding and unraveling over the years. It’s about love, timing, and the painful reality that sometimes, no matter how much two people want to be together, life has other plans. Reading it feels like flipping through old love letters—nostalgic, bittersweet, and filled with the ache of what-ifs. When I say this book had me in streaming tears, I mean the kind of tears that come from feeling everything all at once. I was completely moved—not just by the story itself, but by the way it was written.
At its core, The Light We Lost isn’t just about romance—it’s about purpose, passion, and the choices that define us. It explores how love can be both a guiding force and a heartbreaking lesson.
This book left me thinking about the people who come into our lives and never really leave, even if they’re not standing beside us. Some stories don’t get the ending we wish for, but that doesn’t make them any less meaningful.
Honorable mentions
And in the fashion of this post, all written by women. These are the books that may not have made the main list but still left their mark—stories that moved me or simply stayed with me long after I turned the last page. These books deserve a moment of recognition.
When Women Ran Fifth Avenue: Glamour and Power at the Dawn of American Fashion, Julie Satow
A Very Nice Girl, Imogen Crimp
Letters of Sylvia Plath: 1956 - 1963, Sylvia Plath
They’re Going To Love You, Meg Howrey
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid
People will walk in and out of your life without ever looking back. But these books, they consoled me through some of the hardest times of my life. And if you’re in your twenties, maybe at any age and looking for something to relate to, I’d recommend any one of these a hundred times over.
Love, Sofi
