Waves of Feminist Dystopias
Popular speculative fiction exploring concerns that gender equality has stalled.
Published on March 17, 2023
The Atlantic11 min read
The Remarkable Rise of the Feminist Dystopia
A spate of women-authored speculative fiction imagines detailed worlds of widespread infertility, criminalized abortion, and flipped power dynamics.
The reign of the YA dystopia has come to an end. Anxieties over abortion laws and other regulations of women’s rights have become a battleground once again, and speculating about the darkest timelines has taken over fiction. Get an overview of the feminist dystopia landscape with this article.
The Book of Joan: A Novel
Lidia YuknavitchOne of the most acclaimed novels of 2017, this brilliant story retells the story of Joan of Arc in a techno-futuristic world where a small group of humans fights to survive extinction.
The Female Man
Joanna RussJoanna, Jeannine, Janet, and Jael are four women living parallel lives (in alternate universes) whose paths begin to cross. While strikingly different, they each face similar struggles with the patriarchy. Author Russ offers blunt, satisfying commentary on feminism through four unique perspectives. (Sad to say, this 1975 novel remains highly relevant nearly 50 years later.)
The Handmaid's Tale
Margaret Atwood“The Handmaid’s Tale” initially came out in the 1980s, but has seen a resurgence in popularity thanks to the Hulu adaptation. Atwood’s work is one of the biggest inspirations for later waves of feminist dystopias. Find out why the red robes of the handmaids have become so iconic.
The Shore of Women: The Classic Work of Feminist Science Fiction
Pamela SargentIn a post-apocalyptic world, women live in protected cities with modern advancements while men, considered brutal and primitive, roam the outside. Birana is exiled to live (and presumably die) among the men, but she soon forms a bond with a hunter named Arvil. It’s a story about change and the power of mercy, with unique perspectives on heterosexual relationships.
Parable of the Sower
Octavia E. ButlerSet in the year 2024, climate change has devastated Earth. As the world falls apart, protagonist Lauren deals with “hyperempathy” — the ability to feel the physical pain of those around her — as she protects her loved ones, flees to safety, and creates her own religion. “Parable of the Sower” is a vivid exploration of female bravery and leadership in a time of despair, pain, and danger.
The Book of the Unnamed Midwife
Meg ElisonA post-apocalyptic tale where a disease kills women at higher rates than men, leading to a society where rigid gender norms are put in place once again. The titular midwife does what she can to retain her freedom, disguising herself as a man and attempting to protect other women she meets on her journey across the western U.S. Pairs well with “An Excess Male.”
Before She Sleeps: A Novel
Bina ShahA virus wipes out the majority of women, and leaders of the Green City force survivors to marry multiple men for repopulation. But some refuse, secretly going underground and making a living by offering non-sexual intimacy (literally, sleep) to high-powered men. Shah adds the South Asian perspective to the feminist conversation with her dystopian future where women are simultaneously degraded and highly valued.
The Completionist
Siobhan AdcockIn a grim future where natural pregnancy is near-impossible and mothers are held to oppressive caregiving standards, Gard is a “Completionist” who helps women adhere to the rules. When she goes missing, her brother Carter is determined to find her (while battling his own demons). Adcock’s utopian sci-fi is an intriguing mystery with characters who react believably to a world fraught with ecological, biological, and moral crises.
Bitch Planet Vol. 1: Extraordinary Machine
Kelly Sue DeConnickIn a futuristic world, women must meekly comply or be exiled to the Auxiliary Compliance Outpost, better known as Bitch Planet. But some aren’t going silently. This grindhouse-style graphic novel (the first in a series of 10) is a brash, sarcastic, and self-aware tale that dares to ask, “Are you woman enough to survive?”
The Lesson
Sowmya RajendranRajendran paints a chilling picture of the near future in which women in India live under the shadow of the Adjustment Bureau, society’s conscience keeper, and must comply with the Conduct Book. To break the law means subjection to punishment at the hands of a vigilante determined to preserve and uphold the country’s morality laws. Short, precise, and powerful, this is less dystopian fiction and more so an amplification of the reality many women face in current patriarchal societies.
When She Woke
Hillary JordanIn a not-so-distant future America, the line between church and state isn’t just blurred, it’s completely obliterated. Under the new theocratic regime, crimes are punished by chroming — a procedure that dyes the offender’s skin according to the classification of their crime. Rather than face jail time, criminals serve their time out among the general population. After Hannah refuses to divulge the names of her lover and abortionist, she’s sentenced to 16 years as a red and must survive ostracization, attacks, and death threats. Jordan (“Mudbound”) delivers a modern version of “The Scarlet Letter” and sounds the alarm on the dangers of religious extremism.
Daughters of the North: A Novel
Sarah HallIn a post-Brexit society, elections are suspended, women are forced to wear contraceptive devices, and the country is in a constant state of environmental crisis. As the Authority takes over the UK, a group of renegade women, known as the Carhullan Army, fight for survival just outside the control of the oppressive regime. As the Army repeatedly defies the Authority, Hall explores the radical lengths women will go to maintain their freedom.
The Grace Year: A Novel
Kim LiggettHappy sweet 16! Welcome to the County, where girls are banished from society as they enter their sixteenth year of life. Known as the Grace Year, society believes this is a time when girls are at their most dangerous and that their very skin emits a powerful aphrodisiac. Girls must spend a year in the woods under constant supervision to release this magic so they can return to society pure and ready for marriage.
Woman On the Edge of Time
Marge PiercyPiercy’s feminist text melds many tropes of the speculative fiction genre not normally found in utopian fiction, notably time travel, which shows the main character two different possible futures. “I was weary of affluent white males hogging the [time travel] genre, and I did not feel that they were the sort of visitors I would prefer if I were a future good society,” Piercy wrote in a retrospective piece about the novel in The Guardian.
The School for Good Mothers: A Novel
Jessamine ChanA scathing commentary on the assumptions and stereotypes about mothers and the government powers that separate families, Chan’s dystopian drama is a page-turner. Frida Liu’s recent divorce may be the last straw, but at least she has her 18-month-old daughter — until she doesn’t. When the single mom leaves her child home alone for two hours, she’s sent to a rehabilitation facility where she must be a surrogate mother to other children in order to earn back her own. We included this as one of our best books of 2022, and we think it’d make an intense dystopian movie.
Upright Women Wanted
Sarah GaileyDon’t be fooled by the length of this short story; Gailey packs a punch as they introduce readers to a western society in which queer, antifascist librarians fight the State by smuggling women into safe zones and distributing unapproved material. Gunfights, general badassery, and LGBTQ+ empowerment run rampant in the New West.
Sources
- After ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’: 7 Recent, Essential Feminist Dystopias
- 2018, Barnes & Noble Blog