Great Books of Short Stories About Courageous Women
Have you made a New Year’s Resolution to do more reading? Not sure if you really have time to keep your resolution? Well, here are some books containing short stories of many of the great women of history. You have read some of their stories on this blog. I hope these books will be an encouragement to you. One of the things that is so amazing is just how many women there were!
— Curtis, A. Kenneth and Graves, Daniel, Great Women in Christian History: 37 Women Who Changed Their World, (Wing Spread Publishers, Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, 2007).
Dr. Ken Curtis is the founder and president of Christian History Institute. He put this book together especially to inspire young women.
Dr. Curtis tries to make up for the lack of stories about women in history. He admits 
that this book contains only 37 of many thousands whose stories deserve telling. He emulates the Lord Jesus Christ Who gave women much respect. Our Lord elevated the status of women by talking to them and treating them like equal human beings.
Some religions still keep women in a second-class position. But throughout history Christian women have shown that they can be used of God to do great things. The thirty-seven women in this book are just the tip of ice berg.
The book is divided into categories including martyrs, wives, writers, charitable workers, and reformers.
One of the things I especially appreciate about the book is the bibliography. You can read more about any of these amazing women. (You will recognize some of them in previous reviews on this blog.)
— Kavanagh, Julia, Women of Christianity, Exemplary for Acts of Piety and Charity, (My copy is a public domain reprint. Originally published by D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1869).
Don’t let the nineteenth century English deter you. The book is so full of stories of women that you have never heard of and is so fascinating that you will be delighted to wade through it.
The author explains that it would have taken her many years to cover all of the great and pious women in history; the present book is only the beginning. (There are hundreds of women included.) Of course, it only goes through 1869, but we have many modern good books to fill in since then. (See below.)
Obviously she had to condense a lot of stories, but I hope that it will encourage the reader to get larger biographies of these women (if you can find them!)
Her criteria for the women she chose included those women who, “inherited this spirit (the spirit of Christ), who have filled their lives with acts of self-denial, who like their great Master, have gone about doing good.”
Julia really did her homework. Her “authors and works consulted” contains over 100 listings.
— Good, James I., Famous Women of the Reformed Church, (Solid Ground Christian Books, Birmingham, Alabama, 2007).
Like the previous book reviewed, this book is very old. It was first published in1901 by The Sunday School Board of the Reformed Church in the United States.
This book is not as sectarian as it may appear at first. Though there is a denomination
in the United States called “Reformed”, the reformed women in this book lived many years ago when “Reformed” meant those Christians who were trying to reform the Church. These stories are about the wives of the great reformers, such as Zwingli and Calvin. There are stories from many countries including Germany, France, Italy, Hungary, Switzerland, and even nineteenth American women.
If you enjoy stories of courage and devotion to God you will be inspired by this book. Don’t be put off by the older English. After all, you’re reading this book because you chose a book with short stories!! So enjoy it in small doses.
— Hosier, Helen Kooiman, 100 Christian Women Who Changed the 20th Century, (Fleming H. Revell, Grand Rapids, 2008).
The author of this book wished to express her gratitude for the many women whose influence changed society for the better. As with the other authors, she had so many women to choose from. She did not try to set any sort of criteria. In her words she explained, “I simply had a desire to recognize in one volume the contributions made by Christian women in the twentieth century so that the present generation and generations to come might remember that women had a powerful impact and helped to make a difference. The women, however, had to be Christian women.” She chose women whose lives measured up to the standard in the Bible.
Her categories include, speakers and writers, Bible Study ministry, arts and entertainment, publishing, business, politics, reformers, missionaries, evangelists, and great examples of wives.
— James, Sharon, In Trouble and in Joy: Four Women Who Lived for God, (Evangelical Press, Darlington, England, 2003).
The four women are: Margaret Baxter, Sarah Edwards, Anne Steele, and Frances 
Ridley Havergal. These women lived from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. (Aren’t you glad I included at least one modern book in this list? See entry above.)
I think that one reason it is good to go back and read the stories of these great women is to dispel the myth that until the modern feminists came along women were too suppressed to do anything. It just isn’t true!!
The author deliberately chose women from four totally different life experiences. What they had in common was that they were women that all were completely consecrated to God.
I think that Sharon James is a great story teller and yet her stories are accurate historically. She doesn’t gloss over the truth, but lets you know these women as real human beings that you will look forward to talking to in Heaven.
Happy New Year and I hope that you will read at least one of these truly inspiring books. The books range from fairly easy to read (Dr. Ken Curtis) to a bit deep (Julia Kavanagh). There is something for everyone.
