In honor of International Women’s Day 2023, we’re spotlighting exciting upcoming releases that are both written and translated by women. From graphic novel to memoir and true crime to magical realism, here are ten books from small presses to look forward to in the coming months.

1. As We Exist: A Postcolonial Autobiography
by Kaoutar Harchi, translated from French by Emma Ramadan
March 2023, Other Press

Sociologist Kaoutar Harchi’s memoir recalls her parents’ immigration from Morocco to eastern France, as well as her own reckoning with her identity while navigating French Catholic school and prejudice against the Arab immigrant community.

2. Days & Days & Days
by Tone Schunnesson, translated from Swedish by Saskia Vogel
March 2023, Héloïse Press

After her boyfriend dumps her, a cash-strapped former reality TV star is threatened with eviction and has one week to come up with a large sum of money. This novel from Sweden’s “new voice in Dirty Realism” is forthcoming from Héloïse Press in Saskia Vogel’s translation.  

3. This Is Not Miami
by Fernanda Melchor, translated from Spanish by Sophie Hughes
April 2023, New Directions

In her latest book to appear in English translation by Sophie Hughes, International Booker–shortlisted author Fernanda Melchor applies her signature skill for writing violence to a collection of narrative nonfiction. These twelve stories delve into the motives and circumstances behind true crime events that took place in Melchor’s hometown of Veracruz.

4. Of Cattle and Men
by Ana Paula Maia, translated from Portuguese by Zoë Perry
April 2023, Charco Press

In this bloody novel by Ana Paula Maia, translated by Zoë Perry, a stun operator at a rural slaughterhouse in Brazil notices that the cows are behaving erratically. The mysterious danger that has panicked the cattle now threatens to drive the men mad, too. 

5. Cold Nights of Childhood
by Tezer Özlü, translated from Turkish by Maureen Freely
May 2023, Transit Books

Originally published in 1980 and appearing for the first time in Maureen Freely’s translation this May, Tezer Özlü’s autofictional novel depicts a young woman’s return to Istanbul following a series of love affairs and harrowing stints in psychiatric clinics in Paris and Berlin.

6. Edo’s Souls
by Stella Gaitano, translated from Arabic by Sawad Hussain
May 2023, Dedalus Books

Stella Gaitano’s ambitious historical novel follows three characters—a young woman, a father, and a conflicted soldier—in South Sudan as the civil war upends their lives. Edo’s Souls, translated by Sawad Hussain, is out from Dedalus Books in May.

7. Owlish
by Dorothy Tse, translated from Chinese by Natascha Bruce
June 2023, Graywolf Press

In Hong Kong author Dorothy Tse’s contemporary fairy tale, a professor in the imaginary city of Nevers becomes enamored with Aliss, a music-box ballerina in his antique doll collection, while an oppressive government and university student protests challenge the status quo.

8. Ivan and Phoebe
by Oksana Lutsyshyna, translated from Ukrainian by Nina Murray
June 2023, Deep Vellum

Oksana Lutsyshyna’s political novel chronicles the lives of a husband and wife in the wake of the Revolution on Granite, a student protest movement in the 1990s that led to Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union.

9. Where I Am
by Dana Shem-Ur, translated from Hebrew by Yardenne Greenspan
June 2023, New Vessel Press

An Israeli translator’s struggle to adapt to her married life in Paris comes to a head at a dinner party in Dana Shem-Ur’s novel about belonging and self-translation. Yardenne Greenspan’s translation is forthcoming from New Vessel Press this summer.

10. The Naked Tree
by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim, translated from Korean by Janet Hong
August 2023, Drawn and Quarterly

During the Korean War, a young woman selling painted handkerchiefs at a US military trading post bonds with an artist who has recently escaped from the north. Harvey Award–winning comic book artist Keum Suk Gendry-Kim and translator Janet Hong adapt Park Wan-suh’s classic coming-of-age novel into a striking graphic work.