C. S Friedman.

Also, Margret Weis/Tracy Hickman for the dragonlance series.

Has anyone said Anne Rice? She's pretty good. I liked her first two vampire books.

I thought the third (with the Egyptian or whatever vampire king and queen ?) was not as good and the fourth book (body switching) was the weakest.

Dana Stabenow's Kate Shugak series (which is set in Alaska) is very good.

Just read my first Stabenow book. Very good.

Dana Stabenow has a website, which includes a forum, at www.stabenow.com

-A.M. Homes - "The End of Alice" is brilliant.
-Katherine Dunn - "Geek Love"

Marge Piercy
Toni Morrison
Anne Rice
Colleen McCullough
Maya Angelou
Grace Nichols

and...for fun...Judy Blume (who actually writes excellent books with more adult themes).

I can't beleive my eyes, no one mentioned: IRIS JOHANSEN

Author of:
FINAL TARGET (2001)
THE SEARCH (2001)
THE KILLING GAME (200)
THE UGLY DUCKLING (1997)
THE MAGNIFICENT ROGUE

Man, you guys....

Somehow, when it comes to certain types of literature, like SF/fantasy, women are amog the worst writers I've ever read... and my knowledge of SF is huge, since I've been into this stream for almost 20 years now, sometimes reading a book every day (I'm a very fast reader).

Again and again I try to read Patricia Anthony, Phyllis Gottlieb or Margaret Atwood, only to become bored by the style and the plot. Ursula LeGuin has occasional brilliance ("The Left Hand of Darkness" is such an example) but she is not consistent. I absolutely detest stopping in the middle of the book, realizing it is a drag, instead of being swept away with the action, and being unable to leave it aside. And after dragging through Anne Rice's overextended "The Witching Hour" (compare it with Ken Follet's "The Pillars of Earth", roughly the same number of pages, but what a difference!), only to discover that the end doesn't mean anything, and you have to buy the sequel... that was the last time I'll read something by her!

Having said that, I must concede that mainstream literature, by contrast, has quite a few good female authors: Virginia Woolf and Marguerite Yourcenar are the first that come to mind. Even here, though, the bulk is composed of male authors, who really dominate the scene: I've yet to find a woman capable of writing like Umberto Eco, Nikos Kazantzakis or John Fowles...

But my absolute worst experience was a certain Nevada Barr - whose book I had to review for a national publication... I just couldn't read that thing. It is a crime novel, set out in the Mammoth Caves, of all places! well, she blew it completely. You couldn't care less for the characters - including the hero -, the natural setting is awkwardly described and fails to resuscitate any sense of wonder, and the so-called crime elements were botched severely. I wasn't able to finish that book, despite my best intentions (and eventual desperation). This was the first time i wasn't able to finish a book - I'm really sorry that some trees have died for that piece of garbage.

Jane Austen!

Ayn Rand
Katherine Anne Porter & Dorothy Parker for short stories
George Eliot (MIDDLEMARCH especially)
Edith Wharton
Maud Hart Lovelace (her BETSY-TACY series is excellent)
Daphne du Maurier

Actually just finished MY COUSIN RACHEL by du Maurier. What a great gothic mystery! Interesting, too, that the story is told from a first-person male perspective.

Joyce Carol Oates
Anne Tyler
Caitlin R. Kiernan
Alice Hoffman
Poppy Z. Brite
Jane Smiley
Kathe Koja

I'm really surprised no one has mentioned Candace Bushnell since there are so many Sex in the City fans on this board. If you haven't actually read her, check her out.

Jeanette Winterson is possibly the finest novelist to come along in the last few decades.

Written on the Body is my favorite among all her wonderful books.

As an English major, I have a rather politically incorrect view of female authors: almost all are quite dreadful. I had to take a women's literature class last semester, and we read Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, Kate Chopin's The Awakening, Willa Cather's A Lost Lady, Virginia Woolfe's Mrs. Dalloway, Joan Dideon's Play it as it Lays, Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, and Toni Morrison's Beloved. I'd read several of these before in high school and they didn't leave much of an impression on me. The second time around was the same. I kept asking myself WHY we are still reading Austen and Bronte, as their is very little of value here. Then it hit me: we still read them because they are women! My professor kept pontificating about the importance of these two authors, and yet her answers were flimsy and could be appied to virtually every other author of their time period or before. I find Austen's and Bronte's work to be very mediocre. Kate Chopin's The Awakening is possibly the worst "classic" novel I've ever read. It was so glaringly bad, I was laughing through most of it. It's like it was written by a high school freshman!

The one woman author I do love is Willa Cather, and I was pleased to read A Lost Lady for the dozenth time, as it's a favorite. I generally sympathize with Cather's views, and I can always idenify with most of her characters. There is always a bittersweetness to her novels and a remarkable understanding of human nature. She was a modest, contentedly troubled genius.

Although Mrs. Dalloway is the only Woolfe novel I've read, while I respect her technique, I can't say I particularly like her work.

We then went back down the ladder with the piffle of Dideon, Atwood, and Morrison. Their concerns and troubles are tedious.

No doubt many (most?) will strongly disagree with what I've said, but the strongest argument I can present is "read these womens' male contemporaries' works and compare"

I plan to explore Edith Wharton and Ayn Rand when I get time, however, and am hoping I'll find their works to be something of substance. So far, most of the female authors I've read have very little to say and they say it poorly.

Man, I think you need to get in touch with your feminine side. I say that tongue in cheek, but with a healthy dose of belief in it. To label all these authors as worthless because you didn't think they had anything to say. I hope you realize, but maybe you don't, that women authors are not popular or considered good because they are women. Bullcrap! I have read Toni Morrison, although I wasn't thrilled with Beloved (Song of Solomon was better, IMHO). I have read Atwood. there are many women authors whose work I admire, including Barbara Kingsolver, Jane Smiley, Alice Walker, and many others. Not every word they write is genius, but no author can live up to that. If they don't do it for you, cool. But please realize that doesn't mean they have nothing to say or are accorded their position because they are women.

You will like Ayn Rand, probably, as she is a very masculine writer. You'd be unlikely to tell a woman wrote it.

Jane Austen

more modern:
Elizabeth Moon
Marion Zimmmer Bradley (Mists of Avalon miniseries coming out soon - July I think)
Margaret Weis (Death Gate Cycle with Hickman)
Jean M. Auel
Diane Duane
Anne McCaffery
J.K. Rowling

haven't read myself but heard they were good:
Melanie Rawn
Catherine Asaro
Laurell K. Hamilton
Colleen McCullough
Janny Wurts
Robin Hobb

that's all that comes to mind right now.

Some personal favourites, several already mentioned multiple times:

Elizabeth Moon (Deed Of Paksenarrion)
Laurell K. Hamilton (Anita Blake series)
Robin Hobb

Marion Zimmmer Bradley
Margaret Weis
Anne McCaffery
Melanie Rawn

I can't believe you've left out one of the best horror novelist of all time, Shirley Jackson, "The Haunting of Hill House and "The Lottery" among others. Also Majorie Kinnan Rawlings "The Yearling" is a classic. These books have stood the test of time.

maxine hong kingston
amy tan
madelein l'engle

Is it possible that no one has mentioned Flannery O'Connor? She's absolutely amazing, wrote some of the great southern gothics. Try WISE BLOOD. She's also an incredible short-story writer.

I can't think of hardly any. I like Poppy Brite and Elizabeth Wurtzel. Harper Lee, I guess, but only one book that I know of. I can name a couple of women writers who I can't read: Anne Rice and Kathe Koja. I don't mind dense, purple prose when I'm reading older stories, but when it's done by modern-day authors it just seems almost unreadable to me. I'm sure I'm missing out on a ton of great female writers, so maybe I'll take some of the suggestions posted here.

This is something I never really thought about since I just read b/c I love reading so I don't pay attention to who wrote it... Anyway, here's my list of absolute favorites (these have withstood the test of time):

Beverly Cleary (children's books)
Francis Hodges Burnett (children's books)
Madeleine L'Engle (children and adult books)
Jane Austen
Bronte sisters

I would have to say Anne Rice. I've read, and enjoyed, most of what she has written.

Montgomery, Lucy Maud:

Anne's House of Dreams
Anne of Avonlea
Anne of Green Gables
Anne of the Island
Chronicles of Avonlea
Further Chronicles of Avonlea

Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea (Sequal) are both on DVD via Canada.

I loved the 1st 3 Anne books but thought the rest were okay. I was going to order the DVDs from A&BSound but totally forgot!! Thanks for reminding me!!!