Book cover of What A Body Remembers: A Memoir of Sexual Assault and Its Aftermath

Book description

On a summer night in 1984, nineteen-year-old UC Berkeley sophomore Karen Thomas leaves her uniformed patrol job and walks home alone in darkness. At the threshold of her apartment a man assaults her at knife point. After a soul-chilling struggle, she manages to escape.

Though she is left traumatized by…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Why read it?

1 author picked What A Body Remembers as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

I don’t know how Karen Stefano did it...this brave memoir, thirty years in the making, is a perfect case study of PTSD and how trauma from sexual assault can rear its ugly head at any time—even after years in hibernation.

The daily struggle Stefano faced was real. She worked as a criminal defense lawyer fighting for those accused of heinous crimes—some as bad as the ones that were committed against her decades earlier while she was a uniformed patrol officer on a college campus.

I was touched by her honesty, moved by her courage, and blown away by her humanity.…

If you love What A Body Remembers...

Book cover of These Blue Mountains

These Blue Mountains by Sarah Loudin Thomas,

A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.

German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…

Want books like What A Body Remembers?

Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 99 books like What A Body Remembers.

Browse books like What A Body Remembers

Book cover of She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement
Book cover of Girl in the Woods: A Memoir
Book cover of The Furies: Women, Vengeance, and Justice

Share your top 3 reads of 2025!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,340

readers submitted
so far, will you?

📚 If you like What A Body Remembers, you might also like...

Book cover of Foxfire in the Snow

Foxfire in the Snow by J.S. Fields,

It's a time of change, between magic and alchemy.

Born the heir of a master woodcutter in a queendom defined by guilds and matrilineal inheritance, nonbinary Sorin can’t quite seem to find their place. At seventeen, an opportunity to attend an alchemical guild fair and secure an apprenticeship with the…

Book cover of The Main Gate

The Main Gate by Yvonne Kjorlien,

Dr. Elise Marquette has spent years burying the past—until the past refuses to stay buried.

Hired to join Earth’s first interstellar contact team, she hopes the vastness of space will finally offer distance from the ghosts of war and the wounds left by a mother who never let her be…

5 book lists we think you will like!