I Who Have Never Known Men

By Jacqueline Harpman

***THE RUNAWAY BESTSELLER***

"Each revelation is a small miracle."--The New York Times

Deep underground, thirty-nine women live imprisoned in a cage. Watched over by guards, the women have no memory of how they got there, no notion of time, and only a vague recollection of their lives before.

As the burn of electric light merges day into night and numberless years pass, a young girl--the fortieth prisoner--sits alone and outcast in the corner. Soon she will show herself to be the key to the others' escape and survival in the strange world that awaits them above ground.

Jacqueline Harpman was born in Etterbeek, Belgium, in 1929, and fled to Casablanca with her family during WWII. Informed by her background as a psychoanalyst and her youth in exile, I Who Have Never Known Men is a haunting, heartbreaking post-apocalyptic novel of female friendship and intimacy, and the lengths people will go to maintain their humanity in the face of devastation. Back in print for the first time since 1997, Harpman's modern classic is an essential addition to the growing canon of feminist speculative literature.

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Published May 10, 2022

208 pages

Average rating: 7.44

2,148 RATINGS

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✨ Summarized by Bookclubs AI

Readers say *I Who Have Never Known Men* is a haunting, philosophical novel that provokes deep reflection on captivity, identity, and humanity. Its dr...

Mellific
Jul 09, 2026
I went into this virtually blind, but I really don't understand the 'appeal' behind prepubescent girlhood and sexualizing children in novels. I'm never going to be interested in this material. Please stop writing about it.
sweetlemoneade
May 18, 2025
9/10 stars
Amazing. Everyone should read this book, it is so profound and incredible. You’ll feel every emotion reading this book. Wonderful. Wonderful. Wonderful.
tbr_and_chaos
Jul 07, 2026
9/10 stars
You know from the beginning how this will end, but it still completely captivated me. It’s very rare that I finish a book in a day.
Apricot Wheats
Jul 03, 2026
8/10 stars
Loved this. The oddness, the fact that we’ll Never know the truth or context, we are as in the dark as the protagonist. Gave me handmaid’s tale vibes. Felt like a real classic.
Laura
Jul 01, 2026
I don't even know how to rate this, so I'm going to sit with it for a while.

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