Russ was a notable feminist writer in science fiction in the early 1970s, a time when women were just starting to enter the field in larger numbers. It can be fairly said that science fiction was (and to an extent is) a genre dominated by male authors, often writing for a predominantly male audience, however Russ was one of the first authors to challenge the male dominance.
A prominent example is her novel, We Who Are About To, a clever variation on an established science fiction theme: a group of space travelers marooned on an uninhabited planet decide that they must form a colony and "propagate the species". One of the castaways is a woman who has no particular desire to be part of such an effort. When the others try to force her to be part of the colony, she rebels.
Other books include: