Here are 73 books that The Road to Series fans have personally recommended once you finish the The Road to Series series.
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I remember carrying home tall stacks of library books in the summertime and spending entire days immersed in my heroes’ latest adventures as a kid. This continued as I grew up, as I learned that I ought to be a hero, too, by confronting evil both within and without. So I took steps to face my fears, and now when I write about good guys fighting bad guys in my own action fiction, it’s with a real passion for doing what’s right, for making this world better, even if it’s in my own way and only just a little.
This is the spy thriller that started it all! I was a huge fan of the Matt Damon trilogy and had always been an avid reader, so naturally, I gravitated toward the original novel, which was far better than the film.
Popular action thrillers tend to suffer from one of two diseases: “soldier syndrome,”—meaning the author knows what he or she is writing about but isn’t a master of the language—or from “poser-itis,” which is when the writer is good with a pen but would be too scared to use it to gauge out an eye if he or she had to.
So it’s a rare wordsmith who can understand the deepest, most primal parts of the human psyche and then put it into a literary form that delights the eyes and ears. Ludlum is one such writer.
Jason Bourne is back in the forthcoming major motion picture starring Matt Damon and Alicia Vikander. Go back to where it all began for Bourne in his first adventure - The Bourne Identity
He was dragged from the sea, his body riddled with bullets. There are a few clues: a frame of microfilm surgically implanted beneath the skin of his hip; evidence that plastic surgery has altered his face; strange things he says in his delirium, which could be code words. And a number on the film negative that leads to a bank account in Zurich, four million dollars, and…
I write as Robert J. Lloyd, but my friends call me Rob. Having studied Fine Art at a BA degree level (starting as a landscape painter but becoming a sculpture/photography/installation/performance generalist), I then moved to writing. During my MA degree in The History of Ideas, I happened to read Robert Hooke’s diary, detailing the life and experiments of this extraordinary and fascinating man. My MA thesis and my Hooke & Hunt series of historical thrillers are all about him. I’m fascinated by early science, which was the initial ‘pull’ into writing these stories, but the political background of the times (The Popish Plot and the Exclusion Crisis, for example) is just as enticing.
About WWII codebreaking, the reason this makes my ‘Best 5’ is that, besides being constantly inventive and informative, it’s also very funny. (I’m that shallow.)
There are similarities, I think, with Catch 22, in the plot’s intelligence, absurdity, and dreamlike turns.
I think Stephenson’s character Bobbie Shaftoe, a soldier who carries out counterintelligence deceptions, is hilarious. Also, Stephenson’s use of real historical characters–he presents believable portraits of Alan Turing, Douglas MacArthur, Karl Dönitz, and Hermann Göring, with a walk-on appearance by Albert Einstein–gave me license to do so in my own fiction.
With this extraordinary first volume in an epoch-making masterpiece, Neal Stephenson hacks into the secret histories of nations and the private obsessions of men, decrypting with dazzling virtuosity the forces that shaped this century.
In 1942, Lawrence Pritchard Waterhouse—mathematical genius and young Captain in the U.S. Navy—is assigned to detachment 2702. It is an outfit so secret that only a handful of people know it exists, and some of those people have names like Churchill and Roosevelt. The mission of Waterhouse and Detachment 2702—commanded by Marine Raider Bobby Shaftoe-is to keep the Nazis ignorant of the fact that Allied Intelligence…
Every book in my list is about change and exploring alternative lifestyles. More specifically, they are all about lifestyle change, with some very dystopian. Meaning the change was the result of the old way no longer being available. Each book is different, but all result in a different way of life, one that includes the basics we all strive for: survival, safety, consistency, family, friendship, love, with a creative outlet. These all nurture our passions and provide for a life that respects our beliefs, morals, and spirituality. And all have extremely strong characters. I also embrace change and look forward to the new, the innovative, and the unknown.
Each book in this series is about the illusions we create and live with, depicted through a team of rejected British spies.
When a M15 spy screws up an assignment they are transfer to the Slough House to waste away until they retire. That’s the premise, but it’s led by a master spy, who is entrenched in the highest levels of the spy world. You don’t know what is real or what is an illusion, as situations evolve.
It’s at times insane, the characters are unusual, and the situations are full of twists and turns, from the illogical to the unheard of. I loved every minute of each book.
'To have been lucky enough to play Smiley in one's career; and now go and play Jackson Lamb in Mick Herron's novels - the heir, in a way, to le Carre - is a terrific thing' Gary Oldman
Slough House is the outpost where disgraced spies are banished to see out the rest of their derailed careers. Known as the 'slow horses' these misfits have committed crimes of drugs and drunkenness, lechery and failure, politics and betrayal while on duty.
In this drab and mildewed office these highly trained spies don't run…
On the surface, my childhood was characterized by 1980s unsupervised country freedom in rural Alberta. Deeper in, my history involved emotional abuse and neglect. I wanted nothing more than to be seen and loved for my true self. The library was a refuge, but the fiction section allowed me to find the community I so greatly desired. I was seen and loved by the characters I read. They showed me it was possible to be myself–loudly and audaciously–and still be accepted. I read and now write books that delve into themes of identity, autonomy, and acceptance because I still struggle with these themes today.
The title made me stop mid-step. Sometimes, a book title is misleading. I’ve been burned before. I finally borrowed it from the library and found myself smitten by the “Dramatis Thingummy” at the very beginning and headlong in love by the end.
I re-read this series often: I weird out my neighbors by laughing so hard I can’t breathe; I seek the community of St. Mary’s. Mostly, I love Max. For all her flaws, her sarcasm, her deep-seated need to go down in flames, I love her to bits. She gives me hope that no matter how screwed up a person may be, they can find love and a place in the world. This is the first book in a many-book series. With short stories. And Christmas specials. All of which I now own.
Time Travel meets History in this explosive bestselling adventure series.
`So tell me, Dr Maxwell, if the whole of History lay before you ... where would you go? What would you like to witness?'
When Madeleine Maxwell is recruited by the St Mary's Institute of Historical Research, she discovers the historians there don't just study the past - they revisit it.
But one wrong move and History will fight back - to the death. And she soon discovers it's not just History she's fighting...
Follow the tea-soaked disaster magnets of St Mary's as they rattle around History. Because wherever the…
I am a professional historian and have published both nonfiction and fiction. I present research in my academic books and spin that research into stories in my novels, but sometimes I wonder whether it doesn’t come out to the same thing–I interpret the evidence in light of my own experiences and look at it through the narrow lens of contemporary values. Is that so very different from making it up? That’s why I like to write (and read) novels that inquire into the nature of our conceptions and raise the question of whether there is such a thing as Truth with a capital T.
This book has been criticized for ignoring the brutal aspects of the Bolshevik revolution and giving us only old-world elegance and luxury. Hello? It’s historical FICTION! Instead of facts, the author gives us atmosphere, a charming main character who is being gradually revealed to us.
It made me ask: Did time change him, or was he always that way, and the events brought out his “true” self? It’s a story told in a polished style or, as one reviewer put it, with “a permanently arched eyebrow.”
The mega-bestseller with more than 2 million readers, soon to be a major television series
From the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, a beautifully transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel
In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and…
I became an author because I loved books and wanted to craft my own. Here are five books I consumed first as a reader and then as a writer, methodically noting what made these books brilliant in style, depth, and plot. If you enjoy thrillers or science fiction and are looking for books to hone your craft as a writer, here are my choices.
This book is the book that made me decide to become an author. I was always a voracious reader and crazy about all things technological—space exploration, airplanes, naval warfare, you name it. In my mind, there was no way anyone would want to read a book about my interests—until Tom Clancy showed it absolutely could be done and singlehandedly created a new genre of fiction with one book.
His research was so accurate that he was accused of spilling classified information about our submarine capabilities and tactics. But no, he was just an insurance agent from Owings, Maryland, who touched a 220-volt wire in my soul that made me decide, “Someday I’m going to do that, too!”
Tom Clancy's rich imagination and his remarkable grasp of the capabilities of advanced technology give this novel an amazing ring of authenticity. It is a thriller with a new twist, a "military procedural" with an ingenious, tightly woven plot that revolves around the defection of a Soviet nuclear submarine--the USSR's newest and most valuable ship, with its most trusted and skilled officer at the helm.
A deadly serious game of hide-and-seek is on. The entire Soviet Atlantic Fleet is ordered to hunt down the submarine and destroy her at all costs. The…
I write stories where consequence comes first. I grew up immersed in Greek/Egyptian mythology and fairy tales, but I was always more drawn to the parts they left out. I wanted to know what daily life looked like for someone like Hercules, not just the story beats. Or what happens when the moral of the story isn’t learned. My passion lies in exploring the cost of power, the wounds we carry (that are often excluded from stories), and the myths we create to justify them. I believe the best fantasy doesn’t just help us escape the world, it helps us to look at ours differently.
This was the first fantasy book that made me afraid for its characters and helped me understand that fantasy is allowed to feel realistic.
Up until this point, the types of books I was reading were very paint-by-numbers, but here the stakes felt real because no one was safe... not even the ones who seemed typical fantasy rules were untouchable.
What stuck with me wasn’t the true-to-form fantasy bits (dragons/battles), but how human the characters felt. In this world, loyalty is a death sentence... love is dangerous, and power always comes with a price.
HBO's hit series A GAME OF THRONES is based on George R R Martin's internationally bestselling series A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE, the greatest fantasy epic of the modern age. A GAME OF THRONES is the first volume in the series.
'Completely immersive' Guardian
'When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground'
Summers span decades. Winter can last a lifetime. And the struggle for the Iron Throne has begun.
From the fertile south, where heat breeds conspiracy, to the vast and savage eastern lands, all the way to the frozen…
I was a cop for twenty years. And while I always saw True Crime as a busman’s holiday, I loved crime fiction all along. Eventually my own writing took me there, as well. I love how crime fiction, much like good science fiction, explores the nature of human behavior in a way that isn’t as prevalent in other genres. As a result, I’ve read widely in the field, always gravitating toward the darker and grittier entries. The lone wolf protagonists who either live by a code or undergo a fascinating change within the book or series has also been my focus.
I loved The Rockford Files TV show, and Sam Strait reminds me a little of Jim Rockford. I love how there’s a lightness to this book (and its sequels) but it still contains an edgy and compelling mystery.
The dialogue is fun, as are the “rules” Sam Strait lives by… the first of which is to never live anywhere you can’t wear flip-flops, thus the moniker of The Flip-Flop Detective series.
Of all five books I’ve chosen, this is the lightest fare and an excellent palate cleanser between Stark or Quinnell without entirely leaving the genre. Conway writes some darker books as well – PI and police procedurals – but Sam Strait is the most fun.
Former deputy Sam Strait lives his life by a particular set of rules. They provide him freedom to do the things he wants where he wants with whom he wants. For a single man in his mid-thirties, things couldn’t get any better. Then why isn’t he happier?
When Sam returns home for the summer, he discovers a stranger dead in his boat. With cops and reporters crawling over his property, gone are the usual plans of soaking up the sun and whiling away the days in the arms of a…
I was a cop for twenty years. And while I always saw True Crime as a busman’s holiday, I loved crime fiction all along. Eventually my own writing took me there, as well. I love how crime fiction, much like good science fiction, explores the nature of human behavior in a way that isn’t as prevalent in other genres. As a result, I’ve read widely in the field, always gravitating toward the darker and grittier entries. The lone wolf protagonists who either live by a code or undergo a fascinating change within the book or series has also been my focus.
I saw the 1987 film adaptation of this novel starring Scott Glenn before I read the book, which is set decades earlier.
I loved the progression of this hard-bitten, psychologically damaged mercenary coming to love this little girl that he is charged with protecting. It’s such a pure emotion for him and the fact that she returns it so completely, as only a child can, is heart-wrenching.
Both the 1987 and the 2004 film adaptations do a good job capturing the magic of this drama, but as is usually the case, the novel does it best. If someone loves The Mandalorian, it is worth trying Man on Fire, which the former has many parallels with.
Creasy thought he had nothing left to lose. He was wrong.
An American soldier of fortune far from home -- alcoholic, burnt out, and broken down -- Creasy has accepted a job as a bodyguard just for something to do. An emotionally dead, one-time warrior, he knows that nothing can pierce the hard shell he's built around himself -- until the little girl he's been hired to protect somehow breaks through. But having something to care about again in making Creasy vulnerable. And when the unthinkable occurs, a man on fire won't just burn ... he'll explode.
I was a cop for twenty years. And while I always saw True Crime as a busman’s holiday, I loved crime fiction all along. Eventually my own writing took me there, as well. I love how crime fiction, much like good science fiction, explores the nature of human behavior in a way that isn’t as prevalent in other genres. As a result, I’ve read widely in the field, always gravitating toward the darker and grittier entries. The lone wolf protagonists who either live by a code or undergo a fascinating change within the book or series has also been my focus.
This book starts in the same moment as Slayground, but follows Alan Grofield as he flees the scene, instead of Parker.
Grofield is more of a grifter than a straight-out thief, and his roles in the thieving scams tend to reflect that. I love that his true love is acting and him taking scores is simply a means to allow him to pursue that passion.
I enjoy the slightly lighter tone of the Grofield novels, though they are still what I’d call gritty. And I love how Stark created a “Parker-verse” long before the idea of an IP universe was commonplace.
When he's not carrying out heists with his friend Parker, Alan Grofield runs a small theater in Indiana. But putting on shows costs money and jobs have been thin lately - which is why Grofield agreed to fly to Las Vegas to hear Andrew Myers' plan to knock over a brewery in upstate New York.
Unfortunately, Myers' plan is insane - so Grofield walks out on him. But Myers isn't a man you walk out on, and his retribution culminates in an act of unforgivable brutality.
That's when Grofield decides to show him what a disciple of Parker is capable…
