Here are 100 books that Atlantica and the Rustic fans have personally recommended if you like Atlantica and the Rustic. Book DNA is a community of 13,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Alphabet

Paul Hoover Author Of O, and Green: New and Selected Poems

From my list on contemporary long poems.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have published 18 books of poetry, most recently the one I have listed here, as well as a collection of literary essays, Fables of Representation. My emphasis has always been on the more progressive and risk-taking kinds of expression, as seen with the Beat poets, Ginsberg and Corso, and the New York School poets, Ashbery and O'Hara. Seeing a lack of that perspective on bookshelves, I edited two editions of a major anthology, Postmodern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, and 42 issues of the literary magazine, New American Writing. I have been reading, more recently, a lot of great writing by women, especially those writing at length, with the volume up. 

Paul's book list on contemporary long poems

Paul Hoover Why Paul loves this book

One of the leading poets of Denmark, Christensen virtually invented proceduralism. An abecedarian poem, A to H, each section of this book is also guided by the Fibonacci number sequence that accretes as follows: 0, 1, 1, 2. 3, 5, 13, 21. Each section has as many lines as the two previous sections. 

Every time I read the book, which I assign in my classes, I am delighted by her prose style written with brilliant clarity. It names things that exist, along with the warning that the human devastation of nature will cause them not to exist. The poet was forced to conclude the work at “H” because the Fibonacci sequence had grown too demanding to continue. Highly recommended for lovers of nature and mathematicians.

By Inger Christensen , Susanna Nied (translator) ,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Alphabet as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Awarded the American-Scandinavian PEN Translation Prize by Michael Hamburger, Susanna Nied's translation of alphabet introduces Inger Christensen's poetry to US readers for the first time. Born in 1935, Inger Christensen is Denmark's best known poet. Her award-winning alphabet is based structurally on Fibonacci's sequence (a mathematical sequence in which each number is the sum of the two previous numbers), in combination with the alphabet. The gorgeous poetry herein reflects a complex philosophical background, yet has a visionary quality, discovering the metaphysical in the simple stuff of everyday life. In alphabet, Christensen creates a framework of psalm-like forms that unfold like…


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Book cover of December on 5C4

December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

Book cover of American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin

Paul Hoover Author Of O, and Green: New and Selected Poems

From my list on contemporary long poems.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have published 18 books of poetry, most recently the one I have listed here, as well as a collection of literary essays, Fables of Representation. My emphasis has always been on the more progressive and risk-taking kinds of expression, as seen with the Beat poets, Ginsberg and Corso, and the New York School poets, Ashbery and O'Hara. Seeing a lack of that perspective on bookshelves, I edited two editions of a major anthology, Postmodern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, and 42 issues of the literary magazine, New American Writing. I have been reading, more recently, a lot of great writing by women, especially those writing at length, with the volume up. 

Paul's book list on contemporary long poems

Paul Hoover Why Paul loves this book

The book contains 70 sonnets, all with the same title as the book. Quick-witted, ironic, and politically dedicated to good cause, Hayes speaks from his own experience as an African-American: “Probably twilight makes blackness dangerous/Darkness. Probably all my encounters/Are existential Jambalaya.” 

Winner of the National Book Award for his earlier work, Lighthead, he is a poet to watch for his moral sense and mastery of poetic form. The book was written in the first two hundred days of the first Trump presidency.

By Terrance Hayes ,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry

One of the New York Times Critics' Top Books of 2018

A powerful, timely, dazzling collection of sonnets from one of America's most acclaimed poets, Terrance Hayes, the National Book Award-winning author of Lighthead

"Sonnets that reckon with Donald Trump's America." -The New York Times

In seventy poems bearing the same title, Terrance Hayes explores the meanings of American, of assassin, and of love in the sonnet form. Written during the first two hundred days of the Trump presidency, these poems are haunted by the…


Book cover of Model City

Paul Hoover Author Of O, and Green: New and Selected Poems

From my list on contemporary long poems.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have published 18 books of poetry, most recently the one I have listed here, as well as a collection of literary essays, Fables of Representation. My emphasis has always been on the more progressive and risk-taking kinds of expression, as seen with the Beat poets, Ginsberg and Corso, and the New York School poets, Ashbery and O'Hara. Seeing a lack of that perspective on bookshelves, I edited two editions of a major anthology, Postmodern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, and 42 issues of the literary magazine, New American Writing. I have been reading, more recently, a lot of great writing by women, especially those writing at length, with the volume up. 

Paul's book list on contemporary long poems

Paul Hoover Why Paul loves this book

The book is a haunting description of a model city, written in Berlin and other cities, that answers the question: “What was it like?” Each of the seventy pages of the book contains four long sentences in prose, each of which begins, “It was like.” 

Every time I read the book, which I teach in my classes, I am delighted by her prose style and awed by Stonecipher’s ability to depict both presence and absence. Stonecipher is exclusively a prose poet and has written a book about that poetic form. Her writing also displays proceduralism, which is the invention of a procedure rather than an existing poetic form. Architects and gardeners will be enthralled.

By Donna Stonecipher ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Model City as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Model City answers its own inaugural question 'What was it like?' in 288 different ways. The accumulation of these answers offers a form of sustained and refined negative capability, which by turns is wry, profound and abundant with an unspecified longing for the passing ghost of European idealism. In the various enquiries and explorations of Model City this is also the mapping of a lived condition and its relationships not readily found on every street corner - nor in the broken ideologies from the populist bargain basement proffered by our political cadres. What becomes apparent is that the model city/Model…


If you love María Baranda...

Book cover of Sexy Selfie Nation: Standing Up for Yourself in Today's Toxic, Sexist Culture

Sexy Selfie Nation by Leora Tanenbaum,

The problem is not with the actions young women take but with the toxic, sexist conditions they are responding to.

Tanenbaum found, based on six years of interviews with young people ages 14-30, that young women are navigating a culture littered with gendered dress codes, revenge porn, and sexually explicit…

Book cover of Postcolonial Love Poem: Poems

Paul Hoover Author Of O, and Green: New and Selected Poems

From my list on contemporary long poems.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have published 18 books of poetry, most recently the one I have listed here, as well as a collection of literary essays, Fables of Representation. My emphasis has always been on the more progressive and risk-taking kinds of expression, as seen with the Beat poets, Ginsberg and Corso, and the New York School poets, Ashbery and O'Hara. Seeing a lack of that perspective on bookshelves, I edited two editions of a major anthology, Postmodern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, and 42 issues of the literary magazine, New American Writing. I have been reading, more recently, a lot of great writing by women, especially those writing at length, with the volume up. 

Paul's book list on contemporary long poems

Paul Hoover Why Paul loves this book

Diaz was born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California. I believe that her long poem, The First Water Is the Body, the centerpiece of Postcolonial Love Poem, is The Waste Land of our era.

Lyrical and fierce, beautiful and scathing, it is both a cry from the outside and a spiritual lesson. After reading that poem, go to Snake Light and Ode to the Beloved’s Hips. I was led to her work by her first book, When My Brother Was an Aztec, which recounts the despair into which her brother, a drug addict, had placed her family.

By Natalie Diaz ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Postcolonial Love Poem as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

WINNER OF THE 2021 PULITZER PRIZE IN POETRY

FINALIST FOR THE 2020 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR POETRY

Natalie Diaz's highly anticipated follow-up to When My Brother Was an Aztec, winner of an American Book Award

Postcolonial Love Poem is an anthem of desire against erasure. Natalie Diaz's brilliant second collection demands that every body carried in its pages―bodies of language, land, rivers, suffering brothers, enemies, and lovers―be touched and held as beloveds. Through these poems, the wounds inflicted by America onto an indigenous people are allowed to bloom pleasure and tenderness: “Let me call my anxiety, desire, then. / Let…


Book cover of Mornings in Mexico

Nicholas Murray Author Of A Corkscrew Is Most Useful

From my list on the spirit of a country for the traveller.

Why am I passionate about this?

Perhaps it was being born in a large seaport – Liverpool – where I would watch from our front window the great liners steaming out on the tide that made me love travel and seeing the world. My book about the great age of British travel, A Corkscrew is Most Useful was the product of this obsession with how people travel, what they see, how they interpret their journeys. I have also written about Bruce Chatwin, one of the most original of modern travellers, and in my 2016 book Crossings I have explored the idea of borders, real and metaphorical, which figure so largely in the life of anyone moving from country to country and define our sense of belonging and identity.

Nicholas' book list on the spirit of a country for the traveller

Nicholas Murray Why Nicholas loves this book

I love this book because Lawrence is one of the great travel writers. His highly individual style of writing, so full of energy and life, makes Mexico in the 1920s come alive. In the marvellous opening chapter you are with him in his Mexican garden, seeing what he sees, smelling what he smells, hearing what he hears. Very few travel writers have this gift and it’s hard to believe that this book is nearly 100 years old when it is as fresh as the day it was written.

By D.H. Lawrence ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Mornings in Mexico as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Much of D.H. Lawrence's life was defined by his passion for travel and it was those peripatetic wanderings that gave life to some of his greatest novels. In the 1920s Lawrence travelled several times to Mexico, where he was fascinated by the clash of beauty and brutality, purity and darkness that he observed there. The diverse and evocative essays that make up Mornings in Mexico - 'Market Day', 'Dance of the Sprouting Corn', 'The Hopi Snake Dance' - bring to life the elemental simplicity of the Zapotec Indians in Mexico, the intense, dark rhythms of the Indians in the American…


Book cover of A Silent Fury: The El Bordo Mine Fire

Elizabeth Emma Ferry Author Of Not Ours Alone: Patrimony, Value, and Collectivity in Contemporary Mexico

From my list on about mining's effects on communities.

Why am I passionate about this?

Ever since I was a child, I have been fascinated by work and the ways that it organizes the rest of life. Mining is one of those activities that brings together economics, politics, gender, class, kinship, and cosmology in especially tight proximity. I am also fascinated by Latin America, a region where mining has been important for thousands of years. These interests led me to become an anthropologist specializing in mining in Mexico and Colombia. It has been my privilege to work in this area for over twenty-five years now, making lifelong friends, learning about their lives and struggles, and sharing that knowledge with students and readers. 

Elizabeth's book list on about mining's effects on communities

Elizabeth Emma Ferry Why Elizabeth loves this book

I was simultaneously horrified and riveted by this painstaking, searing account of a mine fire that took place in the Mexican mining center of Pachuca in 1920 and the subsequent coverup by the government and media.

The underground fire that burns even as those on the surface go about their business is both historical fast and a metaphor for the “silent fury” of many Mexicans over the inhumanity of corporations operating in their country, and over the conditions of impunity created by legal and political institutions.

This fury continues to burn in the 2020s, Herrera suggests, just as it did in the 1920s. 

By Yuri Herrera , Lisa Dillman (translator) ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Silent Fury as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

On March 10, 1920, in Pachuca, Mexico, the Compania de Santa Gertrudis - the largest employer in the region, and a subsidiary of the United States Smelting, Refining and Mining Company - may have committed murder.

The alert was first raised at six in the morning: a fire was tearing through the El Bordo mine. After a brief evacuation, the mouths of the shafts were sealed. Company representatives hastened to assert that "no more than ten" men remained inside the mineshafts, and that all ten were most certainly dead. Yet when the mine was opened six days later, the…


If you love Atlantica and the Rustic...

Book cover of Crossing: A Chinese Family Railroad Novel

Crossing by Lisa Redfern,

Crossing is a vividly human re-imagining of the love, sacrifices, and accomplishments that two Chinese brothers - American Immigrants - experience as they travel to California to build the Transcontinental Railroad. 

Book cover of The Death of Artemio Cruz

Alejandro Quintana Ph.D. Author Of Pancho Villa: A Biography

From my list on biographies of the Mexican Revolution.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up in Mexico listening to my father´s stories about the Mexican revolution. His storytelling abilities drew me in as he described his childhood memories and those of his father, who lived through the revolution. That's why I became a historian writing about the Mexican Revolution with a preference for biographies. As the Latin Americanist historian at St. John's University in New York City, I've written two books: Maximino Avila Camacho and the One Party State, Pancho Villa: A Biography, and edited A Brief History of Mexico by Lynn V. Foster. I hope you enjoy the list of books on significant personalities that shaped the first major social revolution of the twentieth century.

Alejandro's book list on biographies of the Mexican Revolution

Alejandro Quintana Ph.D. Why Alejandro loves this book

This book is one of my all-time favorites. The Death of Artemio Cruz is a historical novel by one of the most acclaimed literary figures of the Spanish language, Carlos Fuentes. It is a captivating narrative of intertwined memories experienced by Cruz while on his deathbed; this novel is a harsh condemnation of the post-revolutionary political class. It shows the path of idealist revolutionaries becoming corrupt politicians once in power. While a work of fiction, the book describes real corrupt and abusive attitudes and straight-out crimes committed by numerous revolutionary leaders turned politicians. There were many Artemio Cruz among the revolution leaders, which helps explain why the revolution failed to achieve real social change. 

By Carlos Fuentes , Alfred MacAdam (translator) ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Death of Artemio Cruz as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

As the novel opens, Artemio Cruz, the all-powerful newspaper magnate and land baron, lies confined to his bed and, in dreamlike flashes, recalls the pivotal episodes of his life. Carlos Fuentes manipulates the ensuing kaleidoscope of images with dazzling inventiveness, layering memory upon memory, from Cruz's heroic campaigns during the Mexican Revolution, through his relentless climb from poverty to wealth, to his uneasy death. Perhaps Fuentes's masterpiece, The Death of Artemio Cruz is a haunting voyage into the soul of modern Mexico.


Book cover of Casa No Name

Joanna Maclennan Author Of The Foraged Home

From my list on inspiring creating your own unique home or space.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am mainly known as an Interiors Photographer and although accidentally falling into photographing Interiors, it has become a passion, always interested in the story these places tell and alongside my husband we have built our own home creating a unique space using recuperated materials. As part of my work, I am always looking for interesting and inspirational books and places. It is how I train my eye, drawn to the unusual. I am as happy photographing a chateau in Provence as I am in a small and remote cabin in Norway. 

Joanna's book list on inspiring creating your own unique home or space

Joanna Maclennan Why Joanna loves this book

I was given this as a present and what a wonderful present it was. Deborah Turbeville is a wonderful photographer whose work I admire. Her fashion photography was innovative, imaginative and so creative.

This book, a visual diary of her house and time in Mexico is filled with her signature blurred images, from black and white portraits to colourful interiors. It goes against everything we learn in Interiors but it’s magical, evocative, and gothic.

By Deborah Turbeville ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Casa No Name as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In the tradition of Kahlo and Allende, Turbeville’s brilliantly stylish portrait of her Mexican house evokes both her vivid imagination and the mystique of Mexico. High-ceilinged rooms surround a central courtyard that is lined with faded frescoes of biblical scenes. The glimmer and shafts of diffused light that stream into the courtyards and curtained rooms add to the romantic atmosphere—one feels as though they have entered into a quintessential Turbeville photograph. Turbeville has captured the spiritual nature of Mexican culture by incorporating into candlelit interiors such traditional religious artifacts as colorful painted tin retablos, hand-carved saints, wooden tableau boxes, and…


Book cover of A Compact History of Mexico

Why am I passionate about this?

If five gentlemen from Mexico, a colored/negro woman from Eatonville, Florida, a former President who happened to be white, with historical privilege, from Plains, Georgia, and two Professors of History can use their knowledge, training, God’s gifts to help us to understand history better, why shouldn't I also be passionate and excited to write. Telling stories, writing, contributing, and unearthing lies and truths so that a child who looks like me – or who does not look like me – is provided a better world. Let me hokey about this – maybe the word is dorky – whatever, the privilege is mine.

Anthony's book list on history books which weave a wonderful tale, while making us laugh, scream, cry and think, while we are bowing and saying bravo at the same time!

Anthony Paul Griffin Why Anthony loves this book

Texas schools do an incredible job of acculturating their students in Texas history. The school system starts by telling the story of true Texans. Unfortunately, some of those tales were what we called “stories.” 

In college, I took a course called The History of Mexico. The course book used by Professor Macias (if I remember his name correctly) was a small book, less than 200 pages, called The Compact History of Mexico. What a wonderful course and wonderful book. 

I have not looked at the book in years, even though I ordered a copy when writing this. I felt like a child reading the book, being told a different story than I had been told over the years, providing to me – a black student – the why and how history and both sides of a story are so important. Always feeling left out of the discussion, hearing a distorted…

By Daniel Cosio Villegas ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Compact History of Mexico as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Esta obra contiene la dosis mínima de conocimiento sobre la historia de nuestro país. Destinada a todos cuantos quieran una historia verdadera, interesante y escrita en un lenguaje sencillo y claro.


If you love María Baranda...

Book cover of Child of Vanris

Child of Vanris by Nikki McCormack,

At five years old, Kasiel was found with the pointed ends of his ears cut off. Despite that brutal start, he’s lived twelve peaceful years with the man who took him in. Keeping his hair long over his mutilated ears helps him hide the fact that he is Vanrian, a…

Book cover of The adventures of Rynnie Roo and Tater Too!

Carolyn Watson-Dubisch Author Of As The Sun Rises, Morning in Mazatlan

From my list on children's picture books about Mexico.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have lived in Mazatlán, Mexico, for the last 6 years and have explored much of this beautiful country, from the Pacific coast to Mexico City to Puerto Peñasca and the region around the Sea of Cortez. It’s fascinating and varied, and the people here are welcoming and kind. I teach art to primary school children at a local school and love sharing Spanish and English books with them about Mexico. These are some of my favorite books that my students love.

Carolyn's book list on children's picture books about Mexico

Carolyn Watson-Dubisch Why Carolyn loves this book

The Rynnie Roo books are always such fun, and this one is no different. This book takes the reader on an adventure as they explore the animals that live in the Yucatan jungles of Mexico. It includes some words from the Mayan language and even talks about the many, many dinosaur bones that have been found in the region as well as the types of dinosaurs that were common there.

I love the characters Jean Johnson has created for this series and the fact that she actually grew up in the Yucatan jungle. It’s always great fun to read this one to my students here in Mazatlán, Mexico. They love learning about the other side of their country.

By Jean Johnson , Tara Kieschnick (editor) ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The adventures of Rynnie Roo and Tater Too! as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Rynnie Roo the Kangaroo is going on another adventure! This time Tater Tot the Parakeet joins her in the fun as they visit the Yucatan jungle, make new friends, and discover new animals and dinosaurs!In this book, kids will learn about the Mayan Indian language still spoken in this part of Mexico, including how to say “please” and “thank you.” Be sure you check out Rynnie Roo's Adventures for more locations and learning fun!


Book cover of Alphabet
Book cover of American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
Book cover of Model City

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