Here are 100 books that Avalon High fans have personally recommended if you like
Avalon High.
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When I was a girl, my grandmother called me an ‘old soul’ and said she thought my fascination with the 19th century meant that I’d lived then in another life. Ever since, this notion that a person might have lived before has always fascinated me! I gravitate to books that bring the past and present together in all sorts of ways–through memory, ghosts, time travel…and reincarnation. Now my own books of suspense for kids and teens deal with many of those same themes. I always write books I would want to read myself!
Stories
of people with personal connections to times long gone and places far away
always fascinate me. In this novel,
13-year-old Willow begins experiencing strange visions that lead her to believe
that she led a former life in ancient Egypt. I love how the author doesn’t shy away from sensitive
subjects like religion and terminal illness, but handles them with sensitivity (Willow’s best friend is a fundamentalist
Christian who does not approve of the idea of past lives, and Willow’s sister
is gravely ill). Still, the main focus of
the story is Willow’s research into the possibility of reincarnation, and I
found it captivating.
After nearly drowning in Pinecone Lake, thirteen-year-old Willow begins experiencing strange visions that lead her to believe that she led a former life in Egypt. By the author of Nightmare Mountain. Reprint.
A dead top agent, an assassinated politician, and one dangerously hot Swedish spy who knows something about her past that might end up jeopardizing her future.
What has American Division agent Katrina Foster gotten herself into this time?
Katrina knows she’s talented, but once she becomes a target, she soon…
When I was a girl, my grandmother called me an ‘old soul’ and said she thought my fascination with the 19th century meant that I’d lived then in another life. Ever since, this notion that a person might have lived before has always fascinated me! I gravitate to books that bring the past and present together in all sorts of ways–through memory, ghosts, time travel…and reincarnation. Now my own books of suspense for kids and teens deal with many of those same themes. I always write books I would want to read myself!
I am an optimist, and I
believe in true love, and I believe things can work for the best even when
times seem bleak. So I enjoyed this
book, which starts with cave-dwellers and follows their two souls from
prehistory to the present. Again and
again, though separated by death, these teens search for each other. I love how they find each other again and
again, and I appreciate the wonderful message that love is stronger than
death.
From prehistory to the present, theirs was a love for the ages. It starts with a fight in a cave over an elusive green jewel . . . and then travels over time and lives to include Egyptian slaves, Greek temples, Massachusetts witch trials, Civil War battlefields, Paris on the eve of World War II, America in the 1960s . . . and a pair of modern-day teenagers. For readers who believe that love is stronger than time or death, this is an unforgettable novel from a wonderful storyteller.
When I was a girl, my grandmother called me an ‘old soul’ and said she thought my fascination with the 19th century meant that I’d lived then in another life. Ever since, this notion that a person might have lived before has always fascinated me! I gravitate to books that bring the past and present together in all sorts of ways–through memory, ghosts, time travel…and reincarnation. Now my own books of suspense for kids and teens deal with many of those same themes. I always write books I would want to read myself!
I’ve always had an interest in the Salem Witch
Trials. So Gallows Hills is a
spine-tingling novel that ticks a lot of boxes for me! 17-year-old Sarah moves to a new town and is
asked to be a fortune teller at a local fair. When her fortunes start coming true, people question her. Is she a witch? Then she starts having visions that link her
to a time and place long ago. I love the idea that our past is always with us,
and that we are doomed to repeat the past until we can deal with it!
Sarah agrees to play the fortune teller at the school fair. But as she looks into the ball, disturbing images appear and the students begin to believe that she is a witch and threaten her. As the danger increases, Sarah's mother and her friend intervene and prevent disaster.
A dead top agent, an assassinated politician, and one dangerously hot Swedish spy who knows something about her past that might end up jeopardizing her future.
What has American Division agent Katrina Foster gotten herself into this time?
Katrina knows she’s talented, but once she becomes a target, she soon…
When I was a girl, my grandmother called me an ‘old soul’ and said she thought my fascination with the 19th century meant that I’d lived then in another life. Ever since, this notion that a person might have lived before has always fascinated me! I gravitate to books that bring the past and present together in all sorts of ways–through memory, ghosts, time travel…and reincarnation. Now my own books of suspense for kids and teens deal with many of those same themes. I always write books I would want to read myself!
This is another tale that starts with a
fortune-teller—but this time it’s teenage Jo who gets her future told. The clairvoyant tells her that there is only
one true love for her—but the last time Jo saw him was in a past life! Now she needs to find him in this life. Jo doesn’t believe a word of this, but events
start to unsettle her. Could
reincarnation possibly be true? But
what if she can’t recognize her soul-mate when she finds him again in this
life? I love the suspense elements in
this book as well as the romance.
Unlucky in love Jo is dragged along to see a clairvoyant by her two coupled-up best friends, and is told that there's only one boy for her. The trouble is, the last time she saw him was in a past life, when she worked as a governess to his younger brother. The clairvoyant tells her that as she is back in this life, so is he, and she must find him if she is ever to know true happiness and love.
Jo doesn't believe a word of it - but then a series of events begin to change her mind.…
I have been studying Celtic myth and history since I was in college and took a class on Arthurian literature. Drawing heavily from Irish and Welsh lore to build my “land beyond the veil” known as the Five Quarters, I have always been intrigued by the Celtic view of the land of the dead as a distinct world to which we go and then return, like two sides of the mirrored surface of a well. I hope you enjoy these mythic fantasy books as much as I did!
I read this book so many years ago, but it has stayed with me. It struck me then, as it does now, as revolutionary in that it was one of the first retellings of the Arthurian myth from the female perspective.
I took a class on Arthurian Literature in university, and the tales of the period are obviously male-dominated. But The Mists of Avalon showed me a way into the female characters in the tale, and they are fascinating.
Here is the tragic tale of the rise and fall of Camelot - but seen through the eyes of Camelot's women: The devout Gwenhwyfar, Arthur's Queen; Vivane, High priestess of Avalon and the Lady of the Lake; above all, Morgaine, possessor of the sight, the wise, the wise-woman fated to bring ruin on them all...
People give me funny looks when I say my historical novels are autobiographical. Yes, I spend months doing research, but the idea for The Devil’s Library actually came from a motorbike trip through Europe (think horses for motorbikes) and the friendship at its heart is partly a homage to the Shane Black scripted buddy movies I grew up with (Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout...). Every great historical novel is a journey from the present to the past, in other words. We take something with us when we crack the spine. And – when it works – find something life-changing to bring back home with us at The End.
Ok, so it’s a trilogy rather than a single book – an epic retelling of the legend of King Arthur and his knights – but what a trilogy! No one who’s read these books will forget what it feels like to have the life squeezed out of them at the centre of a shield wall, with spear-blades edging inexorably closer...
Like The King Must Die, The Warlord Chronicles recount a legend with so much verve and detail you’re left thinking this must be the way it really happened. Above all, it’s a moving study of heroes at the end of an age of heroes. However much they might be willing to die trying, not even the greatest warriors – or the greatest magicians – can stand against the tide of history.
Title In This Collection:- The Winter King Excalibur Enemy of God The Winter King Uther, the High King of Britain, has died, leaving the infant Mordred as his only heir. His uncle, the loyal and gifted warlord Arthur, now rules as caretaker for a country which has fallen into chaos - threats emerge from within the British kingdoms while vicious Saxon armies stand ready to invade. Excalibur Arthur has crushed Lancelot's rebellion, but at a cost. Guinevere's betrayal has left him reeling, and his Saxon enemies seek to destroy him while he is weak. Chaos threatens to engulf Britain. Yet…
I grew up playing Dungeons & Dragons. I’m always on the hunt for not just good but great stories. One of the most profound things I have done revolving around fantasy writing was walk the same streets as the legends walked. Oxford, UK is a magical location and the place where Narnia and The Hobbits were born. I visited CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien gravesites. I visited their homes where they wrote their works. Adventure is around every corner in life. If we choose it. Here is a dwarven proverb from my book series, “May your light shine bright and blind your enemies.”
Wowzers! I’m a sucker for Merlin and King Arthur so I gobbled this one up. I was not disappointed but instead enamored by the characters and Angela’s writing style.
Fantastic storytelling that truly brings you in and doesn't let you go. The opening chapter drew me in deep and I couldn’t stop reading from there. Seeing Merlin so emotionally tortured after the fall of Arthur was an eye opener. Definitely grab this one.
“Merlin…Merlin!” Elanor desperately called out, reaching to him. Like a ghost she stood across the chasm, her arms outstretched and her raven black hair blowing behind her in the wildness of the wind.
“Please, Elanor!” Merlin cried out. “Elanor!”
He couldn’t lose her this time. This time he would reach her. This time he would grip her hands and not let go. The wind tore violently between them, like an angry beast threatening to separate them…
Merlin was all Elanor could think of since her strange dreams had begun. She kept reminding herself that he was not real. He was…
Cory O’Brien, author of such books as Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes: a No-Bullshit Guide to World Mythology, grew up reading myths and legends of all sorts, and turned that passion into a career with the advent of his extremely serious mythology website. He has always had a fondness for the Arthurian Legend in particular, ever since his father read him Howard Pyle’s King Arthur books as a child, and he realized he could use them as a moral justification for hitting other kids with big sticks.
Arthur Rex tells the same story as Le Morte D’Arthur, but in a radically different way. Where Mallory idolizes the knights and nobles of Arthur’s court, Thomas Berger paints them in the most unflattering light possible. Everyone is a cretin, a sex maniac, or both, and their backwards morals are used as clever mirrors of our own modern moral failings. Arthur Rex is probably the funniest version of the Arthurian Legend that I’ve read. It’s got its tongue firmly lodged in its cheek. Even so, the ending managed to make me cry, so props to Berger for capturing the full range of emotions with this one.
Reinterpreting and expanding upon the Arthurian legend, the author begins to inject his own personality into the narrative, which constitutes a salute to the Age of Chivalry
As an author of historical fiction set in Upper Michigan and a seventh-generation resident of Marquette, I’ve always wished I had a time machine so I could travel back to see what Upper Michigan looked like when my French voyageur ancestors traveled the Great Lakes in the 1600s and when my Marquette ancestors helped found the town in 1849. Since I haven’t learned how to invent a time machine yet, the next best thing was to write a time travel novel. To begin, I tried to pick one Marquette history event I wanted to change—the dramatic 1903 move of the Longyear Mansion from Marquette to Massachusetts.
Mark Twain’s King Arthur time travel novel led to numerous others.
While Twain’s novel is more of a veiled attempt to depict his own time, other authors have depicted Camelot as a utopian place and asked what the world would be like if it had not fallen. In The Forever King, a young boy, Arthur Blessing, turns out to be a reincarnated King Arthur. He travels back in time to Camelot to try to restore its past glory.
He failed in the past, but with the help of the Holy Grail, he is determined not to fail again. The novel led to two sequels. Like all these time travel novels, the goal is to change the past to create a better future. But utopias are always hard to achieve.
In a darkened house not far from the place where Camelot may once have stood, a madman schemes, plotting toward the day when he will wrest the cup that men call the Holy Grail from the boy who is its guardian. Arthur Blessing is no ordinary ten-year-old. The Grail is his by chance, this time, but the power to keep it - a power as ancient time itself - is his by right. Now he must stay alive, battling foul sorcery and indefatigable assassins, long enough to use that power.
As a university historian and archaeologist my focus has been the Early Middle Ages. In the 1990s I wrote several books about the fifth and sixth centuries which barely mentioned Arthur but popular histories and films based on his story just kept coming, so I decided to look again at his story and work out how and why it developed as it did. I have published three well-received books on the subject, each of which builds on the one before, plus articles that have been invited to be included in edited volumes. I disagree with much in the five books above but collectively they reflect the debate across my lifetime. It is a great debate, I hope you enjoy it.
Oliver Padel is a linguist specializing in early Welsh and Cornish and as such the ideal guide to Arthur’s presence in early Celtic literature. While acknowledging that the earliest datable instances come in the Historia Brittonum in 829-30, his view is that Arthur began as a figure of Celtic mythology and was only later converted into a pseudo-historical figure fixed in the past. In that sense, the early Arthur is the individual in the Historia Brittonum in the section called Mirabilia (Wonders), where he is used as a way of explaining landscape features and the names given to them, who has then been adapted to be a British general fighting 12 battles in chapter 56. This has strongly influenced ways of looking at the evidence in recent years and it deserves our attention.
Personally, I don’t agree with it for two reasons. First of all is the whole issue of…
A fascinating survey of the numerous references to Arthur found in medieval Welsh literature emphasising the diverse literary genres used and the multifaceted portrayal of the character. New edition.
