56 Books Like Aya

This book deals with the death penalty. The author covers several cases involving people who were on death row and were subsequently found to be innocent.

The book also covers related topics, such as mass incarceration, mandatory sentencing, racial bias, prison overcrowding, cruel and unusual sentences for minors, the psychological impact of long-term solitary confinement, and a host of other crime and punishment issues.

This book is a roadmap on how to be an inclusive leader. It explores the history of race in America through a firsthand account of Dr. Kendi.

In addition, the book explores the interpersonal and intrapersonal dimensions of cultural engagement. By doing so, it offers the tools needed to understand how to challenge your own biases, stereotypes, and prejudices. It also provides the invitation to pause, reflect, and grow by encouraging self-reflection. 

General Harriet Tubman provides an in-depth look at Tubman’s leadership legacy.

You discover her passion for justice and commitment to ensuring freedom for all. Most publications on Tubman focus on her role in the Underground Railroad. Her courage and tenacity helped many to break free from the bondage of slavery. This is only one dimension of her life. She was also a spy for the Union Army.

In addition, she helped to organize a community in Canada for hundreds who had escaped from slavery and reclaimed their liberty.

Moses was her name because she was determined to see her people set free.

Drawing upon the biblical Moses, the book outlines the parallels between the lives of Moses (who led his people to the Promised Land) and Harriet Tubman (who was guided to freedom by the North Star). This book provides children with the inspiration to serve as leaders. They recognize that they too can combine faith and freedom to make a difference in the world.

One of the biggest worries as the Civil War wrapped up was that Confederate troops might disappear into the Appalachian Mountains, where they could conduct guerrilla raids with relative impunity. As a result, the war could have been extended for years, maybe even decades, as the insurgents crept out of their strongholds to conduct hit and run raids. Fortunately, that didn’t happen. Confederate leaders like Robert E. Lee and Pete Longstreet reminded Southerners they lost the war. It was time to get on with their lives.

Most southern veterans accepted the situation. However, a few, like Jesse and Frank James and the Younger brothers, couldn’t accept defeat. So they holed up in the backwoods of Missouri and fought a new kind of war using tactics they’d learned under William Quantrill and Bloody Bill Anderson.

Sound familiar? It’s the same situation that has allowed terrorist groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda to… show more.

This beautiful short novel about various matters, including chickens, house cleaning, idiosyncratic neighbors and parents, is funny—really, how can you not laugh at a hen named Miss Hennepin Country.  (Her owners live in Minnesota.)

Also, the novel goes to the heart of the grief of infertility. At the same time, Jackie Polzin is very, very funny in a remarkably quiet way. Her writing is spare, eloquent, and precise. She is, as we say in the biz, The Real Deal. I can open this book at any page and marvel and be filled with happiness.  

This book is one of many Mary Higgins Clark books I read in my early teens, but this particular one has stayed with me. It is a domestic noir, somewhat a tale of how never to rush into a marriage with someone you hardly know. Added to this is the peril of involving small children.

I really liked this book–it terrified me beyond belief, but I think this is why it has stayed with me. That first look perhaps at the psychopath hiding in plain sight, appearing to all the world like a safe, kind person, but inside, totally damaged and deadly. Superb.

Sigurd Olson’s book is the most beautifully written and profound evocation of the utter beauty of the Quetico-Superior wilderness that I have ever read. Olson finds wonder and astonishment everywhere: trees, lakes, rivers, wildlife, and birds; the sound of rain; “laughing loons,” the signature sound of the North Country; falling leaves and bobcat trails.

I have read this entire book twice, and each time, I have learned more about appreciating the beauty of the wild. Each chapter is a unique lesson in seeing, hearing, and—most importantly—learning how to appreciate the wild and immerse oneself within it while leaving it intact. 

Jim Northrup, Fond du lac Ojibwe author, was my writing mentor from the time I met him in 1991 until he passed away in 2015. He would always ask, “What are you writing today?” That was his way of encouraging me to keep writing. His crime novel, Dirty Copper is the story of Luke Warmwater, who returns to the Reservation after serving in Vietnam. Luke becomes a deputy sheriff on the Rez and sees firsthand the war raging below the appearance of peace.

I would listen to Jim talk about his writing and the progress he was making on his story as he wrote it. Listening to him encouraged me to keep going with my writing. Jim’s way of storytelling through the written word is something I have tried to emulate.

In the Summer of 1932, the orphan Odie O’Banion commits a terrible crime and is forced to flee the terrible institution where he is, in a very real sense, a prisoner. He and three of his young companions steel away in the night and begin to search for a new, better way of life.

This book has everything: an epic tale well told, a heroic journey, a paddle down a wild river, poignant adventure, and the growth of the soul. Think The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Odyssey.

I loved it from the very first page and could not put this book down.