66 Books Like Booked to Die

Colin Dexter immediately pulls me into what reads as a real world.

The writing is so beautiful, I’m not aware of anything but the story. The chapters are delightfully short and tight, so much so that the pages absolutely flow past.

I prefer reading books that, even though they are clearly fiction, read as true crime stories. When I read a Colin Dexter Morse mystery, I am unaware of pages, chapters, sentences, punctuation. I am allowed to be totally immersed in the story. The casts of perfectly drawn characters in each story always intrigue me.

Morse is flawed, a quality he shares with the camera. He doesn’t mind being wrong, a rare quality in a human. 

I find it such a treat to eaves-drop on a real-life cop in that, unlike most detective fiction, which usually focuses on a single crime, the Frost stories allow me to walk in the shoes of a real detective and experience firsthand the truly multi-faceted work of an average detective.

I find the Wingfield books really difficult to put down once I start. Slowing them down to savor them at leisure is quickly kicked into touch in my desperation to discover what happens next.

I have found that Dick Francis stories (33 standalone and a series character for an additional 4 books and a second series with 2 books) have stood the test of time in that I read them all as they were published, and recently I am working my way through them again on Audible and I have found them to be even better the second time around.

I feel they are equally exciting, character-led, thrilling, and each title still kept me guessing right up to the end. I am in total in awe of Dick Francis' writing and storytelling. 

Each title deals with horses and horse racing as either the main theme or, in some of the titles, as the back story. I have selected Decider mainly because I found that he effortlessly incorporates the horse world with the “Succession syndrome” – that is to say, family life and entitled family… show more.

The thing I love about Michael Connelly is his very subtle way of keeping up the pace of the investigation without you even being aware he is doing so.

There are few things I like more than reading an author you’ve never known before, loving their work, and then discovering the author in question has several other titles available. I call the resultant state: heaven!

Michael Connelly is one such author. He doesn’t know how to write a bad book or even an average one, for that matter.

In my opinion the Harry Bosch series of books are even better than the Bosch TV show, and that’s saying something. Narrows is the perfect starting point, but really, it could be any of the two dozen and counting titles.

I loved Lioness because it took such incredible inner strength for the daughters of Zelophehad to stand before Moses, as judge, and argue their case for equal rights for women regarding inheritance laws.

The characters and time period became so real to me that I read through this novel series, following the daughters to Canaan. The author spun a fiction tale around the biblical account and filled it with deep historical background, plus touched on the emotional core of Mahlah and her sisters.

I love Britton’s writing, too; it reminds me of Joyce Landorf’s fiction style.   

Her book inspired me to write my own memoir about my experiences as a local child living the life of an expat in the British colonial territory of Singapore in the 1960s.

This is her autobiographical memoir of her life and childhood. I found her story captured in a sophisticated writing style. It covers all the elements of how she kickstarted her career as a writer and the catalysts behind the stories of all her books.

As promised by its title, this book indeed reveals the DNA of big tech companies. I learned about the strategies that helped them to rise to power and transform our economic and social landscape. It unveils their sophisticated manipulations that affect every aspect of our daily life. Reading this book changed the way I think about tech companies ever since!

Protagonist Vera Kelly’s personality is the kind I grew up with in my blue-collar neighborhood. Sample line: “In fact I could tell she wanted to like me, which was probably why my first instinct was to lie to her.” Right on: If you didn’t have a cynical edge, you’d be somebody’s toast sooner or later.

Vera, a tech-savvy spy in the midst of the South American political upheaval of the 1960s, makes no big announcement about being queer, and she doesn’t consider herself some frail victim either. Cheers to that! I can relate.

Although I consider most contemporary novels to be tricked up and dumbed down, this one’s an exception. The writing’s unapologetically smart. I dig it. I’m in Mensa; what can I say?

This one hit close to the bone because it captures the specific rage of being discarded by the people who were supposed to keep you safe.

I was drawn to the way these girls, hidden away in a place meant to break them, found a way to turn their collective shame into a weapon. It reminded me that there is a sacred power in the "wayward" and the "unwanted" because they are the ones who aren't afraid to look into the dark.

It is a beautiful, terrifying testament to the fact that you can only push someone into the shadows for so long before they learn how to make the shadows move for them.

Pollan was an important guiding voice in the food movement of the early 2000s, both with Omnivore’s Dilemma and with this book, which got less attention, but which I think is so important for understanding how Americans’ current relationship to nutrition, dietary advice, and changing food fads has developed.

This book helped me understand how the food industry and food science have contributed to the widespread confusion about what foods we should and shouldn’t eat, what is and isn’t healthy for us.

Pollan points out how the mania for or against one macronutrient or another (Low fat! Keto! Low carb! High protein!) has been used to sell products but has done little to actually improve consumers’ health.