95 Books Like Brick Lane

To me, this slim novel is perfect, and perfectly constructed.

The narrator spends it obsessing over a single question–why did my sister marry an older, wealthy, boring man?–and doesn’t figure out the answer till the end. And in retrospect, it’s obvious. Meanwhile she also mulls over the options for young women circa the early 1960s in an England that’s transforming dramatically: Do I marry? Stay single? Let my life drift?

My parents bought the Penguin paperback when we lived in London in the late 1960s for a year, when the city was really swinging. I began reading it at 10 and was transfixed by the glimpse it offered into adulthood, and I have re-read the same paperback many times since.

“Long ago Virginia decreed, in the way that Virginia decrees, that I was the painter and she the writer.” Vanessa and Her Sister is a portrait of two extraordinary and unconventional women, Virginia Woolf and her sister, Vanessa Bell. The story is told in the form of a diary kept by Vanessa, beginning at the turn of the 20th century with the formation of the Bloomsbury Group in London. Priya Parmar has created a sympathetic yet honest portrayal of Virginia Woolf, her genius and her often precarious mental state, and the impact it had on her family—in particular Vanessa, who was an important and steadying influence for her sister and a talented artist in her own right.

Flynn Berry’s first thriller opens with a stunningly rendered scene in which the protagonist, Nora, discovers the body of her sister, Rachel, who has been murdered.

Throughout the novel, Berry captures Nora’s shock, grief, and sense of mission—to find out who killed her beloved sister—in precise but poetic language. I witnessed the horror visually and felt Nora’s emotions without any extra flourishes or sentimental language. 

This is a children's book – the story of the three Fossil children, their peculiar upbringing, and the ups and downs of their lives at stage school – but it is a wonderful read at any age. Brilliantly infused with the texture of daily life in 1930s London, it creates a really specific and compelling atmosphere. The food they ate, the cost of clothes, transport, the make-up of their household, even the quality of the air they breathed, is all described, as part of a warm and engrossing tale. Nothing I've read quite transports you to that time in the way that this does. 

Embrace this beloved comic novel with seventy-five-year-old showgirl twins, Dora and Nora Chance. Dora recalls their bawdy existence of struggle and romance hours before partying with the toff side of the family, Shakespearean actor dynasty, the Hazards. The Chances grab life and joy from the wrong side of the tracks. Possibly fathered by actor, Sir Melchior, or his twin brother, the Chance twins struggled to make a living in the illegitimate theater of song and dance. Despite male lovers, their lives are shaped by women, like Hollywood starlet Delia, and the Lady A, both unfortunate wives of their putative father. Disabled and thrown out by cruel daughters, Lady A pops up as Wheelchair when taken in by the warm-hearted Chances. The kindness of women is what matters here.

Katy Yocom’s Three Ways to Disappear won the Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature and was named a Barnes & Noble Top Indie Favorite—well-deserved recognition for this gorgeous debut novel. Three Ways to Disappear reveals the plight of the endangered Bengal tigers through the stories of two sisters who come together years after a family tragedy changes their lives—journalist Sarah, in India to help preserve the tigers, and Quinn, in Kentucky, dealing with family issues. The novel shows the complicated balance of tiger conservation among humans who themselves are struggling, and portrays the complexities of family bonds as well as the immense challenges facing the natural world. Both the human and tiger characters are beautifully rendered, empathetic, and unforgettable.

V.C. Andrews was my first dive into gothic fiction. Fans often fawn over Flowers in the Attic but something about Andrews' only standalone book (let's not talk about the sequel!) really spoke to 14-year-old me.

I loved the isolating setting of the aging Whitefern estate. I hated every member of the family. Audrina herself is an unreliable narrator who assures the reader just how unreliable she is. And so, of course, when a boy shows her interest, she dives headfirst into her only source of comfort.

Teenage me was smitten with this book, and adult me now sees all the red flags these characters wave. Andrews might not have been the best writer, but her storytelling ability sure cut into my coming-of-age female psyche like no other writer could.

I’m a sucker for endpapers so, with inside covers that appear browned with age, this book instantly grabbed me. I was even more drawn in by the edges of all pages looking aged, with the book’s title repeatedly running along the bottom of each one like a handwritten footer. Once I was reading, the flavour of classics like those by the Bronte sisters and Jane Austin meant I couldn’t put it down.

Set in the later part of the 20th century, Kate’s story explores self-worth and finding purpose. First-person narrative uses language cleverly. It is easy to read, the voice unpretentious. I felt like I knew Kate. We have so much in common, including the ability to write in the dark and a penchant for taking laneways rather than main roads.

I love stories set in modern times, with the fae living—secretly—in the local woods. It reminds me of the uncanny in real life, and the possibility of adventure.

The pleasure of this rendition of the fae-next-door is that the human realm is brought fully to life and slowly entwines with the fantastical. Also: It gradually dawned on me that the human thread of the story is a fairy tale in its own right. That really twisted my expectations.

I love coming-of-age stories in the 50s and 60s, so I was thrilled to find this one. I know from my own passage into the teen years what these two sisters were experiencing. Their mother was like many others, taking care of her home, husband, and family. Women were on the cusp of new freedoms, and she fell under the spell of a divorced artsy feminist who moved next door to them. Then the secrets started.

I recall the whispers and dropped conversations as a young teen around my mother. Often we didn’t know the adult decisions that were being made. I wanted to hate the girls’ mother, and I couldn’t wait to find out how the story would end.