Here are 66 books that Down the River Unto the Sea fans have personally recommended if you like
Down the River Unto the Sea.
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As a writer, I consider myself lucky to be born and raised in the Deep South. Although I currently live near Los Angeles, I continue to draw upon the region’s complex history, regional color, eccentric characters, and rich atmosphere for inspiration. I also love to read fiction set in the South, especially mysteries and thrillers—the more atmospheric, the better!
Although the film version is better known, Dickey’s gut-wrenching saga of four men who decide to take one last canoe trip in the remote North Georgia wilderness is one of my favorite novels of all time. I love Dickey’s vivid prose, which is at times poetic but never obtrusively so.
Simply put, To me, this book represents thriller storytelling at its finest.
“You're hooked, you feel every cut, grope up every cliff, swallow water with every spill of the canoe, sweat with every draw of the bowstring. Wholly absorbing [and] dramatic.”—Harper's Magazine
The setting is the Georgia wilderness, where the states most remote white-water river awaits. In the thundering froth of that river, in its echoing stone canyons, four men on a canoe trip discover a freedom and exhilaration beyond compare. And then, in a moment of horror, the adventure turns into a struggle for survival as one man becomes a human hunter who is offered his own harrowing deliverance.
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
It’s all my father-in-law’s fault. Before I ran into him, I was a card-carrying “literary” high-brow. Shoot, I was reading Faulkner’s “The Bear” in high school and thought I would be the next generation Steinbeck if I ever got around to writing novels. But one weekend, while visiting my wife’s folks, I found myself with nothing to read—a problem solved by my father-in-law’s complete collection of Richard Stark novels. Those books knocked me head-over-heels, which is why when I did get around to writing novels, the first six were hard-edged crime fiction.
This book grabbed me by the throat and threw me into a world I could literally feel spinning around me—a world in which good intentions don’t mean squat and random chance frequently outperforms the most carefully crafted of plans. Block always hits his target, but this one broke my heart along the way.
Nobody knows better than Matthew Scudder how far down a person can sink in this city. A young prostitute named Kim knew it also—and she wanted out. Maybe Kim didn't deserve the life fate had dealt her. She surely didn't deserve her death. The alcoholic ex-cop turned p.i. was supposed to protect her, but someone slashed her to ribbons on a crumbling New York City waterfront pier. Now finding Kim's killer will be Scudder's penance. But there are lethal secrets hiding in the slain hooker's past that are far dirtier than her trade. And there are many ways of dying…
Some of us are confronted, amid life, with the need to look at ourselves and to change. It’s usually a question of survival. Do I want to live? Better stop this, better start that. I consider myself fortunate to have been forced down this path. So, who am I, really? Will I double down on my past mistakes, or can I change up and make some new ones? I love stories of the pain that precedes growth, redemption, and freedom that comes with it. Here are five of my favorite novels about recognizing what you are and becoming something new.
Redemption is not just about stopping this or quitting that. Whether your problems are chemical or behavioral, those simple changes are a necessary beginning, but they are rarely enough to get the monkey’s teeth out of your neck.
In this novel, Block’s protagonist from 8 Million Ways to Die wrestles with the post-addiction problem of who you are, really, after that thing that has been propping you up is taken away. Redemption isn’t about what happens when you stop digging the hole. It’s about what happens when you climb out of the hole and start becoming.
Detective Matt Scudder is on the trail of a killer - but solving the case might be his undoing...
Matt Scudder and Jack Ellery were at school together but never exactly friends. Twenty years later, when Scudder was a detective and Jack was standing on the other side of the one-way glass in a police line-up, it was clear their lives had taken very different paths.
What they shared, however, was a battle with alcohol. Now Jack is on the ninth step of the AA program and it's time to make amends to the people he's wronged over the years…
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
Some of us are confronted, amid life, with the need to look at ourselves and to change. It’s usually a question of survival. Do I want to live? Better stop this, better start that. I consider myself fortunate to have been forced down this path. So, who am I, really? Will I double down on my past mistakes, or can I change up and make some new ones? I love stories of the pain that precedes growth, redemption, and freedom that comes with it. Here are five of my favorite novels about recognizing what you are and becoming something new.
Many cops retire and decide they want to write, but I think Ed Dee is just about the best of the bunch. I write crime fiction, but I usually write from the criminal’s point of view because I can’t compete with guys like Dee; he’s too good and knows too much.
In this novel, his protagonist is another one of those guys, another ex-cop who made some seriously bad choices and who paid a heavy price. Maybe he can live with it and squeak by, but then he hits one of those bumps, and he has to make some choices.
I understand the consequences. I have a few scars, but I reserve the right to be human, to make mistakes, and to learn from them, hopefully. I love this book.
Banished NYPD cop Eddie Dunne knows his daughter Kate has been kidnapped by the Russian mob for something he's done. But the cops and Feds give him no help, and now he has to find out which of his misdeeds will lead him to his daughter-or to his death. From the Coney Island beaches where the Russian Mafiosi swim to a warehouse disco where nouveau criminals cut deals to a Queens bocce club where old Italians keep bloody secrets, Eddie starts bouncing like a pinball through a game of guts, guns, and gangsters. With the help of a tough woman…
People behave rationally and irrationally. Observing and thinking about human nature is the sport of my lifetime. In literature and art, I worship real wit. I thirst for the unusual, the deadpan, the acknowledging of one thing while another slips in unseen. Wit has been, for me, a shield and a tool for good. I try not to use it as a weapon because wit as a weapon often damages a wider target than one intends. I strive to endow my fictional women, my protagonists, with sharp yet understated wit that spares no one, not even themselves. Especially not themselves. The books I recommend here live up to my standards.
Socialite Nora Charles helps guide her husband to discovering the truth about the eponymous “thin man” via artful suggestions, one-liner putdowns, and plenty of cocktails, and that’s why I love this book. Although Nick Charles is the main detective in this 1934 romp by Dashiell Hammett, Nora is instrumental in helping him make decisions of all sorts. The biting dialogue elevates this book above the genre norms of the time.
Nora’s comment on an impending Christmas gift from her husband:
“Whatever you’re giving me,” she said, “I hope I don’t like it.”
This one single novel sparked all those great movies with William Powell and Myrna Loy, in which Nora shines ever more brightly. The novel was a comedy of manners but, sadly, was also Hammett’s last.
'When I opened my eyes and sat up in bed Nora was shaking me and a man with a gun in his hand was standing in the bedroom doorway.'
Ex-detective Nick Charles attracts trouble like a magnet. He thinks his sleuthing days are over, but when Julia Wolf, a former acquaintance, is found dead, her body riddled with bullets, Nick - along with his glamorous wife, Nora - can't resist making a few enquiries. Clyde Miller Wynant, Julia's lover and boss, has disappeared. Everyone is after him, but Nick is not convinced Wynant is the murderer - and when he…
I’m a 23-year city cop who spends a fair amount of time around hard cases, from veteran co-workers to repeat felons. I’ve always been fascinated by formidable fictional heroes who succeed despite overwhelming odds. It’s an art to create a protagonist who is memorably and realistically resilient. I strove for this in my debut novel. The authors above delivered and then some.
Child’s Jack Reacher is a classic knight errant, strong, resourceful, and courageous who has headlined dozens of books. But this book stands out because, in the finale, he squares off with a formidable opponent with a hook for a hand.
Reacher struggles to stay conscious during this standoff because he has a woodworking nail stuck in his head, shrapnel from a shotgun blast, that is inexorably shutting down his brain and body. I will remember that passage for quite some time.
Jack Reacher hunts the hunter in the third novel in Lee Child's #1 New York Times bestselling series.
DON'T MISS REACHER ON PRIME VIDEO!
Ex military policeman Jack Reacher is enjoying the lazy anonymity of Key West when a stranger shows up asking for him. He's got a lot of questions. Reacher does too, especially after the guy turns up dead. The answers lead Reacher on a cold trail back to New York, to the tenuous confidence of an alluring woman, and the dangerous corners of his own past.
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
When I was nine years old, I joined a book club. The members were me and my dad. He’d throw detective books into my room when he was done with them, and I’d read them. We’d never discuss them. But that’s why hard-boiled detective fiction is comfort food for me and how I know it so well. I’ve been binging on it most of my life and learning everything the shamus-philosophers had to teach me. Now I write my own, the Ben Ames series, for the joy of paying it forward.
You know what I like about Donald Strachey? His boyfriend. I’m kidding—Strachey’s fine.
He’s a smart, tough detective in the hard-boiled tradition so of course I like him, but do you ever think way more of someone because they had the good taste to pick the partner they did? Timothy Callahan is a Jesuit-educated political aide, former Peace Corps volunteer and one of those characters who gets called a “moral centre” because they are one.
I was half in love with him before he (accurately) dissed Mother Teresa but I adored him after that. I came to the Strachey books for canny, realistic and never twee gay detective fiction but I’ve stayed for Timmy. He’s a soothing, reaffirming, hilarious wonder and you never know—he might smack-talk Gandhi next.
Shocked to discover the body of the grandson of the godfather of Albany's political machine in his car, P.I. Donald Strachey knows he is in for trouble. But when he learns that the murder victim left a $2.5 million legacy with instructions that it be used to destroy that machine, along with a personal letter to Strachey asking for his help, his suspicions are confirmed. Faced with power-brokers at all levels, Albany's only gay P.I. tries to fulfill the dead man's mission-with his own survival at stake.
I love to read mysteries, particularly those with recurring characters. As a lawyer with experience in criminal law and teaching college law courses, I particularly appreciate cerebral detectives and legal maneuvers, and active investigators doing legwork for cerebral types. When I write, my recurring characters come first, followed by the case plots that those characters would find interesting. I always have some ideas of where the case is going and what procedures would be followed from my legal experience. Still, my detectives seem to inspire scenes and activities that show off their particular virtues and personalities as the investigations proceed. This seems to be what happens in the detective stories I am recommending.
The intricacies of the investigation multiply, but all of the clues are laid before the reader, though often veiled. The suspects are intriguing characters. Poirot, the little Belgian, is arrogant, but his arrogance seems justified by his brilliant investigative insights.
I love this complex character immersed in a complex mystery. This is classic Christie.
Car brakes fail A boulder misses Accidents? Or not?
On holiday in Cornwall, Poirot meets a pretty young woman with an unusual name, 'Nick' Buckley.
Upon discovering a bullet-hole in Nick's sun hat, the great detective decides the girl needs his protection. He also begins to unravel the mystery of a murder that hasn't been committed. Yet.
When I make a snarky remark during a party, chances are one person will catch my eye with the amused look that says, “I saw what you did there.” Everyone else will keep right on talking. But in a book, the reader is right there in the character’s head, which lets your audience catch those subtle humorous comments. In my mystery series, The Accidental Detective, Kate shares witty observations about life with the reader – making Kate funnier than I am. I don’t do as much slapstick and joking (in life or in fiction), but I enjoy writers who pull off those forms of humor well. Humor makes life’s challenges bearable
In this historical mystery set in the 1920s, the hero-narrator is likable and a bit goofy. He reminded me of Bertie Wooster in the Jeeves stories by PG Wodehouse, but Heathcliff is more intelligent. The mystery was complicated and puzzling, with added fun from the 1920s setting. It’s hard to investigate when phone lines are down and roads become impassable in poor weather. I've read the rest of the series, and they’re all pretty strong. Some move the action to Scotland or Egypt for extra 1920s travel excitement. They’re perfect reads when you want a light cozy with historical charm and some chuckles along the way.
It's 1920 and Christmas is coming. Major Lennox finds a body on his doorstep - why on his doorstep? Was it to do with the Countess? Was it about the ruby necklace? Lennox goes to Melrose Court home to his uncle, Lord Melrose, to uncover the mystery. But then the murders begin and it snows and it all becomes very complicated....
Major Heathcliff Lennox, ex-WW1 war pilot, six feet 3 inches, tousled, dark blond hair, age around 30 - named after the hero of Wuthering Heights by his romantically minded mother - much…
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the world’s most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the book…
Flannery O’Connor once said that all fiction is ultimately about the “mystery of personality.” I agree. In fact, I have always suspected that all good novels, genre-based or otherwise, are secretly mystery novels, if only in the psychological sense. Conversely, many so-called genre novels have just as much depth, insight, and realism as any literary work. I have read a lot of genre and literary fiction in my time, and I have long been fascinated by works that blur the line between the two. My favorite kind of book is one that feels like a genre novel (that is, it has a great plot) but also has the depth and vividness of a literary novel.
If there is one central defining quality of noir crime fiction, it is the main character’s struggle to preserve his moral center in a fundamentally corrupt and evil world. The best P.I. novels are able to render this kind of character in brushstrokes that are both beautiful and subtle.
One of my favorites is Ross Macdonald’s Lew Archer, first introduced in this novel. When Archer is hired to find a missing rich guy in a tony, Southern California beach town, he finds himself knee-deep in violence, greed, and deceit, uncertain of who is guilty, who he can trust, and even who is worth saving. A moving target, indeed.
The first book in Ross Macdonald's acclaimed Lew Archer series introduces the detective who redefined the role of the American private eye and gave the crime novel a psychological depth and moral complexity only hinted at before.
Like many Southern California millionaires, Ralph Sampson keeps odd company. There's the sun-worshipping holy man whom Sampson once gave his very own mountain; the fading actress with sidelines in astrology and S&M. Now one of Sampson's friends may have arranged his kidnapping.
As Lew Archer follows the clues from the canyon sanctuaries of the megarich to jazz joints where you get beaten up…
