Here are 93 books that Far from the Light of Heaven fans have personally recommended if you like
Far from the Light of Heaven.
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My debut novel,The Sleepless, is a sci-fi noir story born out of my passion for both speculative fiction and crime fiction. I grew up devouring Marvel comics and Ray Bradbury and Agatha Christie, and those were some of my strongest influences when I finally decided to write my own stories. As a queer immigrant and a person of color, I was also influenced by the lives of people who live these identities, as much as I was influenced by my career as a lawyer in the immigration, criminal, and civil rights fields.
Noir can sometimes be hard to identify, but most readers are familiar with the tropes: the put-upon private investigator, the case that he can’t walk away from, the hunt for leads, the twists and double-crosses. With Hammers on Bone, we get all the aesthetics of a hardboiled detective story but also: Lovecraftian monsters. Noir stories lay bare individual and collective moral failings, and in adding eldritch horrors, the book further externalizes those ills, showing how monstrous humans can be.
Hammers on Bone by Cassandra Khaw is a novella that melds the hardboiled detective novel with Lovecraftian monsters. Our private dick, John Persons, is hired by a ten-year-old kid to off his abusive stepfather. From this classic noir setup, to the character voice and dialect, to the shady characters, to the twists and reversals, this book really keys into the strengths of the genre, and amplifies them even further with…
Cassandra Khaw bursts onto the scene with Hammers on Bone, a hard-boiled horror show that Charles Stross calls "possibly the most promising horror debut of 2016." A finalist for the British Fantasy award and the Locus Award for Best Novella!
John Persons is a private investigator with a distasteful job from an unlikely client. He’s been hired by a ten-year-old to kill the kid’s stepdad, McKinsey. The man in question is abusive, abrasive, and abominable.
He’s also a monster, which makes Persons the perfect thing to hunt him. Over the course of his ancient, arcane existence, he’s hunted gods and…
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…
I’ve always been attracted to strange things. When I was a kid, I loved to picnic in graveyards and make up stories about the people buried there. I think I gravitate toward the strange because it’s an escape from the gray every day. The best horror writing fills readers with wonder, opens the door to that magical question, ‘what if?’ But being truly engaged depends on caring about what happens to the characters in a book. That’s why I chose Horror with A Heart as my theme. I like horror with well-developed characters, people that matter to me. People who I could imagine as my friends.
Just when I thought I was done with vampires, Silvia Moreno-Garcia’sCertain Dark Things came along.
I was burned out on the genre. Most of the characters in vampire stories are rich, privileged, and frankly, not that interesting. Atl, the main character in Certain Dark Things, is the exception.
A descendant of Aztec blood drinkers, she finds herself caught between the rival vampire clans that dominate Mexico City. When she develops an unexpected attachment to a street kid named Domingo, her life gets even more complicated.
Domingo could have been nothing but a Renfield, a plaything for her vampire lead. But Moreno-Garcia explores the tender bond that develops between them, a connection that puts both in jeopardy. An engrossing new spin on the vampire tale.
Welcome to Mexico City, an oasis in a sea of vampires. Domingo, a lonely garbage-collecting street kid, is just trying to survive its heavily policed streets when a jaded vampire on the run swoops into his life. Atl, the descendant of Aztec blood-drinkers, is smart and beautiful - and very dangerous. Domingo is mesmerised.
Atl needs to escape the city quickly, to get far away from the rival narco-vampire clan relentlessly pursuing her. Her plan doesn't include Domingo, but little by little, she finds herself warming up to the scrappy young man and his undeniable charm. As the trail of…
I’m primarily a science fiction writer and reader, but mystery is my first literary love, and I was the editor-in-chief of the mystery magazine, Plan B. So, I doubly love it when a mystery story takes place in a science fictional world. In my own work, certain themes keep showing up even when I don’t intend them to because I love them as much as I love a juicy mystery: using technology to change our bodies and environments, the struggle that wealth and corporate greed create, how we can learn to understand someone who is radically different from ourselves. These five books hit all those marks for me.
I don’t care about baseball at all, but I love stories with cybernetic implants, reluctant detectives, and corporate machinations and this book has all of those… plus cyborg baseball. I loved Kobo, the down-on-his-luck baseball scout barely scraping by on his implant maintenance fees, and the mystery he’s sucked into when his childhood best friend (and major league baseball star) dies in the middle of a game. This is the best kind of onion mystery, with layers upon layers of twists and turns, and it’s full of the brain-busting science fictional ideas I love—biological and technological augmentation and their consequences.
Hong Kong society is often regarded as politically apathetic. Yet throughout its history, Hong Kong experienced periodic waves of social movement activity. In part, the perception of an apathetic populace stems from the colonial government's laissez-faire policies, the society's concentration on economic development, the maintenance of traditional Chinese culture, and a consensus that Hong Kong would revert to Chinese sovereignty. Since Hong Kong was a colony, instead of evolving into a democratic government, Great Britain instituted a system of elite consultation and absorption of the masses' political problems through indirect participation. Butenhoff addresses the question of why social movements emerged…
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…
Growing up, I devoured books from two authors, the grande dame of mystery, Agatha Christie, and the science fiction great, Isaac Asimov. Luckily for me, both were prolific. That combination explains what I write, best described as the sleuth story meets speculative fiction. As a reader, when it comes to mysteries I’m always on the lookout for the out of this world. Which doesn't necessarily mean murder on a spaceship, though it can! What breaks the mold could be an unlikely detective, an inventive premise, an unusual setting, a narrative that surprises… Here are five such tales.
Rob Hart’sThe Paradox Hotel is bursting at the seams with interesting characters. The hotel of the title serves the needs of wealthy time tourists on their way to and from the nearby Einstein port. Working security is one January Cole. Her only friend an AI drone, January is grieving a lost love and fast succumbing to a time-travel illness that has her becoming unmoored from the present. Things go from bad to worse when she stumbles on a dead body that only she can see—turns out, it’s quite tricky to solve a murder that hasn’t happened yet. Surprisingly poignant, with moments that made me laugh out loud, and some inventive time travel shenanigans.
“Time travel, murder, corruption, restless baby dinosaurs, and a snarky robot named Ruby collide in this excellent, noir-inflected, humor-infused, science-fiction thriller.”—The Boston Globe
An impossible crime. A detective on the edge of madness. The future of time travel at stake. From the author of The Warehouse . . .
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR, Kirkus Reviews
January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder.
Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly waiting…
I am Australian but have lived in four other countries – England, Nigeria, USA, and Qatar – so I love reading about life overseas. How does the weather impact daily life, from what people wear to the available activities? How does culture influence behavior? Food, from what’s in the supermarket to the menus at local restaurants, can change the flavors and smells in homes and on the street. And what about alcohol? Does banning wine and spirits impact the vibe? (Hint: yes, it does!) These factors play out in my writing, and I love seeing how other authors portray place on the page.
I lived in Lagos for four and a half years, so a mystery in Nigeria grabbed my attention right away. Vanessa’s descriptions are so vivid that I was transported back there on the page.
I loved the insight into the lives of the Nigerwives—women from other countries married to Nigerian men. The power dynamics within the family were fascinating, and even as I wanted to know what happened to the missing Nigerwife, I was just as intrigued by the cultural insights.
“The perfect beach read…catapults you into a world that most of us have never seen before—and will have you glued to every page.” —HuffPost
“White Lotus meets Big Little Lies” (Good Morning America) in this riveting domestic drama about a young woman who goes missing in Lagos, Nigeria, and her estranged auntie who will stop at nothing to find her.
Nicole Oruwari has the perfect life: a handsome husband, a palatial house in the heart of glittering Lagos, and a glamorous group of friends. She left gloomy London and a troubled family past behind…
I’m a mystery/thriller author fascinated by how and why people, especially black women, go missing. I’ve probably watched every episode of Unsolved Mysteries, Dateline, and Forensic Files. For me, the questions are always the same. What led up to their disappearance? And more importantly, who were these women? What’s their backstory? So often, the lives of the missing get lost in the circumstances and details surrounding their disappearances. These five books show how the media ignores missing marginalized women. I hope that these excellent thrillers give readers some much-needed food for thought.
I love thrillers set in foreign locations that give me a glimpse into other cultures, along with a big dose of mystery and intrigue. This book delivers on all fronts.
I could not put this book down. Set in Lagos, Nigeria, I loved the dual points of view of Nicole, the missing British wife of a wealthy Nigerian businessman, and her estranged aunt Claudine, who arrives from London to look for her. The sense of dread, helplessness, and desperation both women experience throughout the book is palpable and devastating, making both characters relatable and well-developed.
This book deftly explores the complications that arise when women, especially black women, go missing in foreign countries.
'I was hooked right through to the shocking end' BERNARDINE EVARISTO
'An excellent read' GUARDIAN
'Beautifully written, immersive, thought-provoking' MARIAN KEYES
'Obsessed' KERRY WASHINGTON
'A shimmering success' DIANA EVANS
THE PERFECT WIFE. THE PERFECT MURDER.
Nicole Oruwari has the perfect life: a handsome husband, a palatial house in the heart of Lagos and a glamorous group of friends. She left London and a troubled family past behind to become part of a community of expat wives.
But when Nicole disappears without a trace after a boat trip, the cracks in her so-called perfect life start to show. As the investigation…
A fake date, romance, and a conniving co-worker you'd love to shut down. Fun summer reading!
Liza loves helping people and creating designer shoes that feel as good as they look. Financially overextended and recovering from a divorce, her last-ditch opportunity to pitch her firm for investment falls flat. Then…
I’ve worked for two decades as a researcher and campaigner to expose the tax behaviour of unscrupulous multinational companies and wealthy individuals, and the central lesson is that we only make progress when the narrative shifts: when the public and policymakers start to appreciate just how much damage is done to our societies by the professional enablers of tax abuse. These books are real narrative-shifters, showing the world to us in ways we need to see, and making it a pleasure.
Eva Joly is one of the great heroes of tax justice, one of my heroes, a campaigning judge who faced down death threats in order to break the extraordinary corruption case of France’s biggest oil company.
But here, she joins forces with the novelist Judith Perrignon to tell a story of corruption that is sharp, ironic, and intelligent, as it runs from Lagos to London, by way of Paris and St Petersburg.
The head of the Nigerian fraud squad is evacuated from Lagos by secret-service operatives. Meanwhile a junior prosecutor in Nice probes the mysterious death of the wife of a powerful banker and a crusading journalist in St Petersburg pursues a corrupt oligarch and his criminal business empire. The paths of all three cross in London, where they find themselves embroiled in violent events obviously linked to financial and political interests and hunted by the oligarch's men, the Western secret services and goons sent by Nigerian oil magnates. A satirical, intelligent and fast-paced thriller set in the world of high finance…
I am an art and architectural historian whose field also includes the histories of cities. My area of specialty is Africa. I am also a professor at Harvard who has lived in Cambridge, Ma. for over 30 years where I have become a civic leader, co-founding the Harvard Square Neighborhood Association to help bring improvements to the city and preserve historic buildings here. I teach a class on Harvard Square (and the city of Cambridge) and following January 6, I felt it was important to rethink the way we teach young people – encouraging them to understand the diversity of all our communities.
This delightful new addition to children’s literature addresses two young cousins, both living in large cities on different continents – one (Olu) in Lagos, Nigeria, and the other (Greta) in Milan Italy – share complementary experiences and differences in their diverse settings – in their lived lives and while they are playing.
The bold, colorful, and wonderfully engaging illustrations that convey the different characters and settings are a key part of the pleasure of reading this book.
The geographical and cultural distance between two cousins is counteracted by the universalities of childhood and the dream of uniting.
Olu lives in Lagos, Nigeria; his cousin, Greta, lives in Milan, Italy. Though their lives may be different, their ways of living and playing are quite similar. They both roller skate; they both skip down the street; they both play with toy trains, trucks, and boats... and they both dream of meeting and being together. Debut author-illustrator Diana Ejaita references her own childhood and heritage to create a rich, poignant, and authentic portrayal of Nigeria, of Italy, and of the…
I’m a serial memoirist (two published, two more to come), and a true fan of well-written memoir. I read all kinds, but my favorites often combine coming-of-age with unusual travel or life choices. I love getting inside the authors’ heads, discovering not just what they did, but why, and how they felt about it later, and what came next. Great memoirs take us out of our own lives and into settings, situations, and perspectives we may never experience. What better way to understand how other people live and move and think and feel? Fiction is fine, but a unique true story hooks me from start to finish.
I lived in Lagos for four years in the early ‘90s and have struggled ever since to describe the strange energy and appeal of this troubled, oft-maligned country.
Noo, a British-raised Nigerian, takes us to 12 Nigerian locations in a quest to understand her roots. Her childhood memories of visits to the homeland weren’t great, and she’s highly attuned to the widespread corruption that afflicts almost every aspect of Nigerian life.
Still, she travels with an open mind, asking questions, seeking mini-adventures, and falling in love-and-exasperation with the loud, outspoken, resilient residents of Africa’s most-populated country.
Her lively account, packed with nuggets of history, culture, and one-of-a-kind encounters and conversations, brought me back to a country that stole my heart when I least expected it. Such a treat!
“Rowdy” Randy Cox, a woman staring down the barrel of retirement, is a curmudgeonly blue-collar butch lesbian who has been single for twenty years and is trying to date again.
At the end of a long, exhausting shift, Randy finds her supervisor, Bryant, pinned and near death at the warehouse…
I discovered science fiction at age nine with Rocketship Galileo and Red Planet and have never lost my love for speculative worlds, even after growing up to follow a career teaching and writing about the history of cities and city planning. In recent years, I’ve also begun to write about the field of SF. So it is one-hundred-percent natural for me to combine the two interests and explore science fiction cities. I try to look beyond the geez-whiz technology of some imagined cities to the ideas of human-scale planning and community that might make them fun places to visit or live in if we could somehow manage to get there.
I get bored when aliens always seem to land on the National Mall in Washington or hover over Los Angeles, so I was delighted to discover that at least one alien ship prefers to land in the lagoon off Lagos, Nigeria.
It’s a city as big or bigger than New York, after all. There is the challenge of dealing with very enigmatic visitors, but the time is the present and readers get a whirlwind tour of one of the world’s megacities. It’s like having the most highspeed guide you can imagine… who happens to be one of the most compelling SF writers today.
Three strangers, each isolated by his or her own problems: Adaora, the marine biologist. Anthony, the rapper famous throughout Africa. Agu, the troubled soldier. Wandering Bar Beach in Lagos, Nigeria's legendary mega-city, they're more alone than they've ever been before.
But when something like a meteorite plunges into the ocean and a tidal wave overcomes them, these three people will find themselves bound together in ways they could never imagine. Together with Ayodele, a visitor from beyond the stars, they must race through Lagos and against time itself in order to save the city, the world... and themselves.
