Here are 16 books that Ghosts fans have personally recommended if you like
Ghosts.
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I loved RF Kuang's Babel last year, and I loved this complete change of pace this year! Kuang addresses issues of cultural appropriation, race, representation, authorship, and scandal. She also manages to make the book compelling in spite of it's rather loathsome main character and subvert some fictional tropes that readers might expect.
The No. 1 Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller from literary sensation R.F. Kuang
*A Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick*
'Propulsive' SUNDAY TIMES
'Razor-sharp' TIME
'A wild ride' STYLIST
'Darkly comic' GQ
'A riot' PANDORA SYKES
'Hard to put down, harder to forget' STEPHEN KING
Athena Liu is a literary darling and June Hayward is literally nobody.
White lies When Athena dies in a freak accident, June steals her unpublished manuscript and publishes it as her own under the ambiguous name Juniper Song.
Dark humour But as evidence threatens June's stolen success, she will discover exactly how far she…
The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.
The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.
Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…
The prose is so confident and evocative, the plot intricate and original, the world-building vivid and lush, and the pacing steady and sure-footed. I highly recommend this for Asian fantasy lovers!
Princess Lu knows that the throne of the Empire of the First Flame rightfully belongs to her. After all, she is the late Emperor's firstborn and has trained for the role all her life. And she can't forget made a promise to shapeshifter Nok, the boy she came to love, to win justice for his now powerless people. But even with an army at her side, Lu will need to face down a major obstacle: the current sitting Empress, her once beloved younger sister, Min.
Princess Min used to live in Lu's shadow. But now she can control a powerful,…
I'm a huge anglophile, and I love Dolly's writing, so I knew I'd love this book. But if you'd told me I was going to read a story about a failing, male standup comic who just got dumped and can't let it go--I wouldn't think it was my thing. But I loved this character. I understood him, I wanted him to win, I loved walking the streets with him, I loved hanging out in his world, even though it wasn't his happiest time. Endearingly melodramatic like a funny friend who just got dumped.
'Funny - of course it's funny - but also smart, insightful and sincere about heartbreak' David Nicholls, author of One Day
'A novel to be devoured, adored, underlined ... if only more books made you laugh as much as this' The i
'The author of Everything I Know About Love nails the zeitgeist with a witty, relatable and acutely insightful page-turner about the trials and tribulations of the lovelorn' Daily Express
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Every relationship has one beginning. This one has two endings.
Andy loves Jen. Jen loved Andy. And he can't work out why she stopped.
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
Throughout my childhood and young adulthood, I escaped an abusive real life by reading stories that transported me away. They were written by female authors who seemed to speak directly to me. By their example, they told me to be brave and strong. To keep learning. They taught that if I rose to the challenges that presented themselves, I too would end up triumphant like them.
Walls’ recounts her unconventional childhood marked by poverty, instability, and the eccentric choices of her parents.
The memoir offers an unflinching but often tender portrait of a deeply flawed family and the complicated bonds of love and loyalty. Walls’s voice is both clear-eyed and compassionate as she revisits her past.
Wanting to make sense of my own dysfunctional family, I reread this book several times.
Now a major motion picture starring Brie Larson, Naomi Watts and Woody Harrelson.
This is a startling memoir of a successful journalist's journey from the deserted and dusty mining towns of the American Southwest, to an antique filled apartment on Park Avenue. Jeanette Walls narrates her nomadic and adventurous childhood with her dreaming, 'brilliant' but alcoholic parents.
At the age of seventeen she escapes on a Greyhound bus to New York with her older sister; her younger siblings follow later. After pursuing the education and civilisation her parents sought to escape, Jeanette eventually succeeds in her quest for the 'mundane,…
The funny, touching and unpredictable No. 1 New York Times bestseller, now a major Netflix TV series
'A brilliant and comforting read' MATT HAIG 'Funny, compassionate and wise. An absolute joy' A.J. PEARCE 'A surefooted insight into the absurdity, beauty and ache of life' GUARDIAN 'I laughed, I sobbed, I recommended it to literally everyone I know' BUZZFEED 'Captures the messy essence of being human' WASHINGTON POST
From the 18 million copy internationally bestselling author of A Man Called Ove _______
It's New Year's Eve and House Tricks estate agents are hosting an open viewing in an up-market apartment when…
I’ve felt like a fish out of water for most of my life. My mom’s English and my dad’s from Pennsylvania, so growing up it was always difficult to figure out who I was, where was “home.” So I always felt uneasy and self-conscious about not fitting in, wherever I happened to be. I always felt vaguely homesick for somewhere else. Reading was one way I could escape, travel was another, more literal way. Which is how I ended up in South Africa, where I eventually got my master's in journalism/international politics. (And my adventures there, of course, led to my book.)
I love that this book does such a great job of capturing the many incongruities and quirks of life in South Africa, a country with such a complex, troubled history that it is still struggling to reconcile.
It’s a country of immense diversity (racially, politically, and culturally), which leads to some absurd situations. Some funny, some tragic. And it’s set against an incredibly unique and beautiful natural backdrop, and it’s at the bottom of the world, literally representing the global south/periphery. So there’s a ton of dramatic tension inherent.
I also relate with Noah’s story just in terms of the cross-cultural element; growing up with parents from different places and never quite fitting in. And yet he tackles these very serious, very bleak situations and experiences, at both the micro and macro levels, with humor.
The compelling, inspiring, (often comic) coming-of-age story of Trevor Noah, set during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed.
One of the comedy world's brightest new voices, Trevor Noah is a light-footed but sharp-minded observer of the absurdities of politics, race and identity, sharing jokes and insights drawn from the wealth of experience acquired in his relatively young life. As host of the US hit show The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, he provides viewers around the globe with their nightly dose of biting satire, but here Noah turns his…
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…
Throughout my childhood and young adulthood, I escaped an abusive real life by reading stories that transported me away. They were written by female authors who seemed to speak directly to me. By their example, they told me to be brave and strong. To keep learning. They taught that if I rose to the challenges that presented themselves, I too would end up triumphant like them.
Raised in a survivalist family that rejected formal education and medical care, Westover never entered a classroom until age 17.
Her journey from rural Idaho to earning a PhD from Cambridge is a remarkable story of transformation through self-education, resilience, and the pursuit of truth, even when it means questioning your origins.
Like Westover’s father, my father held very strong beliefs separating us from others. But we both instinctively know there was more to life.
Selected as a book of the year by AMAZON, THE TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, GUARDIAN, NEW YORK TIMES, ECONOMIST, NEW STATESMAN, VOGUE, IRISH TIMES, IRISH EXAMINER and RED MAGAZINE
'One of the best books I have ever read . . . unbelievably moving' Elizabeth Day 'An extraordinary story, beautifully told' Louise O'Neill 'A memoir to stand alongside the classics . . . compelling and joyous' Sunday Times
Tara Westover grew up preparing for the end of the world. She was never put in school, never taken to the doctor. She did not even have a birth certificate…
As a writer, I love watching people, imagining their worlds and lives. Aside from the outdoor cafés of Paris (which are hard to get to), one of the best places for people-watching is a good bar. All five of the characters I’ve listed would make wonderful conversation companions for a bar evening, because of their energy, quirkiness, intelligence, and/or observational skills. (Also, I’d just want to get to know them better.) And as a recovering alcoholic with enough sobriety that sitting at a bar all night, sipping seltzer would not be a problem, I could watch what these characters reveal about themselves once alcohol lowers their ordinary defenses.
When I sent my agent the first few chapters of a memoir I was writing, she told me to begin a different project. “You’re not famous, and you don’t have a distinctive, unforgettable voice like Mary Karr.” Harsh words, but so true. No one writes like Mary Karr. Her narration of her hardscrabble, traumatic upbringing in West Texas combines harsh truth, horror, and humor. The book is evidence that real life can be far more fantastical and engaging than fiction.
I always love writers who play with language, and Mary Karr is an expert at creating wild and giddy combinations of words to present indelible images. She uses her poetic sensibility to distance herself from difficult memories, making it easier for me to read about them. When, for example, her mentally ill mother abandons the family without notice and returns several days later, everyone is so relieved, they can’t stop…
#4 on The New York Times' list of The 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years
The New York Times bestselling, hilarious tale of a hardscrabble Texas childhood that Oprah.com calls the best memoir of a generation
"Wickedly funny and always movingly illuminating, thanks to kick-ass storytelling and a poet's ear." -Oprah.com
The Liars' Club took the world by storm and raised the art of the memoir to an entirely new level, bringing about a dramatic revival of the form. Karr's comic childhood in an east Texas oil town brings us characters as darkly hilarious as any of J.…
I think I sometimes get in trouble for saying this, but the truth is, I don’t give a shit about the likability of characters, whether I’m reading or writing. I’m here for a good time, not a long time. Because of that, fiction is the most riveting for me when interesting characters start making bad decisions. Any good narrative train wreck must create tension that keeps ratcheting up in its pages, and these are some of the books that do that most expertly, in my opinion. So, grab something to hold onto while you go on some of my favorite wild rides.
This book is chaos-defined, and I felt absolutely giddy when I first read it. Olivie Blake knows what readers want, and her books are not afraid to speak to their id. How could I not love a school of twentysomething lust-filled, murderous magicians?
It is also happy to scratch the romance itch; it’s the rare book where it feels like any two characters could have a romantic relationship, and many do. Even better, it’s full of delicious twists and betrayals and never lets its characters off the hook.
An Instant New York Times Bestseller A Goodreads Best Fantasy Choice Award Nominee
The much-acclaimed viral sensation from Olivie Blake, The Atlas Six—now newly revised and edited with additional content.
• The tag #theatlassix has millions of views on TikTok • A dark academic debut fantasy with an established cult following that reads like The Secret History meets The Umbrella Academy • The first in an explosive trilogy • Indigo's Top 10 Most Anticipated Sci-Fi & Fantasy Books of 2022 • Tor.com's Most Anticipated SFF of 2022
Each decade, only the six most uniquely talented magicians are selected to earn…
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 can't be the only one to see men with power manipulate their status to hold back others. This isn’t just a Hollywood thing. A Sunday supplement piece by a young gay actor about his troubled life with a leading director struck a chord. Fate led me to him, and he connected me with others who shared off-the-record stories of exploitation and ambition. I wanted to tell these tales but not launch yet another bad news book into an already battered world. I aimed to create something accessible and engaging, darkly funny while shining a light on Hollywood's underbelly.
After 608 days, Maggie is single again and almost 30–two things that give cause for concern and reflection. Thankfully, Maggie takes no blame for either thing happening and plows on, determined to find the pearl in the gritty oyster her life has become.
I laughed, but I also found myself filled with sad recognition of how we all too often set goals we’ll never score, only to find that halfway home is where the heart is.
The No. 2 SUNDAY TIMES Bestseller
An Observer Best Debut of the Year
'Intoxicating ... heralds a really good author to watch' The Times
'Hilarious and profound' Dolly Alderton, author of Everything I Know About Love
'Wildly funny and almost alarmingly relatable' Marian Keyes, author of Again, Rachel
'Monica Heisey is a genius' Nina Stibbe, author of Reasons to be Cheerful
One of the most hotly anticipated, hilarious and addictive debut novels of 2023, from Schitt's Creek and Workin' Moms screenwriter and electric new voice in fiction, Monica Heisey.
I feel like when you get a divorce everyone's wondering how…
