73 Books Like Heartbreaker

I love stories where the heroes are facing great challenges. In One Perfect Rose, as the story begins, Stephen Kenyon, Duke of Ashburton, has just learned from his doctor that he has only a short time left to live. Shocked, he runs from his wealthy world and wanders the country as an ordinary man. When he rescues a young boy who had been swept away by a flood, he is embraced by the boy’s family and finds all that he had been missing in his life—the warmth of a family and our heroine, Rosalind. His hidden past and his knowledge of his impending death made this a page-turner for me.

As the story begins, Jackson Rule is being released from prison after serving fifteen years for a crime he confessed to. Since he’s our hero, I knew right then he had to be innocent, and I was hooked. Who was he protecting?  He gets hired by a preacher’s daughter, Rebecca, who has misgivings about hiring him. He proves himself to be a hard worker, and Rebecca also discovers that there’s something exciting about him that she can’t resist.

The hero Mitchell Shaw is a Navy SEAL, but as the story begins, he wakes up in a homeless shelter with amnesia. He does have a gun in his boot and money, too, but no clue how he got there. He finds a note that says “Looking forward to meeting you.”—Rebecca Keyes, the Lazy Eight Ranch. He heads for the ranch, hoping it will help him figure out who he really is. What a great hero!

In a list about zombie apocalypse references, this is definitely a quirky entry. But it is important for all writers to read outside of their genre, or they run the risk of becoming generic. 

Far more important than the story’s backdrop is the story’s focus. People predominantly care and read about people.

Whether that means writing about people resisting zombies, as is the case with most zombie stories, or writing about zombies doing their best to become human—as seen in Elantris and The Girl With All The Gifts—writers need to know how to tell stories about people.

I don’t write books about zombies, I write books about families. And there is probably no more famous family right now than the Bridgertons (though if I had one more recommendation, it would definitely be Swiss Family Robinson).

By reading books about strong families, I’m better able to translate my own… show more.

Garrow’s Pulitzer-prize winning biography is the first complete, almost minute-by-minute, account of King’s life based on extensive research in the King documents, interviews with dozens of his associates, and a deep understanding of American history in that period. Garrow picks up the story just as King comes to Montgomery, and there are other books to read about the young King before 1954, but from there forward, Garrow’s is the indispensable account, and was the first book to really delve into the FBI’s surveillance of King.

The delight of this book is in the characters of the two sisters, and the character development/coming-of-age arc of the hero.

We have two sisters in a little village (living in the Small House at Allington). They are very different, but both delightful - one sought by a cousin she can't care for, the other jilted by a casual gallant.

As I've written elsewhere, the plot is Austenesque and the writing not far inferior - the dialogue instantly transports one to the period, to the village, and every character is cleverly drawn. It was first published in serial form, so there are no boring bits. There's a satirical portrait of high society, too, and the men are much better-developed than is generally the case in the period. There's a HEA, but not necessarily the one expected!! Highly recommended!

For a long time, I assumed that I would find these three novellas about churchmen and parishioners in the English countryside of the late 18th and early 19th centuries sleepy and dull. They’re anything but. Eliot depicts the presence of alcoholism, spousal abuse, loneliness, and life-damaging gossip in her fictional communities. But her signature empathy and wit, already on display in this early work, make it invigorating, not a downer.

I adore sweeping family sagas with strong women characters and with tragedy, romance, and heartache set in Australia, The Thorn Birds is a beautiful example of the genre.

Meggie is rebellious and headstrong and makes questionable choices, but we empathize and root for her. All the well-rounded characters each come with their own secrets that will keep you turning pages.

Look. I could tell you it’s a modern-day gothic. I could tell you it wields its heresy to illuminate the true meaning of God. I could tell you she writes with the clarity of an imprisoned martyr watching the pyre being assembled outside her window. But, really, I just want you to know that I read Sierra Simone with a goofy smile on my face, marveling at how she makes the bonkers believable. She’s a surreal realist. There’s an energy here that’s simply unmatched. The book vibrates. And if you make it through Priest, might I suggest her New Camelot trilogy, which tackles the only thing more sacred than the Catholic church: the American presidency.

Whether it’s moving onto a new home, job, school, or cellphone, we can all relate to upheaval. Having done much of the latter, I get why young Turner Buckminster doesn’t like Maine much. He sees his life on one trajectory, and now he’s cut adrift on another.

I’m in awe of the way Gary D. Schmidt uses this simple setup to tell a wider story of a friendship that develops between Turner and local black girl Lizzie Bright Griffin that transcends the harsh racism of the times.

The gut punch came when I learned the basis of this book is the true history of Malaga Island, Maine, where an entire village of nearly fifty people was uprooted. Some, like Lizzie, were condemned to life in a mental institution.