Here are 100 books that Kick Back fans have personally recommended if you like
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I am a writer who will never give you a sad ending! I love books that reflect on life (the good and the bad) but that look for the positive in people. My experience has taught me that there is so much good to find—and as I explore in my debut novel, The Keeper of Stories, everyone has a story to tell. My first novel was published when I was 60, so I am also a believer that you should never underestimate anyone. And I love to see that reflected in books.
My mother had every one of Georgette Heyer’s regency novels, and I inherited them. They are witty, romantic, and satisfying. When I feel sad I dive beneath their covers and lose myself in them. I also remember my mum. The Grand Sophy was her favourite, it is the story of an extraordinary young woman who has a gift for sorting out other people’s problems – whether they want her to or not!
If you love Bridgerton, you'll love Georgette Heyer!
'The greatest writer who ever lived' ANTONIA FRASER 'One of my perennial comfort authors. Heyer's books are as incisively witty and quietly subversive as any of Jane Austen's' JOANNE HARRIS 'Absolutely delicious tales of Regency heroes. . . Utter, immersive escapism' SOPHIE KINSELLA __________________
The charming Sophia Stanton-Lacy is a force to be reckoned with.
When Sophy is sent to stay with her London relatives, she finds her cousins in quite the tangle.
Cecilia is besotted with an attractive but feather-brained poet, Hubert has fallen foul of a money-lender, and the ruthlessly…
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 feel like I’ve read all of my life—though I know at some point someone had to teach me—but stories and storytelling are in my DNA. The first four books were my writing “primers.” I learned more about storytelling from them than any how-to book. They also fueled my passion to write in different genres. You will notice the words “blush free” in some of my recommendations. That is because I love well-told stories that live between prim and steamy, books where I don’t have to flip past the steamy stuff to get back to the story. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have!
I found The Moon-Spiners through a Disney movie of the same name (book was better). When I found out it was also a book, I went hunting at my local library and fell in love with the way Stewart immediately pulled me into her stories, evoking awe, fear, laughter ,and romance. She wafted me away to exotic places, and into exciting and romantic adventures with strong female characters. I went on to read all her books, even the Arthurian ones, but her romantic suspense books remain my favorites and the ones I turn to when I need a comfortable visit with old fictional friends.
Impetuous and attractive, Nicola Ferris has just arrived in Crete for a holiday when she sees an egret fly out of a lemon grove. On impulse, she follows the bird’s path into the White Mountains. There she discovers a young Englishman who, hiding out in the hills and less than pleased to have been discovered, sends Nicola packing with the order to keep out of his affairs. This, of course, Nicola is unable to do, and before long events lead to a stunning climax among the fishing boats of Agios Georgios Bay.
In this bestselling novel, first published in 1963…
I love reading crime but oh, it does annoy me when an otherwise competent sensible female detective insists on going into the lonely house to tackle the murderer without backup, and needs to be rescued by her male sidekick. Cass is the cool-in-a-crisis heroine we’d all like to be. Like her, I’m a solo sailor (I’ve lent her my yacht for the series) and I’d love to say I’ve learned to be quick-thinking, self-reliant, and prudent—the sea doesn’t forgive stupidity. I also live in a village where everyone sees the lifeboat going out, and having to be rescued would be the ultimate embarrassment.
Through Covid I revisited childhood favourites, and found I still loved this series. Cathy has grown up in a Birmingham orphanage, and the only clues to her identity are a locket with a portrait of a Highland lady and a torn luggage label. She escapes north, where she meets Ian and Sovra. They spend their time messing about in their boat on the loch or camping in a remote bothy. Their determination to help Cathy gets them all into trouble, but it’s Cathy’s own character that gives her the chance of a happy ending.
In this, the third Ian and Sovra story, the pair discover that life in Edinburgh can be as thrilling as life in their own Western Highlands. For there they meet Cathie, who's escaped from an orphanage. They smuggle her out to a secret hut on the coast, where, after her rides in lorries and rolls of carpet, she's only too delighted to enjoy the free outdoor life of her new friends, while Ian and Sovra do a spot of detection for her. How they solved the mystery and found that this land of mountains, lochs and white sand really was…
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…
I love reading crime but oh, it does annoy me when an otherwise competent sensible female detective insists on going into the lonely house to tackle the murderer without backup, and needs to be rescued by her male sidekick. Cass is the cool-in-a-crisis heroine we’d all like to be. Like her, I’m a solo sailor (I’ve lent her my yacht for the series) and I’d love to say I’ve learned to be quick-thinking, self-reliant, and prudent—the sea doesn’t forgive stupidity. I also live in a village where everyone sees the lifeboat going out, and having to be rescued would be the ultimate embarrassment.
This one’s my go-to fantasy world when I feel middle-aged. Bett runs a mysterious team whose skills include hacking, guns, gadgets, and flying helicopters. When scientist Ross Fleming disappears from his arms research job, Bett calls in the person he knows will do anything to save Ross: his mother, bored housewife Jane Fleming who dreams of adventure. Leaving a trail of broken laws behind her, she gets herself illegally into France to join Bett, where her dreams start coming true: a sports car, a transmitter disguised as an earring, a casino, and a gun she now knows how to fire... and it’s all narrated with Brookmyre’s trademark humour.
As a teenager Jane Bell had dreamt of playing in the casinos of Monte Carlo in the company of James Bond, but in her punk phase she'd got herself pregnant and by the time she reaches forty-six she's a grandmother, her dreams as dry as the dust her Dyson sucks up from her hall carpet every day. Then her son Ross, a researcher working for an arms manufacturer in Switzerland, is forced to disappear before some characters cut from the same cloth as Blofeld persuade him to part with the secrets of his research. But they are not the only…
The North of England is home. I was born here, I work here and it’s where I will see out my days. It’s a place with its own character, a place largely forged on hard industrial work and one trying to find a new purpose after decades of financial neglect. My home city of Hull captures this in miniature as we’ve shared a journey over the last decade via my novels from 'UK Crap Town of the Year’ to ‘UK City of Culture.’ Tied in with my background in studying Social Policy and Criminology, I’ll continue to map the city and the region’s trials and tribulations.
Set in Manchester, Ray Banks’s gift to us is a razor-sharp contemporary Private Investigator series, a relative rarity within the UK crime writing scene. His surly PI, Cal Innes, may be battered and bruised, but his big heart continues to beat. Finding himself in the centre of a racist uprising in the city, it’s a place that needs a hero and he’s going to be the man who rises to the occasion. Using the classic PI template created by the great US writers, it showed me that I could also adapt the format and apply it to my own writing and PI, Joe Geraghty.
It's Manchester's hottest summer on record and while Callum Innes evicts families on behalf of local slum lord Donald Plummer, the English National Socialists stir up racial tensions to breaking point. A firebomb attack at a Plummer property thrusts Innes into the spotlight as he saves a child from the burning building. But when Plummer enlists his help to track down the arsonists, Innes finds himself dealing with more than the ENS and his rapidly overwhelming codeine addiction. Time's running out and the temperature keeps rising. Manchester needs a hero and Callum Innes is the closest it has.
I’m a private eye. No, I don’t carry a gun. Or trail around after cheating spouses. In fact, the job is way more interesting than that, in a truth-is-stranger-than-fiction way. So it’s a pleasure to recommend these books that tell private eye life as it really is. One is written by a private eye, three others are written about us, and one more is a remarkable investigation itself, but they all ring true about the mystery that is private detective work. On days when even I can’t believe my job, I turn to these books for inspiration, information, and reality checks too. I hope you enjoy them as I do.
Fictional lady detectives are sexy and fascinating, we can all agree. But what about real life? That’s the question asked and answered in this non-fiction book by brilliant crime writer Val McDermid, who lavishes her attention and experience over nearly 300 interview-packed pages to explore all the ways in which private investigation is – thank you – a very suitable job for a woman indeed. “Smart, strong and sure of themselves, they walk the mean streets to their own beat,” Val concludes. When I think of my friends who, like me, are real-life women PIs, I have to say Val McDermid has done her detective work – because that sounds exactly right.
""But down these mean streets must go a man who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished or afraid."" When Raymond Chandler wrote these words in his classic The Simple Art of Murder, he drew a blueprint for the male private eyes who descend from Philip Marlowe to populate the world of crime fiction. But what if the private eye is a woman? And what if she is not a character in a novel but a real, working investigator testing not only the meanness but the absurdity of life on seamy streets? Who will tell her story?
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…
I have been reading cozy mysteries since I was 8 years old. That’s over fifty years now, and I love, love, love them. Partly it’s the history: the setting and era so different from my own, and partly it’s the mystery element, I love to try to get to the answer before the sleuth, so that I can nod sagely and say, ‘I thought so.’ It’s also about people going through tough times, and seeing how those times can make or break them. I relate so much to their struggles with everyday life, and trying to fit an investigation around romance or vice versa, often during wartime.
The strengths of Wentworth’s books lie in the portrayal of the era, and in the characters who are forced to find their way through unfamiliar and difficult circumstances. They are not all wealthy, they are not all high-born, and we watch them as they try to adapt to wartime conditions and deprivations.
Wentworth’s mysteries are fascinating, clever, with the protagonist Miss Silver, a spinster who is a professional ‘private enquiry agent’. The Listening Eye, I feel, contains some of the most acute observations of human nature, and this makes the characters just seem so relatable. Wentworth books are ‘clean’ mysteries with a strong thread of romance, little gore, no bad language, or sexy shenanigans.
No one would ever have guessed that Paulina Paine was deaf, and that her ability to lip-read was astonishing. So the two men who met one day during the showing of a new art exhibition did not realise until too late that the middle-aged tweedy figure sitting out of earshot could understand every word they said. And it had been no ordinary conversation. In fact, Paulina was so shaken by its implications that she went to see Miss Silver straight away.
As the violence escalates, Miss Silver finds herself at a very tense house party where all the guests are…
I write the West Investigations series, a romantic thriller series, centered around the men and women running a private investigations firm. When I began the series I knew I wanted it to be set in an urban city, not just because I’m a city girl at heart, but because of the eclectic nature, diversity, and color that can be found in the big city. Each of the books I’ve recommended below features a big city PI that jumps off the page, grabs you, and doesn’t let go for 200+ pages.
Joe Pike may live in the City of Angels, but he is as far away from angelic as a man can get.
The ex-mercenary turned sometimes PI is tasked with protecting a spoiled Hollywood princess in this gritty, fast-moving novel. Joe has little patience for doing things the conventional way and no compunction about using violence to get what he wants.
Even though his investigatory methods can be destructive, to both him and others, he’s a man you find yourself rooting for…and wondering about. A compelling PI who anyone would want on their team when it really hits the fan.
'Packed with whiplash plot twists and taut dialogue...THE WATCHMAN is as good a psychological test case as it is a thriller' ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
A long time ago, Joe Pike asked for help. In return, he would, one day, be called upon to return the favour, no questions asked. That day has come.
Joe Pike is asked to protect the life of Larkin Conner Barkley, a spoiled rich girl who happens to be a federal witness in a major case. But someone is leaking information about their whereabouts, and the killers are getting all too close. So Pike hatches a plan:…
I’m a private eye. No, I don’t carry a gun. Or trail around after cheating spouses. In fact, the job is way more interesting than that, in a truth-is-stranger-than-fiction way. So it’s a pleasure to recommend these books that tell private eye life as it really is. One is written by a private eye, three others are written about us, and one more is a remarkable investigation itself, but they all ring true about the mystery that is private detective work. On days when even I can’t believe my job, I turn to these books for inspiration, information, and reality checks too. I hope you enjoy them as I do.
When I was investigating the heartless murders that are the central mystery of my book, I discovered that the author of Cool Hand Luke had worked as a private investigator on the case back in 1976. The next afternoon I was on his doorstep. Donn Pearce was kind with his time and his advice. Asked for the key to his success as a PI, Donn said, simply: “I absorb.” Every detail, every moment, observed, evaluated, accounted for. It’s as true a description of detective work as you’ll ever find – and of Cool Hand Luketoo. The book is not a detective story but it is a detective’s masterpiece, a harrowing prison saga told from the inside out in spare and beautiful sentences. Every word feels deeply lived, and so alive.
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…
I'm an actor turned journalist and writer. After a series of roles on low-budget movies and forgettable soap operas, I moved to Latin America to write about travel and life and all the heartbreak and humour it entails. El Flamingo follows the misadventure of a struggling actor who gets mistaken for a rogue assassin in Mexico and is forced to assume the mysterious identity in order to survive. It is a preposterous plot that could never happen in real life, yet the essence of it all was inspired by places I went, people I crossed paths with, and a sense of adventure that, to me, was authentic.
Elvis Cole is the first-person narrator of a classic private eye series set in Los Angeles.
It is fun and unpretentious while being full of sociological truisms. The novels are first and foremost crime thrillers, but the comedic voice and observations make for a somewhat genre-bending experience every single read.
The second blistering Elvis Cole novel from the bestselling author of RACING THE LIGHT
'Brilliant... read this, then read all his others' Mirror
Bradley Warren had lost something very valuable, something that belonged to someone else: a rare thirteenth-century Japanese manuscript called the Hagakure.
Everything PI Elvis Cole knew about Japanese culture he'd learned from reading SHOGUN, but he knew a lot of crooks - and what he didn't know, his sidekick Joe Pike did.
Together, Cole and Pike begin their search in L.A.'s Little Tokyo, the nest of the notorious Japanese mafia, the Yakuza - and find themselves caught…
