Here are 100 books that Notes from an Exhibition fans have personally recommended if you like
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I’m a UK bestselling writer of historical fiction who has often used Cornwall as a setting. I wrote about a lost garden and a colony of Edwardian artists in The Memory Garden, about the Second World War in A Gathering Storm and The Hidden Years. My father was Cornish, which meant wonderful childhood holidays spent in the county. I fell in love with its breathtakingly beautiful landscapes - rugged cliffs, picturesque fishing villages, expansive sandy beaches where the sea thunders in. I’ve feasted on its history and legends, and on stories of danger, romance, and adventure set in the region. It’s fulfilled a dream to have written my own.
As a writer I admit that I’m beguiled by Cornwall as a literary setting for high romance and adventure, yet it’s important to me to remember that ordinary people live and work there.
I was impressed by In Her Wake because it manages to encompass both extremes. Its overarching gothic narrative about a stolen child is used by the author to examine the extraordinary experience of some very humble, loving people whose lives have been put into suspension by tragedy. It’s incredibly moving and truthful.
A perfect life ... until she discovered it wasn't her own.
A tragic family event reveals devastating news that rips apart Bella's comfortable existence. Embarking on a personal journey to uncover the truth, she faces a series of traumatic discoveries that take her to the ruggedly beautiful Cornish coast, where hidden truths, past betrayals and a 25-year-old mystery threaten not just her identity, but also her life.
Chilling, complex and profoundly moving, In Her Wake is a gripping psychological thriller that questions the nature of family - and reminds us that sometimes the most shocking crimes are committed closest to…
When the ground shifts, where is one true thing to be found?
Jane, in her twenties, is left parentless when her father dies suddenly; a second shock follows when his Will reveals the existence of a son no-one knew of. Now Wildings, the family home, must be sold.
I’ve always been preoccupied with how personal tragedy, loss, and grief can ultimately teach us truths about existence and our own strength that we might never have learned otherwise. As a child, I was confounded by the fact of death and the transience of life, and as an adult, I’ve spent much time contemplating how literature is able to testify to the magnitude of these things in ways that ordinary language cannot. This interest led me to complete a PhD on the topic of elegiac literature and has also influenced the themes of my own fiction. I hope you find connection and inspiration in the books on this list!
This book is a masterwork of psychological suspense that I love for its unreliable narration, emotional intensity, vivid rendering of character and place, and ingenious plot twists. Just as compelling and atmospheric as du Maurier’s earlier Rebecca, this novel similarly features a central enigma in the form of a shape-shifting woman. Still, its narrator and protagonist is a young man.
Philip Ashley, heir to a Cornish estate, is reckoning with the sudden overseas death of his beloved cousin and guardian, Ambrose, under mysterious circumstances. As he increasingly questions the role Ambrose’s new wife—a mysterious widow named Rachel—might have played in the months leading to his death, the grief-stricken Philip is drawn into a drama of conspiracy, romance, and obsession that will test the limits of his sanity.
NOW A MAJOR FILM STARRING RACHEL WEISZ AND SAM CLAFIN
'Du Maurier is a storyteller whose sole aim is to bewitch and beguile' NEW YORK TIMES
'Du Maurier has no equal' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
' One of her best novels, ingeniously contrived as to plot, successfully realized as to characters' KIRKUS REVIEWS
'I threw the piece of paper on the fire. She saw it burn . . . '
Orphaned at an early age, Philip Ashley is raised by his benevolent cousin, Ambrose. Resolutely single, Ambrose delights in making Philip his heir, knowing he will treasure his beautiful Cornish estate. But…
I’m a UK bestselling writer of historical fiction who has often used Cornwall as a setting. I wrote about a lost garden and a colony of Edwardian artists in The Memory Garden, about the Second World War in A Gathering Storm and The Hidden Years. My father was Cornish, which meant wonderful childhood holidays spent in the county. I fell in love with its breathtakingly beautiful landscapes - rugged cliffs, picturesque fishing villages, expansive sandy beaches where the sea thunders in. I’ve feasted on its history and legends, and on stories of danger, romance, and adventure set in the region. It’s fulfilled a dream to have written my own.
I often write about the Second World War, particularly the roles of women in it. Cornwall is another love, my father being Cornish.
The landscape and the culture have made a huge impression on me and when I read Coming Home I thought, yes, this novel was written for me.
It’s the coming-of-age story of Judith Dunbar. When still a young girl her mother leaves her with an elderly relative near Penzance in order to join Judith’s father in Singapore. After this relative dies Judith has to fend for herself, but is increasingly drawn into the orbit of the charismatic Carey-Lewis family of Nancherrow House. Through her relationship with them she experiences passionate love and betrayal as the storms of war are gathering on the horizon.
For Judith Dunbar, her first glimpse of Nancherrow, her friend Loveday's beautiful family estate on the Cornish coast, is love at first sight - after the rigours of boarding school it spells luxury. She falls in love, too, with all Loveday's family. They treat Judith as one of them. With their generosity and kindness, Judith grows from naive girl to confident young woman basking in the warmth of a surrogate family whose flame of love and affection burns brightly.
But it is a flame soon to be extinguised in the gathering storm of war. In the danger and deprivation of…
When the ground shifts, where is one true thing to be found?
Jane, in her twenties, is left parentless when her father dies suddenly; a second shock follows when his Will reveals the existence of a son no-one knew of. Now Wildings, the family home, must be sold.
I’m a UK bestselling writer of historical fiction who has often used Cornwall as a setting. I wrote about a lost garden and a colony of Edwardian artists in The Memory Garden, about the Second World War in A Gathering Storm and The Hidden Years. My father was Cornish, which meant wonderful childhood holidays spent in the county. I fell in love with its breathtakingly beautiful landscapes - rugged cliffs, picturesque fishing villages, expansive sandy beaches where the sea thunders in. I’ve feasted on its history and legends, and on stories of danger, romance, and adventure set in the region. It’s fulfilled a dream to have written my own.
Zennor is a tiny village perched on the cliffs of Cornwall’s rugged north shore and battered by Atlantic storms. I’ve often visited it, have run my hand over the legendary mermaid chair in its little church and walked the cliff path, which Virginia Woolf reported doing once at night, a dangerous event that inspired Dunmore’s novel.
Zennor in Darkness is based on a true story. D.H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda settled in a remote cottage on the cliffs during the First World War. They were regarded with suspicion because Frieda was German and the couple kept an irregular lifestyle – were they in fact enemy spies? Their story is tenderly told through the eyes of a young local artist, Clare Coyne.
Dunmore writes beautifully, with lucidity and a suspenseful air.
They stand by side on the rock, facing out to sea. They are hidden from land here. Even spies would see nothing of them.
It is spring 1917 in the Cornish coastal village of Zennor, and the young artist Clare Coyne is waking up to the world. Ignoring the whispers from her neighbours, she has struck a rare friendship with D.H. Lawrence and his German wife, who are hoping to escape the war-fever of London. In between painting and visits to her new friends she whiles away the warm days with her cousin John, who is on leave from the…
Part-Cornish, as a child I spent family holidays in Cornwall and was told family stories of Cornish relatives, especially of great grandfather Philip Henry Hammer and his numerous children who left Cornwall for destinations near – London and Wales – and far–South Africa, Australia, and Tasmania – to make a living. Old family photographs, some from the 1870s helped to bring these men and women alive and inspired me to write The Hammers of Towan. The more I research Cornish history, the more I learn, and the more I want to write about Cornish people and their place in the world.
This book gave me a great introduction to Cornish history from the earliest times to the 21st century and gave me useful information on which to base my research for my book.
It is considered to be a key text for anyone working in the field of Cornish Studies, but is also very readable and I returned to it time and again as my book took shape.
Why is Cornwall so ‘different’ from England? The answer lies in its history, the story of a people whose separate identity was formed in early times and has weathered centuries of turmoil and change to the present day.
The author Philip Payton is Emeritus Professor of Cornish & Australian Studies at the University of Exeter.
The collection Little Musings, available on Amazon, covers several decades of Joy's work as poet and painter. It touches on many aspects of her life, including the loss of her mother, in Do Not Mourn Her and Loss - Double Rainbow. Her childhood was spent in Plymouth, and in A Plymouth Girl Reflects, she recalls the aftermath of the air raids. Being in close proximity to Cornwall, that area also a major theme here, especially in Newquay, Cornwall, and On Air, By Melancholy. Four of the poems, "Absent Friends," "Isle of Thanet," "At Jim's Cafe," and "Captain Ahab of Thanet" are focused on the Thanet area of East Kent, where Joy now lives.
The Cornish Captive makes a powerful portrayal of abduction and imprisonment, as well as describing the forces of mental stress under the elemental pressures of Cornish life of that time. Cornish society then was unbelievably brutal. I identify so strongly with the sufferings of any sensitive soul under those conditions.
The sixth novel in a stunning series set in eighteenth-century Cornwall, perfect for fans of Bridgerton
Cornwall, 1800.
Imprisoned on false pretences, Madeleine Pelligrew, former mistress of Pendenning Hall, has spent the last 14 years shuttled between increasingly destitute and decrepit mad houses. When a strange man appears out of the blue to release her, she can't quite believe that her freedom comes without a price. Hiding her identity, Madeleine determines to discover the truth about what happened all those years ago.
Unsure who to trust and alone in the world, Madeleine strikes a tentative friendship with a French prisoner…
As an avid reader growing up, this list of books was influential in not only fostering my love of story, but also for inspiring me to become a writer. These books showed me what makes a page-turning story; from creating a rich setting to developing authentic characters with tension-filled dialogue, to heart-pounding twists and turns. In the end, the readers are taken on a suspenseful journey that will keep them up all night.
A slight genre shift from the typical romantic suspense novel is the Gothic romance, and Victoria Holt (the pen name for Eleanor Hibbert) was one of the best. Like many of the stories published in this genre, there is a young woman, Martha Leigh, hired on as a governess to a troubled widow whose wife died under mysterious circumstances. Settings—as in all gothic novels—play a strong role in this story with its foreboding mansion and the untamed cliffs of Cornwall.
Mount Mellyn stood as proud and magnificent as she had envisioned...But what bout its master--Connan TreMellyn? Was Martha Leigh's new employer as romantic as his name sounded? As she approached the sprawling mansion towering above the cliffs of Cornwall, an odd chill of apprehension overcame her. TreMellyn's young daugher, Alvean, proved as spoiled and difficult as the three governesses before Martha had discovered. But it was the girl's father whose cool, arrogant demeanor unleashed unfimiliar sensations and turmoil--even as whispers of past tragedy and present danger begin to insinuate themselves into Martha's life. Powerless against her growing desire for the…
Within the caste into which I was born, daughter of a daughter of a daughter, I was ‘nobody’—no dowry, an awkward brain, and unfashionable looks—dark hourglass, not blonde beanpole. Unless I married the right kind of man, of course–an eldest son with a big house. This was the 70s, and you probably don’t believe me, but many girls still went the full Jane Austen. So I’m perfectly qualified to tell you about the best books that centre on a big house as metaphor, a major character or a massive plot point in a novel. And, reader, I swerved marrying a man for his house too.
Susan Howatch walked away from her career as a highly successful novelist some years ago, but she’s well worth a read. Penmarric is the name of another Cornish mansion that is the fixed point in a swirling family saga. She took as her template the lives of the Plantagenet King Henry II and his powerful wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, plus their warring sons, with the house Penmarric standing in for the throne they fought over. You don’t need to know medieval history to enjoy the yarn.
Divided into five sections, each is narrated by a different family member. The action kicks off in 1890 with Mark Castallack clapping eyes on his complicated, older, future wife, Janna, in a churchyard. His mother, Maud, has directed her whole life towards regaining possession of the family estate, left to her cousin Giles instead of her because of primogeniture, and Maud was the wrong…
From the acclaimed author of Cashelmara: the “grippingly readable” New York Times–bestselling saga of a noble English family torn apart (The Sunday Times).
Overlooking the bleak cliffs of Cornwall is Penmarric, the ancestral home of Mark Castallack. The stunning gothic manor is the picture of English nobility, wealth, and comfort. But as the twentieth century unfolds, those behind Penmarric’s towering walls face nothing short of disaster. As Mark and his children struggle to save their home and their aristocratic way of life, they must engage in a bitter fight against greed, ambition, betrayal, and even murder.
I’m a feel-good romance author from Scotland, published with the HarperCollins imprint One More Chapter.
I trained as a journalist and studied Communication and Media, but I always wanted to write romance novels. When I’m not doing that, I write verses and captions for greeting card companies.
I’m also a huge music fan, which gave me the idea for my first published novel with One More Chapter, A Secret Scottish Escape.
There are so many likable characters in this story, which is set in Cornwall around a family hotel, but surfer Riley Bryant was the most lovable character for me.
A bit of a charmer, but secretly in love with Tula, he won me over from the first time I met him, despite his rather feckless attitude at times!
Jill Mansell's bestseller THE UNPREDICTABLE CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE is an unforgettable tale of sunny days on the beach, Cornwall in the summer and secrets about to be revealed. Perfect for readers of Lucy Diamond and Veronica Henry.
In the idyllic seaside town of St Carys, Sophie is putting the past firmly behind her.
When Josh arrives in St Carys to run the family hotel, he can't understand why Sophie has zero interest in letting any man into her life. He also can't understand how he's been duped into employing Sophie's impulsive friend Tula, whose crush on him is decidedly unrequited.…
I am a Finnish-born writer-journalist and photographer who, for the past 12 years, has lived in and around Dunster, traditionally described as one of the best-preserved medieval villages in the UK. The title of Dunster being “Britain’s most haunted place” came about after the British media got wind of my book launch in September 2023. I was brought up in a family where my mother, aunt, and grandmother strongly believed they had had otherworldly encounters. With such a background and armed with an MA in English Literature, Cultural History, Comparative Religions, and Journalism, it is no wonder that the first book I wrote focuses on these “long-term” interests of mine.
The concept of this book is simple but extremely effective in shedding light on the superstitions the Cornish country folk still held in the 19th and 20th centuries.
The author has collected old newspaper clippings, which reveal a fascinating variety of reports on how people tried to protect their belongings, dwellings, and themselves from illnesses and misfortunes caused by spells or “ill-wishes”. The reports talk of ‘witch bottles’ and pierced animal hearts being used to counter-act spells, and how the practitioners of magic, the cunning folk, were frequently taken to court when the purchased cures did not work.
The reports also shed light on the undoubtedly hard lives of those who were believed to be witches. There are several reports of “witch scratchings” ending up in courts when the supposed witches claimed compensation for the injuries caused by villagers trying to draw their blood to counteract spells.
