71 Books Like Providence

After Clay Blackall loses his brother to suicide, he lights out for Twinrock, a decaying mansion perched on an island in Narragansett Bay, where he attempts to retrace his brother’s steps in his final days and hours. Winter’s quirky novel unfolds from multiple points of view. In addition to Clay, there is Vinco Vincenti, a failed author who has taken to impersonating the actor Judge Reinhold, and Alix Maus, an adjunct college instructor burdened by her past. All of them have ties to Clay’s lost brother. But the star of the show is Twinrock itself—a fictionalized version of Clingstone, the mysterious mansion that can still be seen off the coast of Jamestown, RI. Fans of writers like Robert Coover will enjoy Winter’s stylish prose, which convincingly evokes the bohemian atmosphere of the 1980s on Providence’s East Side.

This novel-in-stories follows a quartet of friends—Dub, Rollo, Rye, and Gio—as they party, fight, love, and occasionally even consider leaving Rhode Island. Gio, the group’s storyteller, observes, comments, and guides the reader through a hard-edged world of race and class oppression. Guns and drugs flood Gio’s world, but these forces are offset by bonds of family, friends, and friends who become family. Never has the overlooked town of Pawtucket been so lovingly portrayed, and I’ll not soon forget Holmes’ mouthwatering descriptions of Portuguese Catholic feast days in East Providence. A keen observer of toxic masculinity, Holmes shows how misogyny holds this group of young men together while it also holds them back.

In this baker’s dozen of stories, Jean McGarry reprises favorite topics—tight-knit families, fraying loves, intimations of mortality. A native Rhode Islander with ties to Providence’s blue-collar Irish community, McGarry paints the state and its inhabitants in shades as tender as they are unsparing. McGarry’s great theme is decline: Everything that starts out promising invariably goes bad. Steeped in this worldview, her characters are lively and quick with an insult—even when they’re confronted by experts who presume to know them better than they know themselves. One mordant example: A therapist finally gets a breakthrough with a tough-to-reach Rhode Islander. The patient feels relief, and the therapist urges him to attend sessions more regularly. “You’re at it again,” the patient remarks. “Save your advertisements for someone else.”

I’ve been reading Mary Gordon ever since a fellow writer put her novel Spending in my hands in 1999. Two decades later, I remain as impressed by Gordon’s moral intelligence as by her luscious prose. In this novel, Marian, an older woman living in coastal Rhode Island, relives her young adulthood, which she spent fighting Franco’s forces in Spain while posing as the wife of a politically engaged doctor who happened to be her dead brother’s former lover. Now Marian’s granddaughter has arrived on her doorstep in search of her history and is inspired to visit Spain herself. But what she discovers is only what Marian already knows, living by the coast: that a quiet life in a backwater can also be free and meaningful.

The English Wife had me racing to unravel the secrets at the heart of Annabelle and Bay's marriage. And at the same time I was savoring the fascinating characters and brilliant writing.

The twists and turns of the plot had me gasping, but the biggest mystery was understanding the central characters and their relationship.

I’ve always been drawn to writers who capture such a vivid setting I can actually picture myself right in the pages of the book. I think Kent Kreuger does this better than any author, and readers can select any entry in his Cork O’Connor series and find themselves transported into a mesmerizing scene, but this 21st entry in the series really grabbed me. His word paintings of a field, a blueberry patch and the ancient Indian, Henry Miloux’s cabin is so real I could almost feel, see and smell the scene.

Kreuger has the rare skill to use such colorful and powerful language in his prose; some passages border on the poetic. Not to mention, the story about two missing girls—one white, one Native— is truly gripping, too. 

I loved British forensic archeologist and single mom Ruth Galloway. She’s plump, “moon-faced,” and middle-aged.

In the line of duty, Ruth is doing a TV bit and worries that her stomach sticks out. I can relate. As she frantically searches for a kidnapped child, two dashing men vie for her affection–this gave me hope. And I loved the complex crew of characters, the twisty plot, ancient castles and towers, and the rather exceptional number of extramarital affairs.

I found this book to be a fine and fast-paced read, and Ruth Galloway is a unique and humble heroine. Happy to say there are 15 books in the series.

In this book, the author uses a new character Elvira (her character reappears in subsequent books) who leads the reader forward in the first person, a breakaway from the usual (close) third person in the other books in the series. Her voice is so clear, you can’t help but fall in love with her strange quirks. She is a medical student and trained in body combat. Elvira’s sister has been missing for 59 days and she can’t get the police interested enough to take her seriously. Her sister was an adult after all and left with a packed bag. Anderson and Costello eventually do get involved as more and more young women disappear.

The action in this novel is fast and furious. It left me breathless at times. I had to put the book down and walk away a few times near the end it was that intense.

Here’s a great suspense read from the UK that does everything right. Inspector Alan Banks and his team investigate the theft of a tractor from an area farm—an investigation that leads into a deeper mystery involving a murder, and the disappearance of a young man. Where some detective series tend to peter out and lose steam toward the end of the book, this page-turner keeps up the pace and delivers a very satisfying twist ending.

I fell in love with Miss Phryne Fisher on TV first, then in all of the books only after binge-watching all the seasons in short order. Her attitude, her clothes, her wit—all of it makes her adventures so fun to read. Besides, what list of Jazz Age mysteries is complete without this bobbed-hair socialite and her gaggle of misfits helping her to solve mysteries? Add in a spa vacation for Phyrne and I was hooked to see how she solved a murder while on holiday in some fabulous resort town. After 7 years, my Phryne drought is over!