100 Books Like Testimonies

The Snow Leopard portrays a spiritual quest as much as a physical journey.

Peter Matthiessen went to the Himalayas in search of the elusive snow leopard in 1973. He relates his personal circumstances like a sledgehammer on the book’s third page, stating in matter-of-fact terms that his wife had just died of cancer. I will never forget reading The Snow Leopard at the outset of my own journey from Stockholm to the far north of Sweden, inside the Arctic Circle, where a friend and I were set to undertake a long backpacking trip to celebrate my 40th birthday.

This remarkable book was my companion and helped me understand that the mountains are not there to be conquered. To the extent they take notice of human beings at all, they exist to help us learn and grow: to discover what Matthiessen called “the common miracles,” like the satisfaction of a day… show more.

A life in the wild entails sacrifice in addition to romance.

Few readers would think of Wallace Stegner’s 1971 Pulitzer Prize winner as a book about the mountains. Its narrator is an elderly man confined to a wheelchair who spends his days researching a biography. Yet his fascinating subject is his frontier-era grandmother, Susan Burling Ward, who gave up a life among sophisticates on the East Coast to follow her husband, a geological engineer, into the mountains of the West. There she found beauty and adventure, but also isolation from the culture and society she had left behind. Are the mountains enough to sustain us without such things?

I read this book in the year after my father died; it was one of his favorites and tied together many of his own interests: genealogy, research, books, family, and the outdoors. Angle of Repose is a long novel and the characters… show more.

Never lose your sense of adventure.

Caesar of the New Yorker tells the almost unbelievable story of Maurice Wilson, who in 1933 bought a biplane, flew it halfway around the world from England to Nepal, and attempted to climb Mount Everest by himself. Of course, he did not succeed—Sir Edmund Hilary and Tenzing Norgay made the first summit of Everest 20 years later—but Wilson carried out his attempt with rare panache.

I read this book with a mixture of astonishment and joy. So much of mountaineering literature is about over-serious people taking themselves far too seriously. Wilson, by contrast, liked to wear costumes and disguises, and outrun the authorities bent on stopping him in almost caper fashion. Whatever else the mountains are, they ought to be fun.

This book made me want to write a book of my own.

So many stories of the mountains are about bravado, grit, or conquest. Yet I go to the mountains for beauty and connection. Those are values that the Italian writer Paolo Cognetti prizes. His gentle novel uses the mountains as a setting for the relationship between two people.

The book chronicles a lifetime of friendship between a pair of boys who grow apart over the years. For a time, their shared history in the outdoors and love of the alpine is enough to maintain a connection. And then life intervenes. Yet the steady majesty of the Italian Alps remains a constant. I took my novel’s epigraph from this book: “It was impossible to convey what it feels like up there to those who have stayed below.” 

This is a fast, fun, star-studded read.

Hoffs is one of the founding members of The Bangles, and one can’t help but imagine that it is all true in one way or another. There’s a character who is an awful lot like Prince and...well, that makes the story particularly fun for me. 

This fun story not only showcases a strong female lead navigating grief, but a smart, driven one.

Ali herself is a neuroscientist and her books often feature women in STEM. In this case, Olive (our fmc) is working towards her PHD. Olive’s mum died of pancreatic cancer and the development of this storyline and how it ties into the plot is beautiful and poignant. 

The story follows a fake dating trope as Olive becomes involved with her professor, giving you all the ingredients for a feet-kicking romance, with the character depth all whilst in a fascinating setting.

Girl Through Glass offers readers entry into the magical and rarified world of an aspiring ballet dancer at the School of American Ballet and New York City Ballet.

For readers who love a gritty New York setting, glimpses behind the beautiful façade that ballet offers, and dark secrets, this novel has it all. Fans of My Dark Vanessa will also appreciate the #metoo elements of this story.

I immediately loved this book for its alternate history, detailed folklore, and dark academic vibes. I connected with the complex characters and a strong female protagonist who was fearless of social expectations. The unique combination of folklore and an archaeology background that I share with the author Heather Fawcett was something I found familiarity with instantly.

I enjoyed the alternate history where dark academia met with the more traditional Gaslamp-style fantasy fiction to create something new. This combination of dark academia, marginalized voices, and alternate history is a style I enjoy delving into the past in new, unusual ways and revealing voices that otherwise remain unheard.  

A friends-to-lovers romance like this one by Christina Lauren never gets old, but sometimes the rules of “romance novels” can restrain the two main characters and make their love story feel a little dated and monotonous. Well-written sidekicks, however, are free agents. They can have outrageous backstories and hilarious quirks that inject much-appreciated chaos into the story. This is the case with Reid and Millie’s funny group of fellow academics, Chris, Ed, and Alex. The fact that they are more interesting than the two main characters is no downside. This unabashed friend group is so interesting that it is a welcome addition to the main story plot. This romantic comedy lets you have your sidekick cake and eat it too, and isn’t that what we want in any good romcom? Let us all eat cake!

Deborah's characters struggle with the disappointments of getting older with a bittersweet humor that I found comforting.

Just shy of the "pensioner age" myself, I can relate to the loneliness and regret of lost dreams experienced by the characters. I was captivated by her storytelling. I felt like I was there, and that I not only knew the characters but shared their feelings when alone.