Here are 94 books that The Housewarming fans have personally recommended if you like
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Dugan was my grandmother’s maiden name. Her family was from County Wexford, Ireland near Rosslare on the island’s east coast. In recent years I have extensively studied my Irish heritage and have discovered much about my family, and about the DNA running through my own Irish blood. The inquiry has revealed much about my love of storytelling, good conversation, and generally about the way I move through the world. As a writer of several books of personal narrative and fiction, I have tried to write books that capture a certain emotion, and now through my own ancestral discoveries, I understand how those emotions and familial ties are so tightly linked.
This stunning short novel captures everything about the deep ties that both religion and family have on the Irish experience.
As a boy, I remember my grandmother’s deep religious devotion and how it fueled her way of life. The story touches on this, including an affection for the land, love of community, and the power in doing the right thing. Its moodiness reflects both the story’s unspoken depth and its sublime tenderness.
In Small Things Like These, the protagonist struggles with what he should or should not do after hearing rumors about the local convent and the young girls who live there.
Keegan is a master at delivering the below-the-surface emotions that drive men and women through life’s difficult decisions.
"A hypnotic and electrifying Irish tale that transcends country, transcends time." —Lily King, New York Times bestselling author of Writers & Lovers
Small Things Like These is award-winning author Claire Keegan's landmark new novel, a tale of one man's courage and a remarkable portrait of love and family
It is 1985 in a small Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man faces into his busiest season. Early one morning, while delivering an order to the local convent, Bill makes a discovery which forces him…
A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.
German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…
I was drawn to writing family drama because complex family dynamics are endlessly fascinating to me. I’m an adopted person whose parents went on to divorce and remarry. I have two teenagers of my own and I’ve found that there are a multitude of choices we have to make as parents, and sometimes dilemmas don’t have a clear answer. If we get it wrong, the effects on the people we love can be devastating. Love within families can be tricky. The gap between what we want and what we need can be vast. There’s so much to explore in family dramas!
Secrets and lies always keep me turning the pages and this book has those in spades.
I love that Fisher writes about the kind of women we all know. Her characters are truly relatable and the dilemma of whether Maggie should expose her husband’s lies or protect the people she loves is an agonising one.
There’s so much humour in Fisher’s writing. I love a book that brings out laughter and tears.
In this heart-wrenching, emotionally gripping USA Today bestseller, a woman with a seemingly perfect life finds a mysterious letter that reveals dark secrets from the past that threaten to destroy her family.
Lara's life looks perfect on the surface -- gorgeous doting husband, Massimo; sweet little son, Sandro; and the perfect home. But Lara knows something about Massimo. Something she can't tell anyone else, or everything he has worked so hard for will be destroyed: his job, their reputation, their son. This secret is keeping Lara a prisoner in her marriage.
Maggie is married to Massimo's brother, Nico, and lives…
I was drawn to writing family drama because complex family dynamics are endlessly fascinating to me. I’m an adopted person whose parents went on to divorce and remarry. I have two teenagers of my own and I’ve found that there are a multitude of choices we have to make as parents, and sometimes dilemmas don’t have a clear answer. If we get it wrong, the effects on the people we love can be devastating. Love within families can be tricky. The gap between what we want and what we need can be vast. There’s so much to explore in family dramas!
Her prose is so fluid that it’s easy to lose yourself in her stories, which explore dilemmas that seem like impossible choices for her relatable characters, until a tear-jerking reveal.
The decision Rebecca eventually comes to in My Husband’s Daughter made me wail like a wounded mouse. This book is beautifully written and packed with emotion.
A heartbreaking and emotional story about love, friendship, and what it truly means to be a parent.
On a cold Friday evening, Rebecca and her husband Jack’s doorbell rings. Outside is a woman who introduces herself as Jack’s ex-girlfriend Cara. And she’s holding the hand of a shivering, blue-eyed, four-year-old girl. Who she claims is Jack’s daughter.
Rebecca is shocked to discover he has a child from his last relationship—one he hadn’t known about. Especially since becoming parents isn’t part of their life plan. But Cara needs them. Because she has a devastating secret that she can’t tell anyone yet.…
Coyote weather is the feral, hungry season, drought-stricken, and ready to catch fire. It’s 1967, and the American culture is violently remaking itself while the country is forcibly sending its young men to fight in a deeply unpopular war.
Jerry has stubbornly made no plans for the future because he…
Researching the storylines for my family drama novels gives me the opportunity to speak to many different people about huge events and dilemmas in their families and lives. Through their honesty and generosity, I have gained a huge respect for the way in which people can cope with tragedy and also a fascination with how they deal with it. For me, reading – and writing – about these topics is immensely cathartic and makes me remember to grasp life with both hands. I’m a sucker for a happy ending, though, so I always look for the hope at the end of any story.
The Herd presents the experiences of two mothers – friends – on the subject of childhood immunisation.
The dual narrative takes you inside their thoughts and feelings and I love the fact that the author doesn’t guide you to pick a side. Through the characterisation, and the clever use of other voices, you are presented with all the facets of a complex debate.
At times, their reactions to the circumstances in this story are heartbreaking. It reminded me that there are always two sides to an argument and that it’s important that both sides are heard.
'It is hard to imagine a more timely novel. A fascinating exploration of all sides of a particularly knotty, politicized issue.' Jodi Picoult
'Will have book clubs across the country in hot debate! Brilliant.' Clare Mackintosh
****
You should never judge how someone chooses to raise their child.
Elizabeth and Bryony are polar opposites but their unexpected friendship has always worked. They're the best of friends, and godmothers to each other's daughters - because they trust that the safety of their children is both of their top priority.
But what if their choice could harm your own child?
For fifty years I've studied the British sailing navy, fascinated by its workings, the slow communications, the vagaries of the winds and tides. In parallel with my work in archives, I've sailed in most of the European waters described in Convoys. I worked at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, for 27 years, leaving as Deputy Director in 2000. Since then, I've taught postgraduates and written about Nelson and the British government (Britain against Napoleon), and became convinced that Britain came very close to being defeated by Napoleonic France. If Napoleon had not thrown it all away by his invasion of Russia in 1812, I might be writing this in French, with a very different script!
This is a fine new study looking at the lasting impact of the wars from 1815, particularly at the tens of thousands of men who had served in the army and navy.
Although Britain was in much better shape than the Continental economies, more than twenty years of warfare had changed life and industry, and there were few jobs for the returning soldiers and seamen. It led to domestic protest and violence on the streets, sometimes with veterans fighting regular troops and militia. You could not get further from the glossy fiction of C.S. Forester and Patrick O'Brian.
Few battles in world history provide a cleaner dividing line than Waterloo: before, there was Napoleon; after, there was the Pax Britannica. While Waterloo marked France's defeat and Britain's ascendance as an imperial power, the war was far from over for many soldiers and sailors, who were forced to contend with the lasting effects of battlefield trauma, the realities of an impossibly tight labour market, and growing social unrest. The Horrible Peace details a story of distress and discontent, of victory complicated by volcanism, and of the challenges facing Britain at the beginning of its victorious century.
I became a historian of the American Revolution back in the early 1970s and have been working on that subject ever since. Most of my writings pivot on national politics, the origins of the Constitution, and James Madison. But explaining why the Revolution occurred and why it took the course it did remain subjects that still fascinate me.
The vast majority of books on the Revolutionary War are written by Americans, and they predictably focus on the conflict from the Patriot side. But throughout the war, the strategic initiative rested with Britain, not the United States. Through a series of brilliant biographical chapters, O’Shaughnessy traces the history of the war and the evolution of British strategy, and its ultimate failure, from the imperial side.
The loss of America was a stunning and unexpected defeat for the powerful British Empire. Common wisdom has held that incompetent military commanders and political leaders in Britain must have been to blame, but were they? This intriguing book makes a different argument. Weaving together the personal stories of ten prominent men who directed the British dimension of the war, historian Andrew O'Shaughnessy dispels the incompetence myth and uncovers the real reasons that rebellious colonials were able to achieve their surprising victory. In interlinked biographical chapters, the author follows the course of the war from the perspectives of King George…
Homeless following the death of his adoptive parents in a car crash and the subsequent loss of their farm tenancy, Seb decides to enrol as a residential student at the Asklepios Foundation, a College of Natural Medicine, boasting a sanctuary modelled on an ancient Greek healing temple. Spending a night…
I've been writing Spooky Middle Grade for a number of years, and before that, I wrote horror for Hollywood. Living in Sleepy Hollow, spooky is in my blood, and if I didn't write creepy stories, they'd kick me out. I'm also a professional storyteller and have scared the bejeebus out of kids and adults in places like Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Rockefeller State Park Preserve, and Washington Irving's Sunnyside. Halloween is my favorite time of year. It more or less becomes a month-long village-wide celebration in October. Being inundated with all this crazy rubs off on you, and I have been well-steeped.
Writing a really good spooky short story is hard. Writing 13 of them is near-impossible. Yet Allen has put together an anthology of sheer terror, with each story hinging on something simple and mundane. Basically, Allen makes you afraid of everything, and does it with a smile.
Thirteen ordinary kids. Thirteen ordinary towns. Danger lurks around every corner!
"Wonderful and weird, compelling and unsettling." - Gary Schmidt, two-time Newbery Honor author
Get ready for a collection of thirteen short stories that will chill your bones, tingle your spine, and scare your pants off. Debut author Josh Allen masterfully concocts horror in the most innocent places, like R.L. Stine meets a modern Edgar Allan Poe. A stray kitten turns into a threatening follower. The street sign down the block starts taunting you. Even your own shadow is out to get you! Spooky things love hiding in plain sight.
I am fascinated by how the U.S. Civil War spilled over American borders and across the world. A career spent far from the killing fields of my native Tennessee has nurtured an abiding interest in the global stakes of this struggle. I devour good books about overseas engagement with the South’s quest for nationhood and about the Confederacy’s far-flung ocean cruises.
Since I plowed my way through this rollicking 800-page epic, I have eagerly recommended it to others. It ranks as one of a select few long books that never bogged down and left me with a twinge of sadness that it did not just keep going.
When the curtain finally fell (as I knew it would, upon Confederate collapse in 1865), I had been enthralled by dozens of expertly drawn characters and episodes. Some of the ministers, soldiers, and publicists appear once or twice; others provide a narrative spine that charts developments across the entire struggle.
Collectively, this dramatis personae restores the drama to what less gifted story-tellers than Foreman have termed “Anglo-American relations” in the battle for and against the Confederate rebellion.
10 BEST BOOKS • THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW • 2011
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post • The New Yorker • Chicago Tribune • The Economist • Nancy Pearl, NPR • Bloomberg.com • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly
In this brilliant narrative, Amanda Foreman tells the fascinating story of the American Civil War—and the major role played by Britain and its citizens in that epic struggle. Between 1861 and 1865, thousands of British citizens volunteered for service on both sides of the Civil War. From…
I’ve loved short stories since I was a young girl introduced to Edgar Allen Poe. There’s something especially exciting about a complete story in few words, and once I had to balance work, children, and personal relationships, stories became all the more cherished for short takes. I especially like tales about and by women, relating to our real challenges, and I review them often so other busy women discover better writers and interesting tales. There is nothing like a short story any time of day, especially in the evening, to soothe the soul.
The one and only collection by this great novelist [and the sister of A.S. Byatt] is one of my most favorite. These short tales explore all sorts of relationships, not only marriage and friendship, but our relationships with personal identity, politics, and the culture which defines us. The writing is absolutely divine – images pop from the page and characters stay with us as if we’ve actually known them. And between the lines there is a lot of philosophical musing, which I love – just enough to make us think but never wear us down. These stories are for women who like to explore the existential. Think of them as a workout for the brain.
Margaret Drabble is one of the major literary figures of her generation. In this collection of her complete short fiction from across four decades, she examines the intense private worlds and passions of everyday people.
From one man's honeymooning epiphany in 'Hassan's Tower' to the journeying fantasies of 'A Voyage to Cythera', and from the sharp joy of 'The Merry Widow' to the bloody reality of the collection's title story, these are moving, witty and provocative tales, exploring cruel and loving relationships, social change and personal obsessions, and confirming her status as a leading practitioner of the art of the…
Marriage and Fatherhood in the Nazi SS
by
Amy Carney,
When I was writing this book, several of my friends jokingly called it the Nazi baby book, with one insisting it would make a great title. Nazi Babies – admittedly, that is a catchy title, but that’s not exactly what my book is about. SS babies would be slightly more…
Motherhood blindsided me. I was 37 and living my childhood career dream as a foreign correspondent when I serendipitously smelled the head of a friend’s newborn. Next thing I knew, I was up all night singing old Beatles' songs to a baby who needed to eat every half hour. Amazed by the power of rudimentary biology to reshape my conscious experience, I couldn’t help but start writing about it, first in essays and then in two shameless motherhood books of my own: The Mommy Brain: How Motherhood Makes You Smarter (heavily inspired by SarahHrdy) and Buzz: A Year of Paying Attention (about sharing an ADHD diagnosis with my son).
What mother remembering her own labor wouldn’t be grateful to Rahna Reiko Rizzuto’s essay, “What My Mother Never Told Me, or How I Was Blindsided by Childbirth and Survived,” for her shameless revelations about the most terrifying and grubby aspects of a safe, normal vaginal delivery. It’s just one of the brilliant and necessary essays in a book that kept me company through the hardest and funniest parts of being a mom.
From the editors of the cutting-edge online magazine Salon come provocative essays that take an unflinching look at the gritty truths and unreserved pleasures of contemporary motherhood.
Mothers Who Think: Tales of Real-Life Parenthood, which grew out of Salon's popular daily department of the same name, comprises nearly forty essays by writers grappling with the new and compelling ideas that motherhood has dangled before them. Elevating the discussion of motherhood above the level of tantrum control and potty training, this collection covers an unparalleled range of topics, from the impossibility of loving your children equally to raising a son without…
