11 Books Like The Lost Boy of Santa Chionia

I adored this whipsmart novel about Sylvie Swift, a bold and brilliant young woman who, in 1862, lights out for Nashville, Tennessee, where she is immediately recruited to work as a spy for the chief of the Union Army's Secret Service while also chasing down a mysterious manuscript that may or may not be a version of Aristophanes' Lysistrata. Not only that -- she also becomes absorbed in the threatened world of the city's prostitutes, who offer her company and shelter, and who really were threatened with exile by Nashville's government during the Civil War. Such a rich and complex story would be impossible to tell in the hands of a lesser storyteller, but Fawkes handles the multiplying characters and storylines with admirable ease.

What I've always loved about Clare Beams is exactly what she provides here: an immersive story gracefully told and set in a richly imagined world. At the center of this novel, Beams' second, is Irene Willard, who has retreated to a clinic in the Berkshires while she awaits the birth of her first child after five miscarriages. The clinic is run by a husband-and-wife team who are pioneering a treatment to prevent miscarriage by providing an ideal maternal environment. What Irene finds, however, is a place full of secrets, starting with a mysterious walled garden that Irene can't seem to stay out of. Along the way Beams provides plenty of food for thought about medical authority, patriarchal attitudes, and control of women's bodies -- themes that are, sadly, all too relevant to the moment.

I loved the generational sweep of this novel, its gorgeously written history of Calabria, and its character and relationship studies. Though it is fiction and borders on magical realism, Grames spent time in her ancestral village to give the setting and background a wonderful sense of authenticity.

I loved Stella, who overcame bad luck over the decades, and her intense relationship with her sister, Tina. As a woman who wondered about the back story of her own Italian grandmother and old aunts, I was captivated by the descriptions, the attention to language and detail, and this heartbreaking tale of crushing patriarchy.

This was the first book I read about Basilicata, and it is essential for anyone interested in Southern Italian roots. Written in staggeringly poetic language, it offers a sad but beautiful introduction to the culture and history of the region, which is hardly ever written about and barely even visited, even by Italians.

During WWII, Levi was sent as a prisoner to Basilicata as punishment, to work as a doctor among the peasants there. The book taught me about the feudal farm system still in place there well into the 20th century, about its inhospitable landscape, and its isolated, poverty-stricken population – my ancestors.

It set the bar high for me to write my own memoir and continues to inspire me. The title refers to the fact that the train line only went as far as Eboli – that Christianity and civilization stopped short of Basilicata.

Janie Chang is a master writer who weaves the power of myth into her story of a 1937 escape of Chinese university students as Japanese bombs drop on their city. Charged with protecting an irreplaceable trove of ancient books, the students face air raids, a ragged life on the road, and a growing fear of traitors from within. The Library of Legends is an evocative tale of love, war, and survival, beautifully written.

Gruen paints her scenes with vivid brush strokes, her people are so real you can hear them talk, and her animals likewise - especially Rosie. Incredibly sad in parts, at the end the tale is properly uplifting. The author’s notes are highly worth reading, adding to the heartbreak in some instances. It was a different world back then.

It presents the horrors of slavery in a wholly original way, wrapping a hero you root for -- due to his youthful optimism, his hard-won acceptance of his lot in life, and his embracing of his ability to move though space using the power of memory and storytelling -- in a cloak of magical realism. By the time Harriet Tubman enters the picture, you’ll be wishing fervently that the ability to magically transport slaves to freedom had really existed. The story never devolves into fairy tale, rather the fantastic element puts the heroic acts represented by the Underground Railroad into very appropriate superhuman terms.

This is one of those books that stayed with me long after I finished the last page. I think the author’s choice to tell the story from the point of view of the two dogs and the other animals they meet is powerful. We get to feel their fear, sadness, mistrust, and hope for a better life. 

This story can pose quite a dilemma for a reader because on one hand, we know that we’d never hurt animals, but we also realize that when we purchase products that are tested on animals, we are the villains in the story.

This incredible book gave names and faces to the women of Southern Italy, who, until recently, were mostly ignored by writers—and, by extension, readers. It taught me about the intensely difficult life my own female ancestors endured and stories that did not travel with them to the United States for those who immigrated—stories that were left behind, and for good reason.

The book was written in the 1970s after Cornelisen worked in the South, helping to establish nursery schools there. But the story is not her own. The stories belong to the strong, overworked, oppressed, inspiring women of Basilicata.

When I first read Mark’s book, I was jealous of the access he had to his own Southern Italian family. Over the decades, his father had kept strong bonds with the relatives back in Calabria, and so Mark goes with him on a journey that uncovers family secrets and the history of the region.

His beautifully wrought prose brings the landscape, the food, and its people to vivid life. Though it’s labeled a travelogue, it’s much more: a deeply felt story of family and what binds us together.