Here are 100 books that The Mercies fans have personally recommended if you like
The Mercies.
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Ever since I was a child, I’ve been dismayed by the humdrum monotony of everyday life. Of course, that is why one is drawn to books. The books on this list are historical fiction with otherworldly wonder. The world of the imagination is not an escape; it’s a portal to a new view of life. I’ve written four books set in the Italian Renaissance and two set in ancient Britain. Because of the depth of research, each one has taken about eight years. I’m constantly astonished at how imagination can fill the gaps history leaves. Striving always for plausibility, it is encouraging to count historians and archaeologists amongst my readers, cheering me on.
Another bell-ringer is this wonderful novel which upturned everything I’d thought about Shakespeare’s wife.
It so deftly weaves what is known with what is imagined. Away with Anne Hathaway! Meet Agnes Shakespeare. The ending of the book was terrific, and they managed to capture that in the film.
WINNER OF THE 2020 WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION - THE NO. 1 BESTSELLER 2021 'Richly sensuous... something special' The Sunday Times 'A thing of shimmering wonder' David Mitchell
TWO EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE. A LOVE THAT DRAWS THEM TOGETHER. A LOSS THAT THREATENS TO TEAR THEM APART.
On a summer's day in 1596, a young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to her bed with a sudden fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, searches everywhere for help. Why is nobody at home?
Their mother, Agnes, is over a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London.
The woman who inspired Don Quixote sets out across the dangerous roads of Spain to honor her dying lover's final plea.
The daughter of a wealthy merchant, young Dolça Llull Prat is besotted with the dashing, bootstrapping Miguel Cervantes from their first meeting. Despite Miguel's entreaties, the ever-practical Dolça, with…
I love the challenge of taking a headline, a photo, or a curious little footnote in someone else's history, and fleshing out all the details to make it a full-blown story. Here are five books where I think this task has been taken to entirely other levels.
Estebenico is believed to be the first Black man to be brought to the Americas. In Lalami’s telling, the small party he is with becomes separated and lost, resulting in a years-long journey through unknown lands. Against a vividly detailed backdrop of the early Americas Lalami patiently lays out how Estebanico's willingness to acquire new skills in language and medicine begins to shift the dynamic of his relationship with the master who he had been brought to serve.
In 1527 the Spanish conquistador Panfilo de Narvaez arrived on the coast of modern-day Florida with hundreds of settlers, and claimed the region for Spain. Almost immediately, the expedition was decimated by a combination of navigational errors, disease, starvation and fierce resistance from indigenous tribes. Within a year, only four survivors remained: three noblemen and a Moroccan slave called "Estebanico". The official record, set down after a reunion with Spanish forces in 1536, contains only the three freemen's accounts. The fourth, to which the title of Laila Lalami's masterful novel alludes, is Estebanico's own. Lalami gives us Estebanico as history…
I became fascinated with 16th-century and 17th-century Europe after reading Don Quixote many years ago. Since then, every novel or nonfiction book about that era has felt both ancient and contemporary. I’m always struck by how much our environment has changed—transportation, communication, housing, government—but also how little we as people have changed when it comes to ambition, love, grief, and greed. I doubled down my reading on that time period when I researched my novel, Dulcinea. Many people read in the eras of the Renaissance, World War II, or ancient Greece, so I’m hoping to introduce them to the Baroque Age.
I picked this book up, thinking it might have to do with witch trials in Europe during the 17th Century, and in a peripheral way, it does because it’s very loosely based on the life of Katharina Kepler, the mother of famous astronomer Johannes Kepler. (And really, how can you resist the title.) But the novel delivered so much more.
It’s a witty, searing meditation on community, gossip and envy, the strictures of society, the corruption of power, and a woman’s determination to be her own person. Add to that some of the funniest, most absurd situations I’ve read in a long while. Some sections of the novel are truly laugh-aloud.
The startling, witty, highly anticipated second novel from the critically acclaimed author of Atmospheric Disturbances.
The story begins in 1618, in the German duchy of Württemberg. Plague is spreading. The Thirty Years' War has begun, and fear and suspicion are in the air throughout the Holy Roman Empire. In the small town of Leonberg, Katharina Kepler is accused of being a witch.
Katharina is an illiterate widow, known by her neighbors for her herbal remedies and the success of her children, including her eldest, Johannes, who is the Imperial Mathematician and renowned author of the laws of planetary motion. It's…
The woman who inspired Don Quixote sets out across the dangerous roads of Spain to honor her dying lover's final plea.
The daughter of a wealthy merchant, young Dolça Llull Prat is besotted with the dashing, bootstrapping Miguel Cervantes from their first meeting. Despite Miguel's entreaties, the ever-practical Dolça, with…
I was the kid who always had a fantasy novel in her backpack. Fantasy required I stretch my imagination, be open to possibilities, and understand different concepts of reality. This curiosity fueled my academic career, steering me from philosophy to Jungian psychology and, eventually, many years later, to an apprenticeship with a traditional healer in Ireland where I put my hands in the dirt and learned things that touched my soul, like how the growth of plants relates to the moon, ways to alchemize medicine making, and the psycho-spiritual aspects of healing…. You know, magic. I hope reading through this list brings you as much joy as putting it together did for me.
This book is a glorious exhortation to live, even when—especially when!—death is lurking. It takes place in the plague of 1666. I used to have a bizarre fear of the bubonic plague (like I imagined it was in my closet and, if I opened the door, it would escape out into the world), so it’s strange how much I love this book.
I think it’s because Anna, the main character, is such a force. She repeatedly reminds me to connect with the natural world and myself and then to stretch and reach beyond what I thought I was and who I thought I could be. It's magic.
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of 'March' and 'People of the Book'.
A young woman's struggle to save her family and her soul during the extraordinary year of 1666, when plague suddenly struck a small Derbyshire village.
In 1666, plague swept through London, driving the King and his court to Oxford, and Samuel Pepys to Greenwich, in an attempt to escape contagion. The north of England remained untouched until, in a small community of leadminers and hill farmers, a bolt of cloth arrived from the capital. The tailor who cut the cloth had no way of knowing that the damp…
I love the challenge of taking a headline, a photo, or a curious little footnote in someone else's history, and fleshing out all the details to make it a full-blown story. Here are five books where I think this task has been taken to entirely other levels.
Mishima’s personal story is as dramatic as any of his fiction – on the day that he completed the final novel of his “Sea of Fertility” tetralogy he printed the novel out, laid it on his desk, then he and a band of supporters took a military leader hostage and demanded that the Emperor be restored to power in Japan. The ill-fated coup attempt ended with Mishima committing seppuku (ritual suicide by disembowelment). While the tetralogy is likely his most famous work, his best in my opinion, is Temple of the Golden Pavillion, a novel loosely based on the burning of the Golden Pavillion of Kinkaku-Ji by a disturbed Buddhist acolyte in 1950. Mishima’s harrowing depiction of the young acolyte’s slow descent into madness will have you disturbed as well.
Generally regarded both in Japan and in the West as his most successful novel, THE TEMPLE OF THE GOLDEN PAVILION brings together all Mishima's preoccupations with violence, desire, religious life and the history of his own nation. Based on actual incident, the burning of a celebrated temple, the novel is both a vivid narrative and a meditation on the state of Japan in the post-war period.
I read and write to better understand people. Why do we do what we do, feel what we feel, hide what we hide? Any book that illuminates these questions and their answers draws me in. Reading and writing are ways that I can attempt to walk in someone else’s shoes and see the world through their eyes, expanding my own understanding of the world. Perhaps the books on this list will offer you the same opportunity.
This is one of my long-time favorite books because of the relationships of these sisters and the way they react to a vicious dictatorship in their home country, the Dominican Republic.
Birthed from a true story, this author deftly weaves the tensions of the times with the real impact the violence has on each character. The bravery of these woman calls me to reread the dramatic, beautifully crafted book from time-to-time.
"A magnificent treasure for all cultures and all time.” --St. Petersburg Times
It is November 25, 1960, and three beautiful sisters have been found near their wrecked Jeep at the bottom of a 150-foot cliff on the north coast of the Dominican Republic. The official state newspaper reports their deaths as accidental. It does not mention that a fourth sister lives. Nor does it explain that the sisters were among the leading opponents of Gen. Rafael Leónidas Trujillo’s dictatorship. It doesn’t have to. Everybody knows of Las Mariposas--the Butterflies. In this extraordinary novel, the voices of all…
I love the challenge of taking a headline, a photo, or a curious little footnote in someone else's history, and fleshing out all the details to make it a full-blown story. Here are five books where I think this task has been taken to entirely other levels.
George Mallory’s disputed ascent of Everest hardly qualifies as “little known history,” but I couldn’t do a top 5 list on historical fiction and not include it. You can tell from the details that Ridout is obsessed with this story. Mallory’s efforts on the climb are perfectly juxtapositioned against his wife’s less glamourous but no less difficult task of holding the family together in his absence. The novel thrives as an exploration of the intense pressure that Mallory’s final Everest attempt placed on both.
Above All Things is a heart-wrenching novel about George Mallory's fatal attempt to conquer Everest, from debut author Tanis Rideout.
In the Himalayas two climbers strike out for the summit of the Earth's highest mountain - aiming to be the first to the top.
In Cambridge, a wife collects the milk, gets three children out of bed and waits for a letter, a telegram - for news of her husband.
It is 1924 and George Mallory and Andrew Irvine are attempting to be the first to conquer Everest. They face inhuman cold and wind, but putting one foot falteringly after…
I became fascinated with 16th-century and 17th-century Europe after reading Don Quixote many years ago. Since then, every novel or nonfiction book about that era has felt both ancient and contemporary. I’m always struck by how much our environment has changed—transportation, communication, housing, government—but also how little we as people have changed when it comes to ambition, love, grief, and greed. I doubled down my reading on that time period when I researched my novel, Dulcinea. Many people read in the eras of the Renaissance, World War II, or ancient Greece, so I’m hoping to introduce them to the Baroque Age.
I bought this book for novel research but ended up devouring it. So many interesting details about religion, politics, urban and rural life, festivals, and religious processions!
I especially enjoyed the chapter on domestic life. Not surprisingly, the women of that time were very limited by certain expectations, but it didn’t mean they didn’t show some individuality. For example, wearing spectacles became very fashionable at the beginning of the 17th Century, regardless of whether women needed glasses or not. (It still happens today!)
In "Daily Life in Spain in the Golden Age", distinguished French historian Marcelin Defourneaux gives us an account of life in Spain during the period starting from the succession of Philip II (1556) to the death of Philip IV (1665). In this fascinating scholarly account, the author relies upon literary works and travel accounts written during this 'golden age' to present an overall picture of Spanish society of that time. Rich accounts of political and economic developments are woven into the narrative, and the author also covers the importance of Catholic faith and the emphasis upon personal honor.
Two facts about me as a reader: I like books that deal with difficult issues, and I like reading a lot of them. There’s something about watching teens, for whom everything feels new, deal with the toughest stuff imaginable and come out the other side. I love a protagonist who has been through the wringer. Some people call these stories dark or morbid. I prefer to think of them as hopeful. My own writing history is as diverse as my reading habits. I’ve published in poetry, romance, and criticism, but these days I’m all about YA, like the politically-charged thriller I’m querying or my queer New Orleans ghost story, The Women of Dauphine.
What’s more all-consuming than being in love with your best friend? An uncontrolled fire, maybe–or a few of them. This turbulent romance between two teenage girls is told in prose poetry, and like the best novels in verse, every carefully formatted word carries weight. The narrative jumps back and forth in time, and it dives into the (main) narrator’s mind so intimately you’ll forget you don’t even know her name.
From New York Times bestselling author Ashley Woodfolk, Nothing Burns as Bright as You is an impassioned stand-alone tale of queer love, grief, and the complexity of female friendship.
Two girls. One wild and reckless day. Years of tumultuous history unspooling like a thin, fraying string in the hours after they set a fire.
They were best friends. Until they became more. Their affections grew. Until the blurry lines became dangerous.
Over the course of a single day, the depth of their past, the confusion of their present, and the unpredictability of their future is revealed. And…
I’m a geeky nerd who loves Disney villains and escaping reality while also supporting a slice of the world that means a lot to me. Bi-erasure sucks and the perpetuated stereotypes aren’t helping. So, I tell better bisexual stories. One magical thing about being an author is exploring healthy ways of presenting messy, complicated, and loving relationships with realistic bisexual characters—especially men. Heck, I have a world where the assumed sexuality is always bi. I don’t want to be erased, so I’m leaving a mark behind and, now as a bestselling author, I think I’m getting through for us all—but I’m not the only one. Enjoy the other amazing authors on this list. I certainly have!
I feel like it’s cheating to recommend a graphic novel, but don’t be fooled by the labels. This BDSM erotica is one of the sweetest, silliest, and most heartwarming stories I’ve had the pleasure of stumbling across. The story behind Sunstone’s creation brings me incredible joy: Stjepan was burned out hard, he’d run out of wick on the candle he’d burned at both ends and worried he might never create again. But, as an artist, Stjepan loved drawing beautiful—and kinky—outfits. This sparked into a story he was passionate about, one that he posted for free on DeviantArt to the masses. A common comment from the original posting? "I'm not into BDSM...but this story...I get it." These main characters will win your heart, and possibly awaken things you aren’t expecting.
Two women deal with modern themes of sex, relationships, and fetishism in
this erotic romantic comedy. So beware all who enter, because, to quote a few
hundred thousand readers on DeviantArt: "I'm not into BDSM...but this story...I
get it."
