7 Books Like The Monstrous Murders

The Bookseller of Inverness is an enthralling mystery set during the years after the events of the Battle of Culloden in 1745. It portrays the uneasy accord in Inverness at the time, with the Jacobites (well, those who survived the repercussions and the battle itself of 1746) and Hanoverians living in an uneasy discord that threatens to crack at the slightest provocation.

We have multiple characters from both sides of the divide, but our main character is Iain, a wounded Jacobite survivor of the battle, who is content with his bookshop until events draw him back into the conspiracies and the Jacobites' ongoing desire to put their king back on the throne.

It is deeply enmeshed in the politics of the era, but in the way they affected men and women on a day-to-day basis. Inverness seems small and inconsequential, but it's a microcosm of what's happening on an almost… show more.

he Rush is a fabulous novel about the Gold Rush in Canada in the late 1800s. It takes us to Dawson City and introduces us to three strong-willed women in a world where men seem to hold all the power—or do they?

Our three main characters offer a nuanced view of Dawson City and the surrounding area during the Gold Rush. We have our brothel owner, Martha (although she thinks of it differently), our prospector's wife, Ellen, and our young news reporter, Kate, who is also a visitor to the area. And we also have a mystery to solve: Who murdered Molly?

This is a fast-paced novel, the narrative switching between our three women and moving slightly backwards and forwards through time. It is a fascinating look at what was happening in 1898 and how this affected those involved. It is at times bleak and unsettling. It is also an… show more.

A deep dive into culture, internal conflict, and the struggle to overcome external challenges. The characters in this book were deep and interesting. Their struggle was heartbreaking, and there was nothing you could do to fix the system they were in. They never gave up, even when all hope was lost. 

What drew me to it was the fascinating interaction between the main character and his physician tutors as he learned how to become a healer from some of the most talented scientific minds of the time.

There are so few books about the early Middle Ages that are a) not horrendously violent, and b) not about the English battling someone, that I found this perspective, about a young man who travels on foot to Persia in disguise, to be refreshing.

It’s a long, satisfying read and the first in a trilogy. This book is really popular in Spain and was even made into a movie and a stage show!

This book is personal to me. My ancestry is Hawaiian, and I have often stared at the old photographs of my Hawaiian great-grandparents, which were taken at the beginning of the 20th century, and wondered about their world.

This book begins also at the turn of the century, and as I read, I imagined that Rachel, the protagonist, might be walking down the street at the same time as Mary, my 6-foot-tall great-grandmother. Although I had often heard that there was a “leper colony”(we now refer to it as Hansen’s disease) on the island of Moloka’i, I knew almost nothing about it.

Through this book, reading the descriptions of the clothes and houses, the language and attitudes through history into the 1980s, I really felt like I was a passenger on a voyage through my grandparent’s world. 

I think the title pulled me toward this book. I knew it was about a carpetmaker in 17th-century Persia, and I guessed that the blood of flowers might refer to the dye used to color the wool for the rugs.

I found this way of describing dye to be extremely evocative. As it turns out, that was only the beginning of my fascination with this beautiful book. Following a young woman in the beautiful city of Isfahan, I had no idea that I would learn so much about the process of making carpets. I even found myself looking up ancient and medieval Persian carpet photos online (they’re amazing!).

The protagonist manages to do some extremely stupid things, and at one point, I found myself yelling at her. But she matures. That character development from an immature and reckless young girl to a strong, self-reliant woman was really lovely to experience. 

The first time I set foot in Sydney, Australia (after a 19-hour flight from Los Angeles), I knew that I needed to learn as much about the history of that continent as possible.

In bars and cafes, I would listen to Australians speaking to each other, marveling at their accents. I wondered how a colony of convicts could thrive in a place completely different from their homes in England and Ireland. I wondered what they did to the Aboriginal people to claim as much land and wealth as they had.

This is why I was drawn to Christina Baker Kline’s book, which follows three young women in Australia, telling the story of its colonization in the 19th century from very different perspectives. Kline’s prose is effortless–descriptive without getting in its own way, but not simplistic. At some point, when I was reading this book cover to cover, I looked up… show more.