Here are 100 books that The Mother fans have personally recommended if you like
The Mother.
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As a female grown up in a working-class neighborhood in East Naples (Italy), and as an academic researching political ecologies in Italy, Brazil, and the USA, I am especially interested in how sex/gender, class/work, and race/coloniality are intersected in people’s lives, and especially in how this shapes their perceptions and experiences of environmental problems. This approach has led me to look for the connections between labor and the environment both within and beyond waged/industrial work and formal trade unions, including the unpaid housework and subsistence production done in working-class, peasant, Black, and Indigenous communities and the social movements that represent them.
This is a novel that I have read again over the years, gifted to my loved ones, and recommended to my friends. Set in Kerala (India) between the early 1960s and early 1990s, the book tells the story of the ill-fated love between an upper caste woman and a lower caste man, set against the grain of parallel stories and events involving other members of the two characters' families and village.
What struck me was the profound humanity with which the motivations and worldviews of all characters are depicted and the author's ability to illustrate the chain of suffering that connects them as related to larger social schemes–such as post-colonial relations between the British and the Indian branch of the family.
'They all broke the rules. They all crossed into forbidden territory. They all tampered with the laws that lay down who should be loved, and how. And how much.'
This is the story of Rahel and Estha, twins growing up among the banana vats and peppercorns of their blind grandmother's factory, and amid scenes of political turbulence in Kerala. Armed only with the innocence of youth, they fashion a childhood in the shade of the wreck that is their family: their lonely, lovely mother, their beloved Uncle Chacko (pickle baron, radical Marxist, bottom-pincher) and their sworn enemy, Baby Kochamma…
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
I grew up in a small village in India. The nearest library was in the next town, two bus rides and a long walk away and comprised of one bookshelf, half full, the books with several pages missing. I read and reread those books, making up my own narratives for the missing pages. I suppose this was the crucial first step in my journey to author. I write stories featuring diverse protagonists. In my books, I explore themes of displacement and belonging, how people brought up in different cultures and during different times respond to challenges, how their interactions and reactions are informed by their different upbringings and values.
I loved this masterfully written short story anthology. This book was published in 2009 and I read it soon after but I still remember the stories – they are haunting and thought-provoking. I think this was the first book I read which really brought home to me the challenges faced by the people of Zimbabwe in a changing and uncertain political climate, living their day-to-day lives in a country on the verge of collapse.
A woman in a township in Zimbabwe is surrounded by throngs of dusty children but longs for a baby of her own; an old man finds that his new job making coffins at No Matter Funeral Parlor brings unexpected riches; a politician's widow stands quietly by at her husband's funeral, watching his colleagues bury an empty casket. Petina Gappah's characters may have ordinary hopes and dreams, but they are living in a world where a loaf of bread costs half a million dollars, where wives can't trust even their husbands for fear of AIDS, and where people know exactly what…
I grew up in a small village in India. The nearest library was in the next town, two bus rides and a long walk away and comprised of one bookshelf, half full, the books with several pages missing. I read and reread those books, making up my own narratives for the missing pages. I suppose this was the crucial first step in my journey to author. I write stories featuring diverse protagonists. In my books, I explore themes of displacement and belonging, how people brought up in different cultures and during different times respond to challenges, how their interactions and reactions are informed by their different upbringings and values.
I read this sublime short story collection just after I moved to England from India. Saying that these stories of displacement, yearning, loss, love spoke to me is an understatement. I was new to England, missing India which I still thought of as home and while some of the stories brought India back vividly to me, others I could absolutely identify with as they detailed the immigrant experience so beautifully. A book that will always be very close to my heart as I read it and laughed and cried and yearned alongside the characters.
'One of the finest short story writers I've ever read' Amy Tan
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE
WINNER OF THE PEN/HEMINGWAY AWARD
WINNER OF THE NEW YORKER PRIZE FOR BEST FIRST BOOK
Jhumpa Lahiri's prize-winning debut collection explores the lives of Indians in exile - of people navigating between the strict traditions they've inherited and the baffling New World they must encounter every day.
Whether set in Boston or Bengal, these sublimely understated stories, imbued with umour and subtle detail, speak with eloquence to anyone who has ever felt the yearnings of exile or the emotional confusion…
Crossing is a vividly human re-imagining of the love, sacrifices, and accomplishments that two Chinese brothers - American Immigrants - experience as they travel to California to build the Transcontinental Railroad.
I grew up in a small village in India. The nearest library was in the next town, two bus rides and a long walk away and comprised of one bookshelf, half full, the books with several pages missing. I read and reread those books, making up my own narratives for the missing pages. I suppose this was the crucial first step in my journey to author. I write stories featuring diverse protagonists. In my books, I explore themes of displacement and belonging, how people brought up in different cultures and during different times respond to challenges, how their interactions and reactions are informed by their different upbringings and values.
Oh, this book was just magical. And the ending – wow! Everything comes together and how. The writing is just beautiful and the story is enchanting. This book transported me and wowed me - truly I wasn’t expecting to love it as much as I did. I cried so much while reading this book – the language is so poetic and lyrical. It is a story about stories and it is a masterpiece in my opinion.
"This is magical, lyrical, spellbinding writing." Granta
Adamine Bustamante is born in one of Jamaica's last leper colonies. When Adamine grows up, she discovers she has the gift of "warning": the power to protect, inspire, and terrify. But when she is sent to live in England, her prophecies of impending disaster are met with a different kind of fear people think she is insane and lock her away in a mental hospital.
Now an older woman, the spirited Adamine wants to tell her story. But she must wrestle for the truth with…
I’m an Australian writer with a passion for literary fiction, especially novels centered on complex and multi-layered power dynamics. To me, relationships between women are particularly ripe for this kind of exploration – my own friendships with other women have been influential and formative, but not always easy! My interest in these darker and more complex dynamics of close friendship eventually led me to write my own novel on the topic. I’ve also published a range of essays, reviews, criticism, and creative nonfiction.
While many novels about female friendship focus on young women, The Weekend follows three women in their seventies, whose decades-long friendship has sustained them through illness, infidelity, divorce – and recently the death of their fourth close friend, Sylvie.
Drawn together over a weekend to clear out Sylvie’s house, the remaining women must grapple with their shared past and uncertain future. I loved this glimpse into the lives of older women – a reality not often portrayed in fiction – and admired Wood’s ability to make each of her three narrators flawed, relatable, and human.
If you like immersive character-driven novels, this book won’t disappoint.
People went on about death bringing friends together, but it wasn't true. The graveyard, the stony dirt - that's what it was like now . . . Despite the three women knowing each other better than their own siblings, Sylvie's death had opened up strange caverns of distance between them.
Four older women have a lifelong friendship of the best kind: loving, practical, frank and steadfast. But when Sylvie dies, the ground shifts dangerously for the remaining three. Can they survive together without her?
They are Jude, a once-famous restaurateur, Wendy, an acclaimed public…
I was born and raised in Texas, and I’ve lived here most of my life. For good or for ill, Texas looms large in the American consciousness and, since everything is bigger in Texas, so are the stereotypes. While you can definitely still find cattle ranches and oil wells in our state, modern Texas is much more complex and diverse than many people might think. While I love books that show those traditional elements of Texas (looking at you, Lonesome Dove!), I have always delighted in finding books that give me a new lens on what it means to be a Texan. I hope you’re delighted by these too.
There’s a special pleasure in reading novels set in the place you’ve long lived, and there’s also a special pleasure—at least for me!—in diving into subcultures with strong and strange beliefs. Owen Egerton delivers on both in Hollow. Set in the Austin far removed from tech money and hip new restaurants, Hollowfollows Oliver Bonds, a former religious studies professor whose life unraveled after the death of his young son. Oliver finds distraction in Hollow Earth theory and the idea a whole different world lies inside the one we currently occupy. Hollowbroke my heart in the best sort of way with its exploration of grief, regret, and the lengths we go to in order to survive being human.
An NPR Best Book of the Year, Hollow is the story of a professor whose life is unended after an unspeakable tragedy.
When Oliver Bonds, a revered religious studies professor at the University of Texas, loses his toddler son and undergoes intense legal scrutiny over his involvement, grief engulfs him completely. His life as he knows it is over; Oliver loses his wife, home, and faith. Three years after his son's death, Oliver lives in a shack without electricity and frequents the soup kitchen where he used to volunteer.
It's only when befriended by Lyle, a con artist with a…
Almost Home is a fictional retelling of the last great tragedy of the Civil War.
In late April 1865, almost 2,000 newly freed Union prisoners of war are packed onto the steamer Sultana, in poor repair and with a listed capacity of 376 passengers. Among them are four Indiana soldiers…
As a teenager, I “discovered” the poetry of Emily Dickinson and put her verse to music. Later, at Yale University I delved deeper into the power of rhythms, the beauty of images, the clarity of insights—how they combine to create a genuine poetic voice that reveals an interior world. Politics, of course, define our interactions in the exterior world, and great novels meld these two elements—poetry and politics—into a seamless union. I’ve been inspired to write novels about two poets—Emily Dickinson and John Keats—to bring the reader into the intense, poetic world of their blazing interiors and their unique outward politics.
Happinessis a gentle, insightful, poetic depiction of the politics of nature in London, England—specifically, the treatment of urban foxes in the midst of human activity. The layers of life (children, adults, foxes, falcons, street cleaners, psychiatrists, immigrants, landowners) interact here in ways deeply moving and insightful, reminding me of the central question in much of my writing: the boundaries between our private, poetic perceptions and the politics of survival.
'Forna's voice is relentlessly compelling, her ability to summon atmosphere extraordinary ... A thing of lasting beauty' OBSERVER SHORTLISTED FOR THE RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE 2019 SHORTLISTED FOR THE JHALAK PRIZE 2019 A breathtaking novel from Orange Prize-shortlisted and Commonwealth Writers' Prize-winning author Aminatta Forna Waterloo Bridge, London. Two strangers collide. Attila, a Ghanaian psychiatrist, and Jean, an American studying the habits of urban foxes. From this chance encounter in the midst of the rush of a great city, numerous moments of connections span out and interweave, bringing disparate lives together. Attila has arrived in London with two tasks: to deliver…
I have always asked why too many times I am told. From my early days studying psychology to working for Myspace out in LA and now with clients in London, my fondness for understanding what drives change, inertia, and pain has always been a focus. I knew from an early age that understanding people and how they are affected by, use and fear change and technology would be a useful skill to focus on. Doing so has enabled me to work with big brands, and smart cookies and interview some of the best minds of our generation. I recently brought everything under one roof, TBD Group, to help people see around corners.
Rob used to write for The New York Times and I was lucky enough to interview him on my podcast Mouthwash. His book is an inspiring read that helps you notice more around you. Beyond this it’s a rallying cry for attention and how you choose to utilise it. The book isn’t meant to be a business book, but I have found that there are massive sections that shouldbe applied to business – especially in this remote working world. Buy one for you and one for a friend.
Distracted? Overwhelmed? Feel like your attention is constantly being pulled in different directions? Learn how to steal it back.
Accessible and inspiring, this book features 131 surprising and innovative exercises to help you tune out white noise, get unstuck from your screen and manage daily distractions.
Make small yet impactful changes and bring focus to the things and people that are most important to you.
I am an author, nonfiction writing geek, and marketing practitioner on a mission to help people make a positive impact with their writing. Before setting out on this path, I spent many years as a marketing consultant, working with over 100 technology companies to articulate their messaging and value to customers and prospects. My first book, Subscription Marketing, was my manifesto about the changes needed in marketing to thrive in the emerging, subscription-based world. It’s now in its third edition and has been translated into multiple languages.
Bernadette Jiwa’s short, pithy books make an outsized impact. This one is about applying the power of authentic stories to business and marketing. What if you can differentiate yourself, and your business, through meaning? Jiwa outlines what it means to be a story-driven business and provides a clear path to getting there.
"When you have something to say, you don't need to shout. Bernadette Jiwa helps us learn how to create the change we seek to make in the world."
SETH GODIN
Every one of us—regardless of where we were born, how we were brought up, how many setbacks we’ve endured or privileges we’ve been afforded—has been conditioned to compete to win. Ironically, the people who create fulfilling lives and careers—the ones we respect, admire and try to emulate—choose an alternative path to success. They have a powerful sense of identity. They don’t worry about differentiating themselves from the competition or obsess…
Creativity, Teaching, and Natural Inspiration
by
Mark Doherty,
I have woven numerous delightful and descriptive true life stories, many from my adventures as an outdoorsman and singer songwriter, into my life as a high school English teacher. I think you'll find this work both entertaining as well as informative, and I hope you enjoy the often lighthearted repartee…
Coaching is a wonderful technology that can help people be a force for change… and is often wrapped up in mystic and woo-woo and privilege that makes it inaccessible and/or unattractive to too many. I want being more coach-like—by which I mean staying curious a little longer, and rushing to action and advice-giving—to be an everyday way of being with one another. Driven by this, I’ve written the best-selling book on coaching this century (The Coaching Habit) and have created training that’s been used around the world by more than a quarter of a million people. I’m on a mission to unweird coaching.
Carl Jung has two quotes that I love. First, “the gold is in the dark.” And second, “I’d rather be whole than good.” Both recognize that we’re complicated, contradictory, and gloriously messy beings. Debbie Ford’s book was the first time I felt I could actually do something with the profound wisdom of Jung. One particular exercise pretty much “cured” me immediately of some long-standing resentment I had with a former boss. Even though the language is sometimes a bit too woo-woo Californian hippy for me, it’s a book with some deeply useful exercises to help you become more whole, kinder to yourself, and ultimately more wholly you.
In this enlightening guide, Debbie Ford explains that the dark side of our personality should not be hidden. By denying our dark side, we reject these aspects of our true natures rather than giving ourselves the freedom to live authentically. Here she shows that it is possible to acknowledge and accept our so-called weaknesses, proving that these qualities may be important, hidden strengths. For example, perhaps some 'selfishness' can save us from exhaustion and resentment.
Full of illuminating stories and practical exercises, Debbie Ford shows us how to reconcile our darker impulses and find the gifts they offer. Your life…
