100 Books Like The Postcard

I love this book because it has so many layers that appeal to me: a historical period, the challenges of growing up, and a young woman who dreams of being a writer.

As an author, Jo March’s writing aspirations spoke to me, although I think I saw a bit of me in each of the four March sisters. That breadth is what welcomes me as a reader each time I return to the novel. And—no spoilers—I still sometimes scratch my head over the twist in the romance plot that didn’t go as I anticipated when I first read the book! 

A nominee for the 2020 Booker Prize, The Shadow King opens at the end of WWII as Italy prepares to invade almost undefended Ethopia, whose communications depend on long-distance runners. 

Orphaned Hirut feels her mother’s absence, yet rises from a lowly maid to a position of power as she inspires other women to openly and secretly resist an overwhelming colonial power. This matrilineal story set in a patriarchial society at war has many interwoven tales. I found it captivating, and the focus on relationships between women at war was a fractured mirror of my own concerns as I completed my novel set during America’s Civil War

A desperate mother gives her child all she can before they are separated: a cotton sack with a handful of nuts, a tattered dress, and a braid of hair. Little Ashley was sold away from her mother but somehow held onto and cherished that bag. Later, her granddaughter embroidered that story of a mother’s love onto the bag.

I never knew where this story would take me because it’s not a history book or a family story like any other. The author takes this one sad and beautiful object and asks us to think about motherhood, Black hair, women’s art, nuts, and the history of food for enslaved Americans. She even asks us to think about girlhood itself.

Could I ever see that much in one object? Could you? This is a gorgeous and inspiring reminder of how history works for different people and in different ways if we look… show more.

I loved Waltzing With The Dragons for its autobiographical sense of history and description of mother/daughter bonds that are truly universal. 

The story begins in 1922 with Ly, the daughter of one of the last Mandarins in north Vietnam, who flees an arranged marriage at thirteen to stay with her father’s friends, a French couple, and lives through the WWII Japanese occupation, finally fleeing to the South where she falls in love with a French Army doctor and gives birth to a daughter, Mai-Tam, in 1952. 

Mai-Tam, who is Eurasian and never feels she belongs, grows up in the shadow of the American-Vietnam war. The novel ends in 1967, preserving a mother-daughter kinship that sustains migration and separation. 

Winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize for nonfiction, this magnificent book begins as a memoir with Flannagan visiting the site of the POW camp in Japan where his father was subjected to slave labor during WWII, was starved, and faced certain death, saved only by the atomic bomb dropping on nearby Hiroshima. Throughout this book, Flanagan grapples with the fact he exists only because of this tragedy (as I grapple in Irena’s Gift with the fact I exist only because a Nazi SS officer who tortured and killed women saved my mother.)  

Often, in families of war survivors, one son or daughter becomes curious—obsessed even—with how their parent survived, perhaps not realizing they are also seeking to understand their own identity given they inherited their parent’s trauma. Frustrated by a Japanese museum’s omission of his father’s slave labor experience, Flanagan poses his dilemma: “Sometimes I wonder… show more.

This book is a sweeping, multigenerational, cinematic memoir spanning from the Chinese silk trade to WWII Japanese-occupied Hong Kong and, finally, suburban Australia. I love true stories where we learn about history and cultures through fascinating characters. In House of Kwa, Mimi’s eccentric father, Francis, may have put the war behind him, but Mimi certainly bears his scars. 

Imagine what it’s like to receive a legal letter notifying you that your father is suing you. That’s what turned Mimi’s hair gray overnight. Francis sued his daughter over the distribution of his sister’s estate, Mimi’s doting, nurturing, globe-trotting Aunt Theresa. 

It’s remarkable how Mimi overcame her abusive childhood in 1970s Western Australia and later became a renowned journalist and TV presenter. Mimi is the hero of this story for learning how to stand up for herself and her mother, and when she is older, for helping her mother obtain a… show more.

Given the heroic women I portray in Irena’s Gift, I am naturally drawn to stories of resilient women who challenge conventions to reinvent themselves and thrive in new countries. In Kantika, through exquisite prose, Elizabeth Graver transports readers from the vibrant streets of Constantinople to the bustling avenues of Barcelona–where characters based on her own Sephardic family are exiled after losing everything–to Havana and then New York. 

Its glorious cover is an apt description of the kaleidoscope of cultures and places this story allows us to inhabit. Graver's lyrical writing breathes life into each city as if it were a character. Each location bursts with movement and color, such as this description of 1907 Constantinople: “In wordless tunes, nonsense sounds and ballads, in Ladino, French and bits of Turkish, Hebrew, Greek, she sings, as on the street the lemon man sings lemons, the Bulgarian sings pudding, the vegetable… show more.

As a journalist, teacher and Education Director for Israel’s Kids4Peace (now part of Seeds of Peace), Ittay Flescher has spent years bringing together youth across conflict lines. In this vital book for our times, he shows how recognizing our shared humanity can cultivate dialogue and trust, dismantle stereotypes, counter dehumanization, and foster empathy—demonstrating that in both groups, there are partners for peace. Flescher highlights young voices challenging the one-sided narratives they have inherited, and shows how, “two rooted and indigenous national identities” can engage in difficult conversations about historical events, identity, and coexistence.

Given how war has affected my own family, what resonated most is Flescher’s ability to humanize conflict. He reminds us that behind every headline are innocent mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons who deserve our compassion. He has learned that people with extreme opinions often carry deep traumas that shaped their beliefs: “I can understand someone’s pain and… show more.

Reading aloud to students is my ultimate commendation for the best books, with a bonus for books that are short and powerful. Twenty and Ten is based on actual events in a French boarding school during World War II. When ten desperate Jewish children needed a sanctuary to survive, to avoid being sent to concentration camps, the nuns wisely discussed this with the twenty resident children. Those children would need to keep their life-or-death secret. Limited food and resources, barely enough for the twenty, would need to stretch to keep ten more alive, perhaps for years. If discovered, all might be taken, or killed. “What do you think they will do?” and “What would you do?” and “Why?” are among my favorite questions when sharing this book. Amazing conversations follow, for children and adults. Then eager hands reach for copies to read again.

A slice of historical fiction, this novel delves into the horrors faced by a young Jewish girl, Sarah, who, during WWII Paris, is arrested with her family by the French police. Sara locks her young brother in a cupboard in the family’s apartment, thinking she’ll be returning in a few hours.

The book alternates between Sarah’s life and the life of a middle-aged journalist, Julia, living in Paris 3 at the start of the 21st Century with her French husband and daughter. After discovering a family secret tied to Sarah’s story while researching an article about the roundup of the Jews in Paris during the war, Julia becomes obsessed with finding out what happened to Sarah, especially in connection to her sense of guilt over her family’s potential role in the tragedy.

I love this book because I love historical fiction and family mysteries. The period of WWII holds many… show more.