Here are 40 books that The River Is Waiting fans have personally recommended if you like
The River Is Waiting.
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It’s a fantastic re-imagining of David Copperfield, which I enjoyed much more than the original. It taught me a lot about a side of the USA which, as a Brit, I had never given much thought to. The characters were fresh and engaging - even when they were unlikeable - and I became really invested in them. I know this is a book I’ll re-read and it might even tempt me to have another try at the Dickens,
Demon's story begins with his traumatic birth to a single mother in a single-wide trailer, looking 'like a little blue prizefighter.' For the life ahead of him he would need all of that fighting spirit, along with buckets of charm, a quick wit, and some unexpected talents, legal and otherwise.
In the southern Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, poverty isn't an idea, it's as natural as the grass grows. For a generation growing up in this world, at the heart of the modern opioid crisis, addiction isn't an abstraction, it's neighbours, parents, and friends. 'Family' could mean love, or reluctant foster…
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…
Makkai’s novel, a National Book Award finalist, details, in vivid and visceral ways, the AIDS crisis of the 1980’s and its aftermath. Makkai made me feel what it was to be a gay man in an era during which Ronald Reagan turned his back on them; she details all of the joy and heartache of being in love with someone who, at the same time, made you fear for your life being with that person. Of all the books and movies concerning AIDS, this one situated you so intimately inside the mind and heart of a gay man named Yale that you felt you there. Not merely a sympathetic onlooker, but one of them. Like all of us, Yale is at once generous and kind, thoughtful and insightful, but also petty and selfish, cowardly and angry. In Yale, Makkai has created a character that doesn’t want your sympathy but does…
PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK OF 2018 LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE WINNER ALA CARNEGIE MEDAL WINNER THE STONEWALL BOOK AWARD WINNER
Soon to Be a Major Television Event, optioned by Amy Poehler
"A page turner . . . An absorbing and emotionally riveting story about what it's like to live during times of crisis." -The New York Times Book Review
A dazzling novel of friendship and redemption in the face of tragedy and loss set in 1980s Chicago and contemporary Paris
In 1985, Yale Tishman, the development director for an…
Moorjani's description of coming back to life and beating cancer after an astonishing near-death experience was both comforting and eye-opening, especially for me, as I grieved the loss of my husband in 2025.
In this truly inspirational memoir, Anita Moorjani relates how, after fighting cancer for almost four years, her body began shutting down-overwhelmed by the malignant cells spreading throughout her system. As her organs failed, she entered into an extraordinary near-death experience where she realized her inherent worth . . . and the actual cause of her disease. Upon regaining consciousness, Anita found that her condition had improved so rapidly that she was released from the hospital within weeks-without a trace of cancer in her body!
Within these pages, Anita recounts stories of her childhood in Hong Kong, her challenge to establish…
Former model Kira McGovern picks up the paint brushes of her youth and through an unexpected epiphany she decides to mix ashes of the deceased with her paints to produce tributes for grieving families.
Unexpectedly this leads to visions and images of the subjects of her work and terrifying changes…
I have been writing for almost all of my adult life. In my previous role as a school administrator, I published more than a dozen articles for professional journals. Then, a few articles began appearing in popular magazines, both followed by speaking engagements across the country. When I retired from public school service, I took the leap to the novel. Fools and Children and Ticket to Oregon are the result.
I think this is one of the most beautifully written pieces of writing from across the ages. Its story of a young man and his younger brother fits exactly into my own tastes for a priceless rendering of how youths respond not only to their environment but also to their dreams/goals.
Its odd story twists—kids wanting west but getting east—are a multi-layered set of tales. I loved it for both story and writing.
Before becoming an author, I’d dabbled in almost every other genre—science fiction, western, coming-of-age, fantasy, and the like. When I wrote, published, and won awards for my first two mystery thrillers, I felt like I had finally found my niche with mystery readers. Good writers are good readers, so for years, I read only the genre for which I was writing. After a time, all those mysteries started to become rather formulaic, so I decided to branch out into other genres I used to enjoy. When I heard that other mystery fans were experiencing “genre burnout,” I built this list to encourage them to enjoy the fruits of all genres.
This is a book that simply cannot be siloed into one genre, and it resulted in many precious hours of lost sleep.
I was captivated by the story’s ability to shift effortlessly between a serial killer thriller and an unrequited love story spanning four decades in the lives of an artistic would-be pirate and his beekeeper-turned-FBI agent best friend.
What I loved most about this book were the extremes the author went to regarding 3-dimensional characterization. While there are several prevalent characters throughout, no two are alike; each has his/her own ambitions and pitfalls, and all eventually become interwoven in an explosive climax and an immensely satisfying, full-circle ending that left me thinking long after I put the book down.
A missing persons mystery, a serial killer thriller, and an epic love story - with a unique twist on each...
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Late one summer, the town of Monta Clare is shattered by the abduction of local teenager Joseph 'Patch' Macauley. Nobody more so than Saint Brown, who is broken by her best friend's disappearance. Soon, she will eat, sleep, breathe, only to find him.
But when she it will break her heart.
Patch lies in a pitch-black room - all alone - for days or maybe weeks. Until he feels a hand in his. Her name…
While many of the these wonderful poems were published over a century ago, they are as relevant today as they were then. Hughes charts the pain, suffering, and joys of being Afro-American in a country that was then, and is still now, a very racist place. But the book is neither a polemic nor merely a plea for a downtrodden people. It presents equally the heartfelt joys and deep pleasures the world affords us. One of my favorites is “Mother to Son,” advice that a black mother bestows upon a son, telling him that the uphill climb in life is difficult but “don’t you turn back.” The poems, as a whole, provide the reader with the Hughes’ profound sense of delight, suffering, and, ultimately, endurance. I found this book of poems a powerful yet accessible read for the twentieth-first century reader.
The definitive sampling of a writer whose poems were “at the forefront of the Harlem Renaissance and of modernism itself, and today are fundamentals of American culture” (OPRAH Magazine).
Here, for the first time, are all the poems that Langston Hughes published during his lifetime, arranged in the general order in which he wrote them. Lyrical and pungent, passionate and polemical, the result is a treasure of a book, the essential collection of a poet whose words have entered our common language.
The collection spans five decades, and is comprised of 868 poems (nearly 300 of which never before appeared…
Rusty Allen is an Iraqi War veteran with PTSD. He moves to his grandfather's cabin in the mountains to find some peace and go back to wilderness training.
He gets wrapped up in a kidnapping first, as a suspect and then as a guide. He tolerates the sheriff's deputy with…
One year after his wife disappears under suspicious circumstance, a writer goes to a remote Scottish island to get his life back on track. A few critics have suggested this novel represents a letdown for Feeney, perhaps partly because of an unsatisfying ending. But most readers will find it’s a gripping story full of enough twists and suspense to keep them plunging forward into the unknown.
'I was consumed by this book, it's her best ever, a work of genius' - Lisa Jewell
'Brilliant and chilling, with an inspired setting, characters that jump off the page and twists to give you whiplash. I loved every word' - Claire Douglas
The million-copy bestselling author of His and Hers, Alice Feeney, returns with a gripping and deliciously dark thriller about marriage . . . and revenge.
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Author Grady Green is having the worst best day of his life.
Grady calls his wife as she's driving home to share some exciting news. He hears Abby slam…
It was refreshing to experience how Bailey was so true to the land she lived on and the area she lived in. The connections and openness was so refreshing. This is one I'll read again and again.
In South Carolina, a woman discovers her aunt's profound secrets in an emotional novel spanning decades about trauma, survival, and the bonds of female friendship by a USA Today bestselling author.
Since Bailey Rae Rigby's adoptive aunt Winnie passed, Bent Oak, South Carolina, doesn't have much of a hold on her anymore. So it seems.
Bailey Rae aims to settle the small estate and, armed with her aunt's inspiring personal cookbook, buy a food truck with an ocean view in Myrtle Beach. Everything goes awry when a distraught young mother arrives in town clutching a copy of that same cookbook.…
When I first started The Correspondent, I found it a bit confusing and had to jot down who was who to keep everything straight. But that didn’t last long, once I settled in, I was hooked. The story centers on Sylvia, a senior woman who was ahead of her time professionally, and whose life unfolds through letters to family, friends, and even film stars, authors, and politicians. Through her correspondence, we see her regrets, kindnesses, heartbreak, health struggles, and moments of joy. At first, I wasn’t sure about the letter-writing format, but it ended up being one of the things I loved most. It’s a fresh, beautifully done way to tell a story. I grew deeply attached to Sylvia and found myself rooting for her and those she loves. I highly recommend this book, just give it a little time in the beginning. It’s absolutely worth it.
Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman
by
Alexis Krasilovsky,
Kate from Jules et Jim meets I Love Dick.
A young woman filmmaker’s journey of self-discovery, set against a backdrop of the sexual liberation movement of the 1970s and 1980s. In Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman, we follow Ana Fried as she faces the ultimate…
I loved how Russell takes a familiar setting, in this case the Dust Bowl in the 1930s, and tips us over into a version of it and reality that is unfamiliar and unsettling. She has created here a world full of impossible things and made them seem possible and even necessary.
***Shortlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction***
'Powerful' Financial Times 'A pure dust storm of utter genius' DAISY JOHNSON 'As profound as it is wonderfully strange' LAUREN GROFF
What do we choose to remember and what do we allow ourselves to forget?
Visit the Antidote of Uz - a prairie witch who can keep your memories safe. Speak into her emerald-green earhorn, and your secrets, your shames, your private joys, will leave your mind and enter hers.
Until the Black Sunday storm, which flattens wheatfields, buries houses and vaporizes every memory stored inside the Antidote. She wakes up empty…
