100 Books Like The Villa

I moved around non-stop as a kid, attending a dozen schools by age eleven. As a result, once I stayed put long enough to make real friends, I stuck to them like glitter glue. As a reader and writer, I can’t get enough stories about female friendships, whether rock-solid or fraying. My latest novel involves childhood friends whose loyalty is stretched like a pair of latex gloves yanked off at a crime scene. The book grew out of a meme I saw on Facebook, captioned: “Real friends help you hide the bodies”. My first thought was: who would I help? Straight off, I thought of my oldest friends.

I lived vicariously through Nancy Drew when I was young. I was naturally observant and curious, and my mom was known to tail a car through our neighborhood if she thought the driver looked suspicious. So, it’s not surprising that I developed a love for all things thrilling. While working in the oil and gas industry for fifteen years, I spent some time focused on a foreign deal that served as inspiration for my first novel. I worked with people seeking power; negotiations bordered on nefarious; the workplace became toxic. If you ever ponder the moral implications behind the pursuit of power, you’ll enjoy the books on this list!

I moved around non-stop as a kid, attending a dozen schools by age eleven. As a result, once I stayed put long enough to make real friends, I stuck to them like glitter glue. As a reader and writer, I can’t get enough stories about female friendships, whether rock-solid or fraying. My latest novel involves childhood friends whose loyalty is stretched like a pair of latex gloves yanked off at a crime scene. The book grew out of a meme I saw on Facebook, captioned: “Real friends help you hide the bodies”. My first thought was: who would I help? Straight off, I thought of my oldest friends.

I moved around non-stop as a kid, attending a dozen schools by age eleven. As a result, once I stayed put long enough to make real friends, I stuck to them like glitter glue. As a reader and writer, I can’t get enough stories about female friendships, whether rock-solid or fraying. My latest novel involves childhood friends whose loyalty is stretched like a pair of latex gloves yanked off at a crime scene. The book grew out of a meme I saw on Facebook, captioned: “Real friends help you hide the bodies”. My first thought was: who would I help? Straight off, I thought of my oldest friends.

I’m the daughter of a Californian grape farmer, and have driven tractor, picked grapes, and tied vines. Whilst at Berkeley, I travelled around Napa Valley tasting wines whilst riding pillion on a 750 cc motorcycle; at Oxford I discovered European wines. Thereafter, I was a professor of modern and contemporary history in London, writing nearly a dozen books, and continuing to explore wines with my husband. I have wine in my bones. I now travel around the world tasting it, writing about it, judging it, and leading tasting tours, all the while continuing to drink it. I am currently writing a book on the global history of wine.

I’m a poet, tarot muse, and artist whose childhood experiences with vivid night-time dreams and a handful of years on a commune in the cornfields ignited my passion for exploring inner imagery. I read voraciously from science fiction to fairytales to channelings. I discovered tarot in my twenties, using it to read for others, mend my broken heart, and get squared away enough to apply to graduate school for poetry in the heartland at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Ever since, tarot is my favorite mirror for self-reflection. Author of two poetry collections, I wrote a workbook to help others apply the tarot in joyful, healing ways through writing and art.

I’ve just spent the last few years writing Return to Valetto, about a nearly abandoned village in Umbria and the last ten people who live there. In 2018, I received an NEA grant to conduct research in Italy and I visited about a dozen abandoned and nearly abandoned towns all across Italy. While I was traveling, I immersed myself in books about Italy—from history and biography to memoir and fiction. The books on my list were stepping stones in my education about all things Italian and I hope you find them as transporting as I did!

We have always been fascinated by literary masterworks that stage the plague as a pivotal factor in the plot. We added the next ingredients: a whodunnit with a claustrophobic setting, the Baroque Age, a (real) financial thriller between Rome and London, and an unusual protagonist. Rita is a historian of religions, Francesco is a musicologist. After working as journalists, meeting in a newspaper bureau, and getting happily married, we started a writing career publishing 11 novels translated into 26 languages and 60 countries with more than 2 million copies sold. Our novels are a mix of literary creativity and meticulous research, characters and settings are strictly based on original documents and eyewitness accounts. 

I’ve just spent the last few years writing Return to Valetto, about a nearly abandoned village in Umbria and the last ten people who live there. In 2018, I received an NEA grant to conduct research in Italy and I visited about a dozen abandoned and nearly abandoned towns all across Italy. While I was traveling, I immersed myself in books about Italy—from history and biography to memoir and fiction. The books on my list were stepping stones in my education about all things Italian and I hope you find them as transporting as I did!

I’m a Scottish writer, based in the USA after living in eight countries. I spent thirty years following work, family, and love, and my experiences seep into everything I write—so there are often elements of travel in my books. Thirteen years ago, I was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and underwent life-saving surgery. That experience gave me a new perspective on the power of the human spirit, and our ability to forge new and unexpected paths, in the face of adversity. I love to read about and create characters that take on life’s challenges and find inner strength they didn’t know they had. That’s why feisty female protagonists appeal to me.