Literary Fiction

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Literary fiction
  

State of Wonder
By Ann Patchett
F PATCHETT
A researcher at a pharmaceutical company, Marina Singh journeys into the heart of the Amazonian delta to check on a field team that has been silent for two years – a dangerous assignment that forces Marina to confront the ghosts of her past.

The Forgotten Garden
By Kate Morton
F MORTON
Abandoned on a 1913 voyage to Australia, Nell is raised by a dock master and his wife who do not tell her until she is an adult that she is not their child, leading Nell to return to England and eventually hand down her quest for answers to her granddaughter.

Women of the Silk
By Gail Tsukiyama
F TSUKIYAMA
Spanning the years between the world wars, this tale of a young Chinese girl forced to work in a silk factory describes the sisterhood of workers she discovers there.

Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind
By Suzanne Fisher Staples
YA F STAPLES
When eleven-year old Shabany, the daughter of a nomad in the Cholistan Desert of present-day Pakistan, is pledged in marriage to an older man whose money will bring prestige to the family, she must either accept the decision, as is the custom, or risk the consequences of defying her father’s wishes.

Great Books for Guys with Interesting Plot Twists

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Books for guys
• Adventure
• Plot twists
• Books published in the past 10 years

The Rule of Four
By Ian Caldwell & Dustin Thomason
F CALDWELL
Trying to decipher an ancient text that weaves a mathematical labyrinth within a love story, two researchers obtain a diary that may contain the key to the code, but when a fellow researcher is killed, they realize that the book contains a dangerous secret.

The Thief
By Megan Whalen Turner
YA F TURNER Attolia #1
Gen flaunts his ingenuity as a thief and relishes the adventure which takes him to a remote temple of the gods where he will attempt to steal a precious stone. (This one was not published within the past 10 years, but later books in the series were published in the past ten years.)

Spartan Gold
By Clive Cussler
F CUSSLER Fargo Ad #1
Treasure hunters Sam and Remi Fargo are shocked to discover a bottle of a rare wine taken from Napoleon's lost cellar. However, someone else is also searching for this treasure.

Templar Legacy
By Steve Barry
F BARRY Cotton #1
Former secret agent Cotton Malone and Stephanie Nelle, a U.S. Justice Department prosecutor, must solve the mystery of fourteenth-century Templar riches and secrets before Raymond de Roquefort and his murderous allies prevail.

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Teen books
• Mystery
• Action

Dark Life
By Kat Falls
YA F FALLS
When fifteen-year-old Ty, who has always lived on the ocean floor, joins Topside girl Gemma in the frontier's underworld to seek and stop outlaws who threaten his home, they learn that the government may pose an even greater threat.

Death Cloud
By Andy Lane
YA F LANE Young Sh #1
In 1868, with his army officer father suddenly posted to India, and his mother mysteriously "unwell," fourteen-year-old Sherlock Holmes is sent to stay with his eccentric uncle and aunt in their vast house in Hampshire, where he uncovers his first murder and a diabolical villain.

A Spy in the House
By Y.S. Lee
YA F LEE Agency #1
Rescued from the gallows in 1850s London, young orphan and thief Mary Quinn is offered a place at Miss Scrimshaw's Academy for Girls where she is trained to be part of an all-female investigative unit called The Agency and, at age seventeen, she infiltrates a rich merchant's home in hopes of tracing his missing cargo ships.

Hero
By Mike Lupica
YA F LUPICA
Fourteen-year-old Zach learns he has the same special abilities as his father, who was the President's globe-trotting troubleshooter until "the Bads" killed him, and now Zach must decide whether to use his powers in the same way at the risk of his own life.

Princess Ben
By Catherine Gilbert Murdock
YA F Murdock
Benevolence is not your typical princess. With her parents lost to assassins, Princess Ben ends up under the thumb of the conniving Queen Sophia. Starved and miserable, locked in the castle’s highest tower, Ben stumbles upon a mysterious enchanted room. So begins her secret education in the magical arts.

Plot-Driven Suspenseful Fiction

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Plot-driven books
• Action
• Suspenseful fiction
• Read-alikes for to Brandon Sanderson

The City of Golden Shadow
By Tad Williams
SCI-FI Williams Otherlan #1
In a strange world of the near future, where virtual reality encompasses all aspects of society and boundaries are limited only by the power of the imagination, a dark conspiracy involving the world's most powerful individuals threatens to destroy everything.

The Thief
By Megan Whalen Turner
YA F Turner Attolia #1
Gen flaunts his ingenuity as a thief and relishes the adventure which takes him to a remote temple of the gods where he will attempt to steal a precious stone.

Finnikin of the Rock
By Melina Marchetta
YA F Marchett
Now on the cusp of manhood, Finnikin, who was a child when the royal family of Lumatere was brutally murdered and replaced by an imposter, reluctantly joins forces with an enigmatic young novice and fellow-exile, who claims that her dark dreams will lead them to a surviving royal child and a way to regain the throne of Lumatere.

I Am Not a Serial Killer
By Dan Wells
F Wells John Cle #1
John Wayne Cleaver keeps his obsession with serial killers in check by a set of rigid rules that he lives by, hoping to the prevent himself from committing murder; but when a body turns up behind a laundromat, John must confront a danger outside himself. (This is not fantasy like the other three books on the list, but it has a surprising twist in the middle and an action-packed plot.)

Adventurous, Interesting Books for Teen Guys

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Teen books
• Books for guys
• Adventure

The Wednesday Wars
By Gary Schmidt
YA F SCHMIDT
During the 1967 school year, on Wednesday afternoons when all his classmates go to either Catechism or Hebrew school, seventh-grader Holling Hoodhood stays in Mrs. Baker's classroom where they read the plays of William Shakespeare and Holling learns much of value about the world he lives in.

Downriver
Bu Will Hobbs
YA F HOBBS
Fifteen-year-old Jessie and the other rebellious teenage members of a wilderness survival school team abandon their adult leader, hijack his boats, and try to run the dangerous white water at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

The Wreckers
By Iain Lawrence
YA F LAWRENCE High Sea #1
Shipwrecked after a vicious storm, fourteen-year-old John Spencer attempts to save his father and himself while also dealing with an evil secret about the English coastal town where they are stranded.

Bucking the Sarge
By Christopher Paul Curtis
YA F CURTIS
Deeply involved in his cold and manipulative mother's shady business dealings in Flint, Michigan, fourteen-year-old Luther keeps a sense of humor while running the Happy Neighbor Group Home For Men, all the while dreaming of going to college and becoming a philosopher.

Ender’s Game
By Orson Scott Card
YA F CARD Ender Sa #1
A veteran of years of simulated war games, Ender believes he is engaged in one more computer war game when in truth he is commanding the last fleet of Earth against an alien race seeking the complete destruction of Earth.

Epic Fantasy, in the Tradition of Brandon Sanderson

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Epic fantasy
• Read-alikes for Brandon Sanderson or Robert Jordan

The Name of the Wind
By Patrick Rothfuss
SCI-FI ROTHFUSS Kingkill #1
A hero named Kvothe, now living under an assumed name as the humble proprietor of an inn, recounts his transformation from a magically gifted young man into the most notorious wizard, musician, thief, and assassin in his world.

The Dragonbone Chair
By Tad Williams
SCI-FI WILLIAMS Memory #1
Simon, a young kitchen boy and magician's apprentice, finds his dreams of great deeds and heroic wars becoming an all too shocking reality in a terrifying civil war.

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell
By Susanna Clarke
SCI-FI CLARKE
In nineteenth-century England, all is going well for rich, reclusive Mr. Norell, who has regained some of the power of England's magicians from the past, until a rival magician, Jonathan Strange, appears and becomes Mr. Norrell's pupil.

The Black Company
By Glen Cook
SCI-FI COOK Black Co #1
The tough mercenaries of the Black Company risk their lives and their souls as they set out to find the White Rose, a mystical figure who embodies the very essence of good.

The Red Wolf Conspiracy
By Robert V.S. Redick
SCI-FI REDICK Chathran #1
Scant years after a terrible war that shook empires, a 600-year-old ship sails for enemy lands and must deal with deadly assassins, treacherous mermaids, and monstrous slavers in order to deliver a young woman whose marriage will seal the peace.

The Lies of Locke Lamora
By Scott Lynch
SCI-FI LYNCH Gentlema #1
Vowing to bring down the crime boss running the city, a group of Gentlemen Bastards, led by Locke Lamora, sets out to beat the Capa at his own game, taking on other thieves, murderers, beggars, and thugs in the process.

Books with Strong Characterization, Published in 2011

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Fiction
• Strong Characterization
• Books published in 2011

The Language of Flowers
By Vanessa Diffenbaugh
F DIFFENBA
The story of a girl whose gift of flowers helps her change the lives of others even as she struggles to overcome her own past.

These Things Hidden
By Heather Gudenkauf
F GUDENKAU
When golden girl teenager Allison Glenn is released from prison to a halfway house, she is more determined than ever to speak with her estranged sister. Their legacy of secrets is focused on one little boy. And if the truth is revealed, the consequences will be unimaginable for the adoptive mother who loves him, the girl who tried to protect him and the two sisters who hold the key to all that is hidden.

Divergent
Veronica Roth
YA F ROTH
In a future Chicago, sixteen-year-old Beatrice Prior must choose among five predetermined factions to define her identity for the rest of her life, a decision made more difficult when she discovers that she is an anomaly who does not fit into any one group, and that the society she lives in is not perfect after all.

Rules of Civility
By Amor Towles
F TOWLES
A chance encounter with a handsome banker in a jazz bar on New Year's Eve 1938 catapults Wall Street secretary Katey Kontent into the upper echelons of New York society, where she befriends a shy multi-millionaire, an Upper East Side ne'er-do-well, and a single-minded widow.

Mysteries for Fans of Stieg Larsson

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Mysteries and thrillers
• Read-alikes for Stieg Larsson
• Books with a new perspective
  

Smilla’s Sense of Snow
By Peter Hoeg
MYSTERY HOEG
When her six-year-old neighbor falls to his death, and no one is willing to suspect foul play, Smilla Qaavigaaq Jasperson finds her own investigation taking her into the files of a Danish company.

Three Seconds
By Anders Roslun
MYSTERY ROSLUND
Ex-convict Piet Hoffman--a family man, a rising member of Stockholm's Polish mafia, and an undercover police informant--is sent to a maximum security prison to make himself the boss of the amphetamine trade so the police can shut it down.

In the Woods
By Tana French
MYSTERY FRENCH
Twenty years after witnessing the violent disappearances of two companions from their small Dublin suburb, detective Rob Ryan investigates a chillingly similar murder that takes place in the same wooded area, a case that forces him to piece together his traumatic memories.

A Duty to the Dead
By Charles Todd
MYSTERY TODD
Independent-minded Bess Crawford's upbringing is far different from that of the usual upper-middle-class British gentlewoman. At the outbreak of WWI, she volunteers for the nursing corps, serving from the battlefields of France to the doomed hospital ship Britannic. On one voyage, she promises to a deliver a message from a dying officer to his brother. Once she's able to do so, she's disturbed at the brother's indifferent reception of the message, and when an unexpected turn of events provides her with an opportunity to stay with the family for a short time, she takes it.

Entertaining Teen Historical Fiction

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Teen books
• Historical Fiction
• Strong character development
• Read-alikes for Laurie Halse Anderson and Nancy Turner
• Clean reads

Boston Jane
By Jennifer Holm
YA F Holm Boston J #1
In 1854, sixteen-year-old Jane Peck has ventured to the unknown wilds of the Northwest to wed her childhood idol, William Baldt. But her impeccable training at Miss Hepplewhite's Young Ladies Academy in Philadelphia is hardly preparation for the colorful characters and crude life that await her.

The Raging Quiet
By Sherryl Jordan
YA F Jordan
Suspicious of 16-year-old Marnie, a newcomer to their village, the residents accuse her of witchcraft when she discovers that the village madman is not crazy but deaf and she begins to communicate with him through hand gestures.

Hattie Big Sky
By Kirby Larson
YA F Larson
After inheriting her uncle's homesteading claim in Montana, sixteen-year-old orphan Hattie Brooks travels from Iowa in 1917 to make a home for herself and encounters some unexpected problems related to the war being fought in Europe.

A Countess below Stairs
By Eva Ibbotson
YA F Ibbotson
After the Russian revolution turns her world topsy-turvy, Anna, a young Russian countess, has no choice but to flee to England. Penniless, Anna hides her aristocratic background and takes a job as servant, armed only with an outdated housekeeping manual and sheer determination.

Montmorency: Thief, Liar, Gentleman?
By Eleanor Updale
YA F Updale Montmore #1
In Victorian London, after his life is saved by a physician, a thief uses the knowledge he gains in prison and from scientific lectures he attends with the physician, to create a double life.

Teen Romantic Suspense

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Teen books
• Romance
• Suspense

Divergent
By Veronica Roth
YA F Roth
In a future Chicago, sixteen-year-old Beatrice Prior must choose among five predetermined factions to define her identity for the rest of her life, a decision made more difficult when she discovers that she is an anomaly who does not fit into any one group, and that the society she lives in is not perfect after all.

Graceling
By Kristin Cashore
YA F Cashore
In a world where some people are born with extreme and often-feared skills called Graces, Katsa struggles for redemption from her own horrifying Grace, the Grace of killing, and teams up with another young fighter to save their land from a corrupt king.

Wildwood Dancing
By Juliet Marillier
YA F Marillie
Five sisters who live with their merchant father in Transylvania use a hidden portal in their home to cross over into a magical world, the Wildwood.

Keturah and Lord Death
By Martine Leavitt
YA F Leavitt
When Lord Death comes to claim sixteen-year-old Keturah while she is lost in the King's Forest, she charms him with her story and is granted a twenty-four hour reprieve in which to seek her one true love.

Beautiful Creatures
By Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
YA F Garcia
In a small South Carolina town, where it seems little has changed since the Civil War, sixteen-year-old Ethan is powerfully drawn to Lena, a new classmate with whom he shares a psychic connection and whose family hides a dark secret that may be revealed on her sixteenth birthday.

Issue-driven Books, with Emphasis on Characters

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Books about controversial issues
• Books about characters and relationships
• Books similar to Jodi Picoult’s but cleaner

Please Look after Mom
By Kyong-suk Shin
F SHIN
Follows the efforts of a family to find the mother who went missing from Seoul Station and their sobering realizations when they recall memories that suggest she may not have been happy.

Every Last One
By Anna Quindlen
F QUINDLEN
Mary Beth is first and foremost a mother whose three children come first, before her career, or even her life as the wife of a doctor. Caring for her family and preserving their everyday life is paramount. So when one of her sons becomes depressed, she focuses on him, and is blindsided by a shocking act of violence.

The Language of Flowers
By Vanessa Diffenbaugh
DIFFENBA
The story of a woman whose gift for flowers helps her change the lives of others even as she struggles to overcome her own past.

State of Wonder
By Ann Patchett
F PATCHETT
A researcher at a pharmaceutical company, Marina Singh journeys into the heart of the Amazonian delta to check on a field team that has been silent for two years--a dangerous assignment that forces Marina to confront the ghosts of her past.

These Things Hidden
By Heather Gudenkauf
F GUDENKAU
When golden girl teenager Allison Glenn is released to a halfway house, she is more determined than ever to speak with her estranged sister. Their legacy of secrets is focused on one little boy. And if the truth is revealed, the consequences will be unimaginable for the adoptive mother who loves him, the girl who tried to protect him and the two sisters who hold the key to all that is hidden.