100 books like Magic Lessons

It feels a little misleading to suggest that a Michael Chabon book is widely underread, but this one almost never comes up when I talk to writers and readers about their favorite baseball novels.  Perhaps it’s because Chabon, one of our most celebrated writers, imagined Summerland as a book for young readers, and while it is surely that, it is also surely so much more. It’s strange and wonderful and oh so beautifully written. The author’s prose jumps off every page with an exit velocity that demands your attention. Read it with your kids or your grandkids. Read it on your own. Just, read it. 

I fell in love with this book from the very beginning.

When by-the-book case worker Linus Baker from the Department in Charge of Magical Youth comes to investigate a home for six dangerous magical children, he discovers an unlikely family in an unexpected place. As a mother, I was smitten by the insecure yet powerful children and was cheering for Linus to save them. I’ve been out of my element with kids too, Linus; I understand.

Best of all, I could feel the compassion and love on the pages of this amazing book.

Sometimes strength, particularly for women in history, has been quieter. The colonial early American setting of The Indigo Girl echoed part of the painting’s story from my book as well. In The Indigo Girl, Eliza is willing to speak up, to do what is right, even when it’s the furthest thing from anyone’s mind. As a huge art history fan, and as a hobbyist painter, I am always interested in learning more about where pigments and colors come from. This story told about that, but it also explored forbidden friendship and love and touched the heart, leaving a stain of remembrance, deeper than the indigo itself. 

Its setting in suburban Philadelphia (near my old house) drew me to this book. But I loved it for the way Patchett unwinds the event that upends everything two siblings understand about and expect from their lives.

I’ve experienced how a single accident or illness can change the course of the future. What I recognized and connected with was this book’s portrayal of what I call the Grief Cha-Cha, two steps forward, three steps backward, and how sometimes what you grieve isn’t so much the person you’ve lost as the person that loss makes you. 

Reading should be fun, and this is fun! Margery Benson is a woman after my own heart. She’s impulsive, stubborn, and independent.

I cheered her on as she gave up her frustrating job and boring life in England to go on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of a beetle, which may or may not be a myth. Along with her lively assistant, Enid Pretty, Miss Benson encounters some hair-raising challenges that compel her to break rules and discover a new self.

Miss Benson’s Beetle is a rollicking adventure story, which explores what it is to be an unconventional woman. It’s full of unexpected turns but is also a gentle study of a friendship that flouts convention. Everyone needs friends like Miss Benson and Enid.

Brilliant, feisty, and intrepid Ana, raised in privilege and wealth in ancient Israel, is the heroine of this painstakingly researched historical fiction novel. Her mother discourages Ana’s intellectual curiousity, forbidding Ana’s writings about the secrets of repressed, abused women of her day. Her adopted brother Judas is part of the resistance against the Roman occupation, and her father plans on marrying Ana to a rich older man. Amidst this complexity, Ana defies him and marries far beneath her station. Her groom? Jesus of Nazareth. After the crucifixion, Ana goes to her Aunt Yaltha in Alexandria where she helps Yaltha locate her long-lost daughter. The Book of Longings chronicles Ana’s challenge to overcome the family secrets and cultural repression meant to silence and subdue her. Compelling, intriguing, and powerful! A must-read!

I was drawn to the setting and the plot of this book. The main character Zoey has inherited her mother’s condominium on Mallow Island off the South Carolina coast.

Zoey’s mother died when Zoey was a child, so she is anxious to make some connection with her mother by seeing what she left behind in a condominium the mother stayed in alone throughout her married life from time to time.

Since I was never close to my own mother, I wanted to go on this journey with Zoey who has a delightful, invisible pet, a bird named Pigeon. At The Dellawisp condos, Zoey discovers magical turquoise birds that watch everything. They enter condos at will and steal random objects, hanging them in courtyard trees. Those little devils!

She meets the other residents, including three ghosts, all with their own mysteries to solve. A cast of characters that bond in friendship… show more.

As a kid, I was always enthralled by the idea of paintings coming to life. Blame it on old Vincent Price movies and Scooby-Doo cartoons!  This book is clever and creepy, and at its heart, speaks to the power art has to change the world by unleashing truths we might not want to talk about. You may want to read some of this book with the lights on! (I did!)

A dark and complex feminist story of magic and the patriarchy. A young woman living in a puritanical society discovers the power within herself. Echoes of the church’s own dark history with witch hunts can be found throughout the story, which makes Immanuelle’s story feel real and powerful. With my own history of growing up in religion, the town’s rhetoric about purity and sinfulness really hit home for me. It was in places (particularly at the start) difficult for me to read. But it also completely captured my attention as it felt so real, and it made the ending feel more like a triumph than ever. As someone with a complicated past with religion, there's something cathartic about reading about a character who seizes her own inner power and uses it to tear down the system.

As someone who grew up on Sabrina the Teenage Witch in Archie Digests as well as the TGIF sitcom, I have long had a soft spot for stories featuring witches. As a kid, you always think that magic is the pinnacle of exciting! And that’s how young Moth feels, especially as she finds out that she is a witch. Except her mom has sworn off of magic and doesn’t want that life for her daughter…which I feel for Moth being extremely upset about it. She has to find a way to get in touch with her roots, learn about her magic, and discover secrets about her past that are intriguing and exciting! It’s such a fun story told by a talented creator. Everything about this book is—wait for it—magical!