70 books like Alice the Cat

This book takes on class, gender, and addiction, plus a host of other contemporary issues facing rural America and the nation—and Smarsh still manages to craft a compelling, human memoir.

This book might be the antidote to all the easy, anodyne, partisan conclusions the talking heads offer about rural America. As someone who grew up in rural America but now lives in a small city on the West Coast, I felt challenged reading this memoir.

Smarsh is the best kind of rabble-rouser; she’s telling it straight no matter who is listening. 

This book hooked me from page one. It’s technically a Young Adult novel but is so literary that it appealed to me as an adult reader, too.

The protagonist, Reece, is a fierce sixteen-year-old at that pivotal moment between being a teen and a young adult that so many of us females can identify with. The story itself is very plot-driven–Reece is living in a motel with her dad, and we get the impression they’ve been on the run.

As the story unfolds, we get a close-up look at the circumstances Reece and her dad find themselves in and the things he’s done to protect her (or is it himself…). These are characters that will stay with me for a long time!

This was such a fascinating read for me. It’s an epic tale told over the lifetime of a woman warrior named Akmaral that interweaves fact and folklore into a mesmerizing story about matriarchal power, the ferocity of love and hate, and the alternating currents of battle and peace.

I was so absorbed in the beautiful language of this book that I couldn’t put it down. The novel recreates the expansive, unforgiving world of 5th-century Central Asia, a setting firmly rooted in the natural and spiritual worlds and the struggle to survive.

While being dazzled by the writing, I felt like I had a crash course in ancient history as well!

Miriam Toews has an incredible writing style that is somehow whimsical and also serious, and this book is no exception.

I fell so in love with the characters in this book that I didn’t want the story to end. The novel follows young Swiv, a quirky and fierce kid who is dealing with a lot of very grown-up issues as she navigates an absent father, a feisty grandmother, and a single mother.

While this might sound like a Young Adult novel, it is very much a book for adults, which just shows how talented Toews is at using the voice of young protagonists to unearth some very heavy and serious adult topics. Still, even with the heavy content, Swiv’s special spirit gives the book a welcomed lightness. 

The older sister of Dream, Death of the Endless manifests as a perky goth girl, a fan of Mary Poppins.

The most powerful of the Endless, she is also the warmest and most caring. For one day out of every century, Death consigns herself to take on the form of a mortal fated to die in order to remember the value of the gift she is taking. This is the setting of The High Cost of Living, my favorite of the Sandman comics featuring Death. "It always ends," Death says when her day is over. "That's what gives it meaning."

Part theory, part media analysis, and all awesome, Nelson’s work traces the rise of the “Protestant Gothic” tradition in the United States and the way in which this dark and gloomy literary tradition came to inform most of the media we consume today. From zombies to vampires, HP Lovecraft to Guillermo del Toro, Nelson reveals the ways that the Protestant Gothic has shaped modern literature, television, and film into a space of religious imagining that we don’t even recognize.

“Different, weird, and wonderful”—this is how the author describes “lovely,” and I think that’s a great description of the book itself. Lovely is quirky and bold and puts a different spin on the usual tropes. For example, “black” shows a fair-skinned woman in a black ensemble, holding a black umbrella (a goth Mary Poppins!) and “white” shows a black woman with flowing white hair and striking white eyebrows. I especially loved the hairy leg with fancy, pearl-draped shoes and the prosthetic leg with sporty shoes. There’s even a character with a monobrow that spells “lovely.” And bonus points for using the fun word “stompy”!

Clipstone proved herself a master of the genre with her debut, Lakesedge, and its sequel, Forestfall.

Her upcoming novel, Unholy Terrors, continues her streak of deliciously dark and romantic fantasies. This story of a monster hunter falling under the spell of the very monster she’s sent to kill is full of lyrical prose and impeccable Spooky Season vibes.

There’s even a nod to the goth aesthetic, complete with black nail polish and lipstick. Chef’s kiss perfection.

Set in the 1990s alt/goth scene of Birmingham, Alabama – yes, it did have one – Silk was Kiernan’s first published novel, and it immediately attracted a loyal readership. Daria is trying to hold together a relationship and a band (the wonderfully named Stiff Kitten), while her junkie boyfriend Keith shoots up with his father’s antique rig. Meanwhile, weirdness is going on with local curio shop owner Spyder Baxter, whose pet black widow spiders aren’t her only arachnoid allies. This is a hard novel to describe, but for the right sort of reader, it will become a cherished one.

Dead Run is a no holds bar thrill ride of a zombie apocalypse novel.

The author creates a compelling world where humans try to survive the plaguers who are infected zombie cannibals, as well as each other.

Sulan, the main character wants to become a mercenary and studies the fighting arts in secret so she take a shot at the meat grinder, a contest that will let her become a mercenary and forge her own destiny.

I couldn't stop reading this book and couldn't wait until the next book came out to find out what would happen next.