100 books like All My Sins Remembered

By Joe Haldeman,

Here are 100 books that All My Sins Remembered fans have personally recommended if you like All My Sins Remembered. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of System Collapse

Karen Haber Author Of That Unfortunate Problem with Grandmother's Head and Other Stories

From my list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading.

Why am I passionate about this?

I began reading science fiction when I was 8 years old and "borrowed" my father’s library books until, in defense, he got me my own library card. Not only have I spent decades reading SF, I’ve written it as well. As a veteran reader and writer with plenty of kill marks on my fuselage, I'm literally married to the SF mob (Grandmaster Robert Silverberg, is my spouse). I can both walk the walk and talk the talk. And after writing 9 SF novels including a Star Trek Book and reading uncounted SF and F tales, I still think science fiction and fantasy can be a literature of ideas illuminating the human condition.

Karen's book list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading

Karen Haber Why did Karen love this book?

Oh, the delicious snark of it all. Murderbot may—or may not—have a human heart, but what it does have is attitude with a capital A.

System Collapse focuses on the further adventures of the cyberbot security unit that has hacked itself free from dangerous behavioral controls and named itself Murderbot. The gender-free bot is suffering from PTSD resulting in memory lapses and odd behavior that endangers not only Murderbot but the humans they're protecting from being killed/enslaved by evil Corporate raiders and/or contaminated by deadly alien biotech.

Some of the funniest moments come when human characters try to get touchy-feely with Murderbot, much to their horror. Honestly, Murderbot would rather just watch soap operas with buddy/significant other, ART, the AI ship they live on. It helps to have read the previous 6 books to know who all the characters are and their histories.

By Martha Wells,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked System Collapse as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The million-copy, New York Times bestselling Murderbot series is back in another full-length novel adventure!

Am I making it worse? I think I'm making it worse.

Everyone's favorite lethal SecUnit is back.

Following the events in Network Effect, the Barish-Estranza corporation has sent rescue ships to a newly-colonized planet in peril, as well as additional SecUnits. But if there’s an ethical corporation out there, Murderbot has yet to find it, and if Barish-Estranza can’t have the planet, they’re sure as hell not leaving without something. If that something just happens to be an entire colony of humans, well, a free…


Book cover of Starter Villain

Karen Haber Author Of That Unfortunate Problem with Grandmother's Head and Other Stories

From my list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading.

Why am I passionate about this?

I began reading science fiction when I was 8 years old and "borrowed" my father’s library books until, in defense, he got me my own library card. Not only have I spent decades reading SF, I’ve written it as well. As a veteran reader and writer with plenty of kill marks on my fuselage, I'm literally married to the SF mob (Grandmaster Robert Silverberg, is my spouse). I can both walk the walk and talk the talk. And after writing 9 SF novels including a Star Trek Book and reading uncounted SF and F tales, I still think science fiction and fantasy can be a literature of ideas illuminating the human condition.

Karen's book list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading

Karen Haber Why did Karen love this book?

What happens when Charlie Fitzer, a former journalist and divorcee down on his luck inherits his great-uncle's evil empire?

Hugo Award-winner John Scalzi (Redshirts, Old Man's War) had me at his knowing depiction of cats and their ways of communicating. His other characters aren't bad, either, including the viewpoint character who receives an unexpected and highly daunting inheritance, and most especially Matilda Morrison, a woman of extreme agency. Known for his humorous take on various literary genres, Scalzi here provides action that is laugh-out-loud funny,

 It's worth the price of admission just to read his dolphin scenes or the peculiar behavior of mourners at his uncle's funeral, but there's much much more including a clever satirical treatment of deep-state private clubs belonged to by so-called masters of the universe. Light, funny, heart-warming, and inventive.

By John Scalzi,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Starter Villain as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Locus and Hugo Award-winning author John Scalzi brings us a turbo-charged tale of a family business with a difference - as Charlie discovers when he inherits it. This one comes with a hidden headquarters, minions, talking cats and James Bond-like supervillain rivals.

'Starter Villain establishes Scalzi as SF's leading humourist' - SFX

Warning: supervillain in training. Risk of world domination.

Inheriting his late uncle's business proves complicated. It's also way more dangerous than Charlie could ever have imagined. Because his uncle had kept his supervillain status a secret - until now.

Divorced and emotionally dependent on his cat, Charlie wasn't…


Book cover of The Start of the End of it All: Short Fiction

Karen Haber Author Of That Unfortunate Problem with Grandmother's Head and Other Stories

From my list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading.

Why am I passionate about this?

I began reading science fiction when I was 8 years old and "borrowed" my father’s library books until, in defense, he got me my own library card. Not only have I spent decades reading SF, I’ve written it as well. As a veteran reader and writer with plenty of kill marks on my fuselage, I'm literally married to the SF mob (Grandmaster Robert Silverberg, is my spouse). I can both walk the walk and talk the talk. And after writing 9 SF novels including a Star Trek Book and reading uncounted SF and F tales, I still think science fiction and fantasy can be a literature of ideas illuminating the human condition.

Karen's book list on science fiction and fantasy books that keep me reading

Karen Haber Why did Karen love this book?

The title story of this brilliant collection is a very funny alien invasion story told from the point of view of a woman who is convinced that the invasion is all about her. The other stories are similarly quirky and delightful.

The late Carol Emshwiller was a groundbreaking visionary writer who began publishing her funny, intriguing, unusual work after she was 30 and had to pry writing time away from the demands of her growing family.

When necessary, she would empty out the playpen in her living room, get into it with her typewriter, and work on her fiction while her preschool children enjoyed the freedom of the apartment. She was known for avant-garde approach, unreliable narrators, quirky humor, and a liberal, feminist outlook. 

Recipient of the Nebula and the  Philip K. Dick Award. The late Ursula K. LeGuin called her "a major fabulist, a marvelous magical realist, one of…

By Carol Emshwiller,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Start of the End of it All as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Eighteen stories deal with alien worlds, extraterrestrial invaders, crossbreeds, animals, and lonely city-dwellers


Book cover of A Walk Across America

Margaret Meps Schulte Author Of Strangers Have the Best Candy

From my list on getting you talking to strangers.

Why am I passionate about this?

When I was a youngster, my parents took me on 6-week journeys across the United States by car. We'd stop in a small town each night, and I would explore on foot and meet other kids at the swimming pool or ice cream shop. That slow mode of travel has become my default, and I've spent years exploring back roads, small towns, and bywaters by car, bicycle, and sailboat. I write about the strangers I've found and the "candy" I've gotten from them: strangers have lessons for all of us and are not as dangerous as we've been told.

Margaret's book list on getting you talking to strangers

Margaret Meps Schulte Why did Margaret love this book?

Peter set out during the Vietnam War era to walk all the way across the United States with only a camera, a backpack, and a dog. His books, which I read as a teenager, brought fascinating strangers into my world and taught me how much those strangers can change our lives. Thanks to Peter's writing, I've always felt safe talking to strangers, and I seek them out to find out who they are and what their lives are like. 

By Peter Jenkins,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Walk Across America as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Twenty-five years ago, a disillusioned young man set out on a walk across America. This is the book he wrote about that journey -- a classic account of the reawakening of his faith in himself and his country.

"I started out searching for myself and my country," Peter Jenkins writes, "and found both." In this timeless classic, Jenkins describes how disillusionment with society in the 1970s drove him out onto the road on a walk across America. His experiences remain as sharp and telling today as they were twenty-five years ago -- from the timeless secrets of life, learned from…


Book cover of Charlie Mike

Rick DeStefanis Author Of Valley of the Purple Hearts

From my list on combat soldier’s experience in the Vietnam War.

Why am I passionate about this?

The Vietnam War was a life changing experience for those who fought it and lived through those times; one that will end only when the last one of them dies. Like so many wars, Vietnam will fade into the distant memory of history as a name, some dates, and a historian’s impersonal commentary. My preparation for that war, my infantry training at Fort Polk, and later as a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division as well as my subsequent experience with friends returning from Vietnam have given me the unique ability to experience it through many different perspectives. My goal is to ensure the reader will experience as closely as possible the things they saw.

Rick's book list on combat soldier’s experience in the Vietnam War

Rick DeStefanis Why did Rick love this book?

In this novel, Leonard Scott utilizes his experience as a U.S. Army officer to tell a story about five people involved in the Vietnam War. One is an NCO with the 75th Rangers. Another is a rebellious rich girl who joins the Red Cross and volunteers for duty in Vietnam. The third is a company commander for the 75th Rangers, and the fourth is a young North Vietnamese Army Platoon leader. Scott’s book weaves an exceptionally well told saga and became one of my five choices because it captures the essence (or if you will: the grotesque stench) of the war in Vietnam from several perspectives, including that of an enemy soldier.

By Leonard B. Scott,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Charlie Mike as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

If war may be said to bring out the worst in governments, it frequently brings out the best in people. This is a novel about some of the very best. Some led. Some followed. Some died.

“One of the finest novels yet written about the war in Vietnam.”—The Washington Post

Sergeant David Grady: Leader of Ranger Team 2-2, the Double Deuce, he was a perfectionist who loved his men, his team, and his Army. For a long time they had been his whole world.

Sarah Boyce: Cold. Beautiful. For all her life, she'd been her whole world. She thought she…


Book cover of The Long-Range War: Sniping In Vietnam

Michael Lee Lanning Author Of Inside the Crosshairs: Snipers in Vietnam

From my list on snipers in the Vietnam War.

Why am I passionate about this?

I served as an infantry platoon leader, reconnaissance platoon leader, and rifle company commander in Vietnam and observed the direct results of snipers. I am the author of 30 non-fiction books on the military (six specifically about the Vietnam War), sports, and health that have sold more than 1.1 million copies in 15 countries and 12 languages.

Michael's book list on snipers in the Vietnam War

Michael Lee Lanning Why did Michael love this book?

Contains the history, along with exceptional pictures and illustrations, of Army and Marine snipers in Vietnam. Along with history it details the fielding of rifles, scopes, and suppression devices. More technical than “war story” it provides an excellent base document on which to build an education on long range shooting by American soldiers and Marines in the Vietnam War.

By Peter R. Senich,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Long-Range War as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This is the most complete report ever on the U.S. military's unprecedented use of snipers and sniping equipment in Vietnam. Highlighted are the fielding of the XM21 sniper rifle and the Adjustable Ranging Telescope, plus the application of sound suppression devices and special carbines so typical of the unconventional warfare in SE Asia. 8 1/2 x 11, hardcover, photos, illus., 280 pp.


Book cover of Abandoning Vietnam: How America Left and South Vietnam Lost Its War

Andrew Wiest Author Of The Boys of '67: Charlie Company's War in Vietnam

From my list on the Vietnam War from different POVs.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was always fascinated by the Vietnam War since my older sister’s friends went off to fight in it. After getting my PhD and writing about World War I and World War II, I returned to Vietnam by getting involved with veterans groups and taking veterans and students to Vietnam. Since then I have written widely on the topic, teach about the Vietnam War, and have been involved in several major Vietnam War documentaries for outlets including the History Channel and National Geographic Channel. From those early days I have read everything I can get my hands on about the war, about my generation’s war.

Andrew's book list on the Vietnam War from different POVs

Andrew Wiest Why did Andrew love this book?

A perfect example of what a well-researched and written academic book on the Vietnam War should be.  Abandoning Vietnam tells the critical story of the military side of how America exited its conflict in Vietnam. In most western books on the Vietnam War, our allies in Vietnam, the South Vietnamese, are missing. But this book makes clear South Vietnam’s manifold strengths and clear weaknesses and why our alliance with them failed. The failure of that alliance not only cost more than 50,000 American lives but cost the Vietnamese millions and cost South Vietnam its very life. 

We like to forget what happened there in the wake of our defeat, but this book won’t let you forget. Reading this pushed me to write my own book to further the story.

By James H. Willbanks,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Abandoning Vietnam as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

To achieve this goal, America poured millions of dollars into training and equipping the South Vietnamese military while attempting to pacify the countryside. Precisely how this strategy was implemented and why it failed so completely are the subjects of this eye-opening study. Drawing upon both archival research and his own military experiences in Vietnam, Willbanks focuses on military operations from 1969 through 1975. He contends that Vietnamization was a potentially viable plan that was begun years too late.


Book cover of Dispatches

Tobey C. Herzog Author Of Writing Vietnam, Writing Life: Caputo, Heinemann, O'Brien, Butler

From my list on Vietnam War literature by authors I've interviewed.

Why am I passionate about this?

From an early age, I have made a life out of listening to, telling, teaching, and writing about war stories. I am intrigued by their widespread personal and public importance. My changing associations with these stories and their tellers have paralleled evolving stages in my life—son, soldier, father, and college professor. Each stage has spawned different questions and insights about the tales and their narrators. At various moments in my own life, these war stories have also given rise to fantasized adventure, catharsis, emotional highs and lows, insights about human nature tested within the crucible of war, and intriguing relationships with the storytellers—their lives and minds.

Tobey's book list on Vietnam War literature by authors I've interviewed

Tobey C. Herzog Why did Tobey love this book?

As a Vietnam veteran, teacher of war literature, and writer, I am disappointed that I never interviewed Michael Herr. I can only imagine what such an encounter might have been like with this larger-than-life figure, at least the persona (adrenaline junky, reporter on drugs) found in this fragmented collection of war reportage. With its New Journalistic style and content, the sensory-overload writing might be best described as a collection of literary illumination rounds (their underlying message—war is hell and addictive). As a freelance journalist, Herr arrived in Vietnam wanting to reveal the large ugly truths about the war, which he succeeds in doing, but I find the soldiers’ personal war stories more gripping and truthful. For me and even Herr, the real surprise is that this book ultimately chronicles the author’s own war story of innocence lost: the anti-war reporter becomes just as addicted to war as some of his…

By Michael Herr,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked Dispatches as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

With an introduction by Kevin Powers.

A groundbreaking piece of journalism which inspired Stanley Kubrick's classic Vietnam War film Full Metal Jacket.

We took space back quickly, expensively, with total panic and close to maximum brutality. Our machine was devastating. And versatile. It could do everything but stop.

Michael Herr went to Vietnam as a war correspondent for Esquire. He returned to tell the real story in all its hallucinatory madness and brutality, cutting to the quick of the conflict and its seductive, devastating impact on a generation of young men. His unflinching account is haunting in its violence, but…


Book cover of The Best and the Brightest

John Lawson III Author Of Kurtz

From my list on people who want the Marine Corps to get smarter.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love the Marines. After spending 12 years trying to join the Corps, with numerous rejections, I graduated from Parris Island at 31. As much as I love the Marines, I love reading and writing more. Reading and writing foster deep thought and wisdom in ways that coding, calculating, and puzzle-solving can’t. Having worked as a newspaper reporter, a military analyst, and a Marine, I couldn’t help but loathe the foolish ideas that made the wars on terror so frustrating. I have faith in the Marine Corps (“Semper Fidelis”), and I believe reading thoughtful books can make Marines wiser.

John's book list on people who want the Marine Corps to get smarter

John Lawson III Why did John love this book?

This is my favorite book because Halberstam works so hard to help us understand the intellectual, moral, and personality flaws plaguing the architects of America’s Vietnam debacle.

I believe Marines must understand the civilians who hold the reins if the Corps is to become wiser. This book tells a tragic story, but wisdom and moral courage surface occasionally. Several bright moments belong to Gen. David Shoup, the 22nd Commandant of the Marine Corps.

I love the time he did his best to tell wonkish officials in the Kennedy Administration that their delusional plans for meddling in Cuba (what became “The Bay of Pigs” incident) didn’t square with his military experience (he had earned a Medal of Honor at Tarawa during World War II).

By David Halberstam,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked The Best and the Brightest as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

David Halberstam’s masterpiece, the defining history of the making of the Vietnam tragedy, with a new Foreword by Senator John McCain.

"A rich, entertaining, and profound reading experience.”—The New York Times

Using portraits of America’s flawed policy makers and accounts of the forces that drove them, The Best and the Brightest reckons magnificently with the most important abiding question of our country’s recent history: Why did America become mired in Vietnam, and why did we lose? As the definitive single-volume answer to that question, this enthralling book has never been superseded. It is an American classic.

Praise for The Best…


5 book lists we think you will like!

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