100 books like All Roads Lead to You

By Jackie Ashenden,

Here are 100 books that All Roads Lead to You fans have personally recommended if you like All Roads Lead to You. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Outlander

Annemarie Musawale Author Of In the Shadow of the Styx

From my list on supernaturals who don’t sparkle in the sunlight.

Why am I passionate about this?

My name is Annemarie and I’ve been reading stories almost as soon as I was taught how to read. I’ve also been writing them. My fascination with the supernatural came about, I guess because an active imagination for a small child comes almost naturally from a fear of the dark. The dark held many terrors for me, and in a perverse contrariness, this prompted an interest in supernatural beings. As far as I’m concerned, it’s all real, and the more we know about them, the better. Or at least, that’s what I deduce from my never flagging interest, and I guess that’s why there’s always an element of the supernatural/paranormal in all my stories. 

Annemarie's book list on supernaturals who don’t sparkle in the sunlight

Annemarie Musawale Why did Annemarie love this book?

Is Claire supernatural because she can go through the stones? Her skin is certainly milk-soft and bright enough to shimmer in sunlight, but she doesn’t. Even when her hair starts to go white, it doesn’t exactly shimmer. However, she does fit, and so does the story because Unusual things happen to quite ordinary-looking people.

But the most magical thing about this book is the love that Jamie and Claire find in each other. Swoon.

By Diana Gabaldon,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The first book in Diana Gabaldon’s acclaimed Outlander saga, the basis for the Starz original series.

One of the top ten best-loved novels in America, as seen on PBS’s The Great American Read!
 
Unrivaled storytelling. Unforgettable characters. Rich historical detail. These are the hallmarks of Diana Gabaldon’s work. Her New York Times bestselling Outlander novels have earned the praise of critics and captured the hearts of millions of fans. Here is the story that started it all, introducing two remarkable characters, Claire Beauchamp Randall and Jamie Fraser, in a spellbinding novel of passion and…


Book cover of Unfortunately Yours

Nicole Neiswanger Author Of Thundering Meadows

From my list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve loved to read from the moment I discovered I could, going to the library and checking out the max number I was allowed every week. When I discovered romance novels, I’d hide the covers so no one knew what I was reading but I could never stop. My favorites were the ones focusing on marriage of convenience. They have multiple layers of conflict and the happily ever after never comes easy. There is something about forcing two unwilling souls together that makes for some interesting, complicated, explosive, delightful, and heartwarming storylines. No matter the time frame, two people fighting their attraction but ultimately loving hard is worth the read.

Nicole's book list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life

Nicole Neiswanger Why did Nicole love this book?

There just aren’t enough words to describe how perfectly satisfying this novel is. I started it and couldn’t put it down until the very delicious end.

Natalie and August butt heads from the moment they first meet, constantly throwing jabs at one another, neither giving an inch. When Natalie suggests a marriage of convenience benefiting each of them, she doesn’t anticipate the feelings that bombard her from the moment she says, “I do.”

There is nothing more delectable than a man in uniform and August is a Navy SEAL through and through, but has a heart of gold who wants to help and protect those he loves. When he realizes the depth of his feelings for Natalie, it is like an explosion that only a SEAL can navigate.

By Tessa Bailey,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

#1 New York Times bestselling author Tessa Bailey is back in Napa Valley with this hilarious rom-com about a down-on-her-luck heiress who suggests a mutually beneficial marriage of convenience to a man she can't stand... only to discover there's a fine line between love and hate.

After losing her job and her fiance in one fell swoop, Natalie Vos returned home to lick her wounds. A few months later, she's sufficiently drowned her sorrows in cabernet and she's ready to get back on her feet. She just needs her trust fund to finance her new business venture. Unfortunately, the terms…


Book cover of The Heart of a Texas Cowboy

Nicole Neiswanger Author Of Thundering Meadows

From my list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve loved to read from the moment I discovered I could, going to the library and checking out the max number I was allowed every week. When I discovered romance novels, I’d hide the covers so no one knew what I was reading but I could never stop. My favorites were the ones focusing on marriage of convenience. They have multiple layers of conflict and the happily ever after never comes easy. There is something about forcing two unwilling souls together that makes for some interesting, complicated, explosive, delightful, and heartwarming storylines. No matter the time frame, two people fighting their attraction but ultimately loving hard is worth the read.

Nicole's book list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life

Nicole Neiswanger Why did Nicole love this book?

Who doesn’t love a cowboy, a marriage arranged by two loving fathers, and two souls who have lost something precious?

Cowboy novels are downright delicious and Linda Broday has a knack for making you fall for tough but sensitive cowboys who passionately protect those they love. Lara and Houston meet for the first time on their wedding day. When Houston lifts the wedding veil, he finds a woman with beautiful green eyes, an ugly scar marring her cheek but a defiant glean in her hope-filled eyes.

Houston decides he will protect this woman and will avenge those who hurt her if it’s the last thing he does. I’ve loved cowboy novels for years and will devour Linda Broday’s novels as soon as they are released.

By Linda Broday,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Heart of a Texas Cowboy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Linda Broday's heroes step right out of her books and into your heart." ―JODI THOMAS, New York Times bestselling author

He married her to keep his ranch, but she just might save his heart in this emotional historical western romance from queen of the genre, USA Today bestseller Linda Broday.

One bullet is all it takes to shatter Houston Legend's world. He swore he'd never love again, but with the future of the Lone Star Ranch on the line, he finds himself at the altar promising to love and cherish a woman he's never met―a woman whose vulnerable beauty touches…


Book cover of When the Scoundrel Sins

Nicole Neiswanger Author Of Thundering Meadows

From my list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve loved to read from the moment I discovered I could, going to the library and checking out the max number I was allowed every week. When I discovered romance novels, I’d hide the covers so no one knew what I was reading but I could never stop. My favorites were the ones focusing on marriage of convenience. They have multiple layers of conflict and the happily ever after never comes easy. There is something about forcing two unwilling souls together that makes for some interesting, complicated, explosive, delightful, and heartwarming storylines. No matter the time frame, two people fighting their attraction but ultimately loving hard is worth the read.

Nicole's book list on marriage of convenience binding two souls for life

Nicole Neiswanger Why did Nicole love this book?

Who doesn’t love a hero who fights his attraction and love for a woman until it’s almost too late?

Annabelle requires a husband before she turns twenty-five in just four weeks. A marriage of convenience is all she needs in order to keep her beloved home. When her aunt enlists the help of Quinn who caused Annabelle’s fall from grace six years prior, Annabelle is furious but goes along with the plan albeit reluctantly.

As Quinn sends suitor after suitor away, the time grows short and she still doesn’t have a potential husband outside of Sir Harold who only wants the money that comes with her land. When Quinn finally realizes what he might lose, it could be just a moment too late. A swoon-worthy book everyone should read.

By Anna Harrington,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked When the Scoundrel Sins as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Six years ago, a childish prank perpetrated by the reckless Quinton Carlisle ruined Annabelle Greene's reputation and any chance she had at securing a successful marriage. Incensed, she moved to her beloved estate on the Scottish border and has reveled in the solitude...until now when the contents of a family will are revealed. Suddenly, Belle's single status may cost her the only home she's ever known. Now, with her only marital prospect a horribly greedy and completely undesirable man, Belle knows just the person to rescue her-the one person who owes her for his bad behavior...

There's nothing Quinn Carlisle…


Book cover of For All She Knows

Rebecca Prenevost Author Of Starting in 5th

From my list on fiction portraying realistic parenting dilemmas.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a mom of two daughters who is fascinated with reading nonfiction parenting books and listening to parenting-related podcasts. My absolute favorite, though, is when fiction authors take a dense parenting topic and turn it into a relatable and engaging story so that readers can explore the same important issues and challenges in a more enjoyable way.

Rebecca's book list on fiction portraying realistic parenting dilemmas

Rebecca Prenevost Why did Rebecca love this book?

This novel exemplifies parenting fiction in my mind. It takes a concept I could’ve read about in a nonfiction parenting book (how to handle teenage drinking) and slides it into a compelling narrative that realistically depicts all the potential complexities and nuances in the parenting decisions and how they might play out, including several factors and consequences related to teen alcohol use and parent-sponsored parties that I would’ve never thought of myself.  

By Jamie Beck,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked For All She Knows as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Two mothers face the consequences of their choices in a gripping novel about friendship, family, and forgiveness by Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestselling author Jamie Beck.

Grace first met Mimi when she blew into their sons' toddler playgroup like a warm bay breeze that loosened Grace's tight spaces. Despite differing approaches to life and parenting, the fast friends raised their kids together while cementing a sisterlike bond that neither believed could be broken. But when a string of ill-fated decisions results in a teen party with a tragic outcome for Grace's son, the friendship is ripped apart and…


Book cover of The Naïve and Sentimental Lover

Richard Scholar Author Of Émigrés: French Words That Turned English

From my list on just how much English owes French.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have long been struck, as a learner of French at school and later a university professor of French, by how much English borrows from French language and culture. Imagine English without naïveté and caprice. You might say it would lose its raison d’être My first book was the history of a single French phrase, the je-ne-sais-quoi, which names a ‘certain something’ in people or things that we struggle to explain. Working on that phrase alerted me to the role that French words, and foreign words more generally, play in English. The books on this list helped me to explore this topic—and more besides—as I was writing Émigrés.

Richard's book list on just how much English owes French

Richard Scholar Why did Richard love this book?

This is a bittersweet comedy of manners in which John le Carré ventures way beyond the spy novels for which he is more famous. For lovers of spy novelsand I am one suchthere is much here to savour. Le Carré draws upon the French concept of the naïve – as paired with the sentimental by the German essayist Friedrich Schillerto inform and enliven the telling of a tale about a love triangle in middle England. Underlying the comic idiom of the novel is an acid dissection of the causes of British failure to be a part of Europe and to help lead Europe out of her darkness. A tale, perhaps, for our times. 

By John le Carré,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Naïve and Sentimental Lover as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From the New York Times bestselling author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Spy Who Came in from the Cold; and The Night Manager, now a television series starring Tom Hiddleston.

"I have visited bohemia and got away unscathed."

Aldo Cassidy is an entrepreneurial genius. At thirty-nine, he dominates the baby pram market and rewards his success with a custom Bentley. But Aldo's bourgeois life is upended by a chance encounter with Shamus-a charismatic writer whose first and only novel blazoned across the firmament twenty years earlier. The two develop a passionate friendship that draws Aldo-smitten also with his new…


Book cover of Beautiful World, Where Are You

Jenna Tico Author Of Cancer Moon: How I Survived the Best Years of My Life

From my list on millennials on your next existential crisis.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a 34-year-old memoirist, one of the most frequent questions I get about my genre, delivered with both curiosity and disdain, is: “Why?” After all, why? What could I, the life experience and literary equivalent of a pollywog, have to share about my journey—or, gasp, what I’ve LEARNED? The fun thing is, as someone who once broke my parents’ computer by using dial-up internet to download Napster, I’m used to disappointing people. Even more fun: as a millennial memoirist, I don’t believe in writing books that will tell people what I’ve learned. I hope my writing shows, through both merit and content, that I have indeed learned something.

Jenna's book list on millennials on your next existential crisis

Jenna Tico Why did Jenna love this book?

All hail the queen. Sally Rooney makes it look easy, with just the right amount of Irish, nothing-is-easy-you-insufferable-wanker on the side. This book has it all: awkward yet undeniably hot sexual tension! Arguments! Cool names! A house that is bigger than yours!

And within Rooney’s stupidly gorgeous prose, we find ourselves not only yelling “EXACTLY!” out loud, many times, to an empty room but answering the book’s central question: right here. As long as we have a good book, that beautiful world is right here.

By Sally Rooney,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Beautiful World, Where Are You as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

AN INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Beautiful World, Where Are You is a new novel by Sally Rooney, the bestselling author of Normal People and Conversations with Friends.

Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he’d like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend, Eileen, is getting over a break-up, and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood.

Alice, Felix, Eileen, and Simon are still young—but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get…


Book cover of The Lucky Dress

Victoria Browne Author Of Gut Feeling

From my list on vacation reads about love and friendship.

Why am I passionate about this?

Romance and chick-lit books hooked me as a young adult. It was this genre that inspired me to write. Since publishing my first book Gut Feeling in 2012 I’ve since written three chick-lit novels and a holiday rom-com screenplay. The fiction world of perfectly unperfect romance never fails.   

Victoria's book list on vacation reads about love and friendship

Victoria Browne Why did Victoria love this book?

I enjoy a book that is easy to read and makes me laugh. The Lucky Dress is a story most of us can relate to, with heartache and triumphs. We see the main character deal with a no-good ex and follow her life where we meet her friends and family. She grows as a woman, though not without some bumps along the way.

By Aimee Brown,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Lucky Dress as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

We all have our lucky dress… Emi Harrison hasn’t been feeling particularly lucky lately. Ever since her ex-fiancée, Jack Cabot, successfully shattered her heart into a million pieces. She’s managed to avoid him for a whole year, but all that’s about to change at her brother Evan’s wedding… She will have to face Jack, Jack’s sister, Jack’s parents, and Jack’s new girlfriend: a mean girl that just won’t quit. What could possibly go wrong? With her lucky dress on, all bets are off, and maybe Emi will find her happily-ever-after at last? Can this dream team thwart Edward Pennington’s plans…


Book cover of The Giver of Stars

Julia Jarman Author Of The Widows' Wine Club

From my list on improbable friendships.

Why am I passionate about this?

Like the widows in The Widows’ Wine Club, I’m getting on. Unlike them, I’ve been a writer for forty years, often hunched over a keyboard, ignoring people. Amazingly, though, I managed to have a happy marriage and make some great friends. Phew! Because I’ve needed friends, especially since my husband died. Looking back, I’m interested to see that I didn’t instantly take to some of my closest buddies. Circumstances threw us together, and we got to know and like and love each other. I explore this in my book. 

Julia's book list on improbable friendships

Julia Jarman Why did Julia love this book?

I love this book because it has everything, believable, engaging characters, a riveting plot, a vivid setting, and a cause. Larger-than-life Margery O’Hare and lady-like Alice are unlikely friends, but friends they become in this great story.

When I first saw photos of those "librarians on horseback," the wonderful women who responded to Eleanor Roosevelt’s call to take books to the rural poor of Kentucky in the depressed 1930s, I longed to know more. Jojo Moyes gives us lots more. There’s an array of well-drawn characters, but it’s Margery and Alice who drive the story forward, defying the odds to achieve their aims and find men who love and appreciate them.

Yes, it’s a love story, too, and a whodunnit? Perfect!

By Jojo Moyes,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked The Giver of Stars as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | A REESE WITHERSPOON X HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK CLUB PICK

"A great narrative about personal strength and really captures how books bring communities together." -Reese Witherspoon

From the author of The Last Letter from Your Lover, now a major motion picture on Netflix, a breathtaking story of five extraordinary women and their remarkable journey through the mountains of Kentucky and beyond in Depression-era America


Alice Wright marries handsome American Bennett Van Cleve, hoping to escape her stifling life in England. But small-town Kentucky quickly proves equally claustrophobic, especially living alongside her overbearing father-in-law. So when…


Book cover of The Housekeeper and the Professor

Mark Hummel Author Of Man, Underground

From my list on unlikely friendships or unexpected pairings.

Why am I passionate about this?

Two instincts drive this list, one “writerly” and one about being human: 1) all good fiction maximizes various kinds of tension, particularly between people, and unusual or unexpected character pairings offer rich tensions; 2) I think we live in times when we are in desperate need of human kindness and must recognize that people from very different backgrounds can come together in their humanity. I love novels with complex characters and in books, as in life, I like to see people grow and change, and a big part of change is letting other people into your life.

Mark's book list on unlikely friendships or unexpected pairings

Mark Hummel Why did Mark love this book?

I am fascinated with “made families,” those connections of strangers who pass into such intimate friendships that they become de facto, chosen families.

While the core premise of The Housekeeper and the Professor will seize your imagination—the “professor” has suffered a traumatic brain injury that leaves him with only 8 minutes of short-term memory—it is the beauty of the friendship that emerges between him, the “housekeeper” hired to care for him, and her ten-year-old son that will stay with you.

In the present-tense living of having to reintroduce themselves anew to this math genius every morning, all the characters learn the value of a moment, and together they experience the “curious equations that can create a family.”

This thin, lovely, uplifting novel helped me re-learn the potency of fleeting moments and the enduring lessons of unexpected love.

By Yoko Ogawa,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Housekeeper and the Professor as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This is one of those books written in such lucid, unpretentious language that reading it is like looking into a deep pool of clear water...Dive into Yoko Ogawa's world and you find yourself tugged by forces more felt than seen' New York Times

Each morning, the Professor and the Housekeeper are introduced to one another. The Professor may not remember what he had for breakfast, but his mind is still alive with elegant mathematical equations from the past. He devises clever maths riddles - based on her shoe size or her birthday - and the numbers reveal a sheltering and…


Book cover of Outlander
Book cover of Unfortunately Yours
Book cover of The Heart of a Texas Cowboy

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