Fans pick 100 books like Beyond The Moon

I imagined myself in the desolate place on the Essex coast where the main protagonist had gone, and I felt an invidious sense of dread as the atmosphere built up. The air of supernatural menace seems to breathe out of this story: the threat and the fear crept into me as if I were there myself, knowing something terrifying would happen, willing the main protagonist to get out and save themselves but knowing that I, just like them, would be held fast by those invisible and supernatural tentacles. 

This is a brilliantly written fast-paced time travel adventure, mystery, and romance, all rolled into one. Conway’s descriptive writing style brings the characters and settings of 1912 and present-day vividly to life. The history field trip scene reminded me so much of my own university field trip to a local cemetery that I wondered if we’d been on the same course. However, this story is set in Birmingham rather than Liverpool, but the similarities were uncanny.

The author has really done his research too, but where a less skilled author might inform the reader through info-dumping, Conway conveys the sights, sounds, and historical details of Edwardian Moseley through action and dialogue. You feel as though you have travelled back in time with Rachel and Danny and are experiencing the story with them. There are so many twists and turns and unexpected reveals that you can’t help but keep reading. But… show more.

Highgate Cemetery is a place I have always wanted to visit, and through this book you get to see it in its newly built Victorian splendour, and its wild and overgrown beauty of today, making this a must-read novel for me.

This standalone novel combines a Victorian mystery with a modern-day murder mystery and a real-life incident that occurred at Highgate in 1970 which was reported in both newspapers and on television at the time – The Highgate Vampire. All of the reports the author uses in the book can be found in contemporary newspapers of the time. There are even Facebook groups devoted to discussing the event. Having read about The Highgate Vampire from the reports of those involved I was intrigued to see how Morris would incorporate this event into her time slip.

 It is very unusual for an author to use an event that occurred within living… show more.

Although this is a story aimed at younger readers, Allie, the main character is about to turn twelve years old, but don't let that stop you from reading it if you're an adult. The author tells her story skillfully and anyone old enough to remember the heatwave of 1976 will find themselves transported back to that year whilst reading this book. It's also nice to be reminded of a time before everyone had smartphones, computers, and access to the internet, where finding out how to do things and researching the history of your house wasn't just a few clicks away.

Dialogue is expertly handled with true-to-life characterisation and there are beautiful, evocative, almost poetic descriptions. The author has a knack for choosing words that convey exactly the image and feeling she wants the reader to experience. All of the senses are used to brilliant effect and plunge the reader into… show more.

Set during World War I and inspired by letters of the author’s grandparents, this delightful novel is filled with a fetching cast of characters and borne along by the author’s entertaining sense of humor. The narration reminds us that many folks were suspicious of people with German ancestry during the war, even though they were American citizens and even using the common term “gesundheit,” and that children of German immigrants were drafted to fight against their parents’ former countrymen.

Young Iowa men were trained into soldiering, where there were still rivalries—some about girls back home, some about German sympathies—and sent across to fight the Kaiser’s troops in France. Some didn’t return home, some came back with broken bodies. There is a compelling scene with wounded veterans in a local hospital, at least one scarred on the inside and fighting his own private battle.

This winsome story also carries themes of… show more.

A brilliant, shocking read but one I’ve read several times, and each time I read it the claustrophobic feeling of being trapped underground leaves me feeling breathless.

Although graphic in places, this is a beautifully written novel that I know I’ll return to time and again. As an author of World War One fiction, I aim to bring a sense of how it felt to be my characters and this book achieves that perfectly as far as I’m concerned.

This totally unique retelling blends Greek mythology with World War I and II history in a beautiful way that stuck with me long after I finished the last page.

There are tons of Greek retellings to choose from, but the added element of the World Wars storyline makes this one stick out from the crowd. Aphrodite strikes a deal on trial and must tell the story of two war-torn couples. The story has a big sweeping feel, full of tragedy and romance.

Lovely War brings to mind Greek epics in its scope and feeling, but the setting gives it a fresh feel. I’ve never read anything quite like it.

As I'm sure you have already guessed this is one of my own few stories translated to English ;-D. I chose it to be part of this selection because one of the few things that Cat and Leo, the main characters, have in common is how absolutely different they are. And this, I think, is one of the strong points of the book; the fact that two people that are poles apart can fall madly in love with each other. The other is that More Than Neighbors is an easy feel-good read.

Henderson’s a prize winner and she should be on the top of every reader’s list! Here, she creates a protagonist like no other: a mortician Mary Crampton, living in a stomach-cramp of a town.

What’s surprising and wonderful is that she loves her work, and treats it as art—and I was so fascinated to learn about it. As her town crumbles away, a young man enters her life—a man whose brother was killed in a grain mill. As the two grow closer, the town becomes angrier, making Gal take new stock of the life she has—and the life she could create. So haunting!

Amanda’s dual-time novel is like reading a poem—the prose is breathtaking, the story compelling, the characters real and wounded, and the love story! In the wake of WWII, a grieving fisherman, Robert Bliss, submits a poem to a local newspaper and his humble words change the tide of a nation. Decades later, Annie Bliss is summoned back to Ansel-by-the-Sea when she learns her Great-Uncle Robert, the man who became her refuge during the hardest summer of her youth, is now the one in need of help. The time slip is expertly done, the story wild and wonderful, and again, I was inspired to try my hand at a time-slip novel after having soaked up every last drop of the water on the sand in Whose Waves These Are.