Fans pick 100 books like Coming Home

As a writer I admit that I’m beguiled by Cornwall as a literary setting for high romance and adventure, yet it’s important to me to remember that ordinary people live and work there. 

I was impressed by In Her Wake because it manages to encompass both extremes. Its overarching gothic narrative about a stolen child is used by the author to examine the extraordinary experience of some very humble, loving people whose lives have been put into suspension by tragedy. It’s incredibly moving and truthful.

This book is a masterwork of psychological suspense that I love for its unreliable narration, emotional intensity, vivid rendering of character and place, and ingenious plot twists. Just as compelling and atmospheric as du Maurier’s earlier Rebecca, this novel similarly features a central enigma in the form of a shape-shifting woman. Still, its narrator and protagonist is a young man.

Philip Ashley, heir to a Cornish estate, is reckoning with the sudden overseas death of his beloved cousin and guardian, Ambrose, under mysterious circumstances. As he increasingly questions the role Ambrose’s new wife—a mysterious widow named Rachel—might have played in the months leading to his death, the grief-stricken Philip is drawn into a drama of conspiracy, romance, and obsession that will test the limits of his sanity.

This novel has everything in it that I love about Cornwall – the life and work of its artists, an incredible sense of the scenery and atmosphere, and the limpid light cast over its beauty. 

It’s also an absorbing story about the price that may have to be paid for following your star. Successful artist Rachel Kelly values creativity and self-expression, but all too often she places these above the happiness of her partner and children. Is she right or is she wrong? 

Zennor is a tiny village perched on the cliffs of Cornwall’s rugged north shore and battered by Atlantic storms. I’ve often visited it, have run my hand over the legendary mermaid chair in its little church and walked the cliff path, which Virginia Woolf reported doing once at night, a dangerous event that inspired Dunmore’s novel. 

Zennor in Darkness is based on a true story. D.H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda settled in a remote cottage on the cliffs during the First World War. They were regarded with suspicion because Frieda was German and the couple kept an irregular lifestyle – were they in fact enemy spies?  Their story is tenderly told through the eyes of a young local artist, Clare Coyne.

Dunmore writes beautifully, with lucidity and a suspenseful air.

If you like intrigue, then welcome to Venice in 1938. This novel features a likable heroine in search of the solution to a mystery contained in a sketchbook. It’s full of art—both real and metaphorical. Set against the backdrop of impending war, this one is full of courage and heart.

I was surprised I loved Just for the Summer so much. I’d never read Abby Jimenez before, but I was delightfully surprised. How could you not love that both Justin and Emma have a love curse hanging over their heads? The person they date goes on to find their one true love. So why not date each other and break the curse? The premise is not only original, but the situations she brings to this are hilarious. Like the Toilet King billboard. I now need a Toilet King T-shirt.

The characters are charming, loving people—people I wanted to see have their happily ever after. The secondary characters are just as lovable and realistic. I loved this book, though, because of the realism of their predicaments. They lived through problems that weren’t sugar-coated.

There are plenty of books about memory politics and Germans’ slow and difficult way of reckoning with their evil past. What I really like about this book is how it brings to life these complex moral challenges through the story of a relationship between a younger man and an older woman who turns out to have been a camp guard under the Nazis.

The novel is about the tensions between love, responsibility, and forgiveness, but above all, it is about the difficulty of being German after the Nazis.  

Ninety-year-old Marvellous is a river goddess, her whole being is immersed in a Cornish creek, she lives in a caravan beside the water and loves a swim.

Marvellous lives on in my imagination. Nature is an organic part of the novel, time and seasons move with the tide; the reader knows it is spring because the ransoms (wild garlic) are out. I love rivers, they wind their way into my own writing, West Looe River is often my muse as a poet. 

I met Sarah Winman when I stumbled upon her book signing at my local bookshop. I only had enough money to buy Marvellous Ways or shoes to wear to an awards ceremony that evening. I realized no one would notice my old shoes so I bought the book and loved every page.

This novel was an immersive journey through the English countryside, from Cornwall to the Cotswolds. I was so deep into this setting and story that I was always stunned to look up and see that I was at home in my own living room. Rosamunde Pilcher is from Scotland, and she knows this landscape so well. She takes us there with deft prose and page-turning skill. 

The story is about a woman named Penelope Keeling and her extended family. It is a novel of connections—mothers, daughters, husbands, and lovers—all revolving around a famous painting called The Shell Seekers. Through a bohemian childhood and a wartime romance, we come to love the complicated Keeling family. 

This story is not only a history of Singapore and Malaya before, during, and after the war, it is also a beautiful love story and gripping family Saga. It’s a chunky book in which Noel Barber paints an indelible picture of pre-war colonial life in Singapore for both the colonials and the Malaysians.

Noel Barber brings to life the British defence build-up and the military and colonial administration’s mistakes, which led to the Japanese invasion. It was as though they could not believe the Japanese could or would invade their territory. The story is romantic and heart-breaking, as Noel Barber delves into family ties and the characters’ fight for survival.

I recommend this book for two reasons: I read a lot, yet this book has stuck with me for over twenty years, so it must have impacted me. Second, this author is no longer with us, so I think everyone… show more.