Fans pick 100 books like First Love

This novel is a masterclass in unreliable narration. It follows Will, a young man estranged from his family and religion, as he attends college and falls in love with Phoebe.

As Will takes over and narrates his recollections of their relationship, Phoebe’s friendship with a man named John Leal, and her inculcation into a religious cult, he becomes increasingly untrustworthy. Will rails against John Leal, his lies, and the damage he has done to Phoebe, revealing his complicity in toxic masculinity and his own harmful actions.

Kwon renders her characters as entirely believable, frightening people, in lyrical and considered prose.

When I Hit You is a shattering and visceral account of a woman’s short-lived but harrowing abusive marriage, her family’s determination that she stay in that marriage, and her family’s way of understanding her ordeal once she has escaped.

Kandasamy writes with brutal detail of the husband’s total control of the narrator, who tries again and again to understand her experiences – and escape from them – through her writing. It is a powerful novel about resilience, courage, and determination, which, despite its subject matter, avoids sensationalism.

Sometimes the most toxic relationships are born out of an all-consuming desire to become friends (or more).

So is the case for the narrator of Second Place, M, who becomes obsessed with impressing an artist, L, who stays in her home during the COVID-19 pandemic. L is an awful guest, but M is cringe-worthy in her attempts to impress him, as she begins to reflect on her relationship with her daughter, her husband, and her own body.

The novel is indebted to the Mabel Dodge Luhan’s 1932 memoir Lorenzo in Taos, about DH Lawrence’s stay at her artists’ colony in New Mexico. Lawrence threatened to ‘destroy’ his hostess, as L threatens M in this novel. With every twist and turn, Second Place becomes more surreal, horrifying, and darkly humorous.

Anya and Luke like to listen to true crime podcasts together, but they refuse to share much else: Anya tries to hide her body hair, her family, how she escaped from Sarajevo, and her concern that Luke will leave her.

Luke is stoical, difficult to read, and Anya feels isolated from his wealthy, middle-class English family. When they get engaged, it seems as though Anya might finally be able to settle, but the declaration of commitment only sets off a series of events, estrangements, and secrets that will unravel Anya’s world.

With the tension and pacing of a thriller, and the introspection of a woman who has only known precarity, Sudjic’s novel is terrifying and gripping. 

This is one of those books that you never want to end. I was hooked from the very beginning when I was introduced to Regina and Larry. They had what outsiders would call the perfect marriage until Larry started getting his needs satisfied elsewhere.

I loved how Regina ultimately pulled herself together, took control of her life, and accepted her new normal. I thought the author’s way of describing Regina’s best friend Karen’s character and her husband John was one that left no room for confusion regarding their struggles of dealing with addiction and the demands of a spouse who just wasn't having it.

I finished this book in record-breaking time because it left me wanting more each time I closed it. My bookmark never stayed tucked in the creases of this book for too long! 

This novel, by Meg Wolitzer, offers such a twist at the end, I’m not sure how to write about it as an example of a woman writer finding her voice without giving too much away.
The Wife is the story of a Noble Prize-winning author, Joe Castelman, and his wife, Joan, who have kept a terrible secret for all the years of their marriage. Because you know the topic of my selections here, you can surmise that Joan is also a writer, though she hides that fact. Her character tells the story, and we only slowly see the facets of their strange and deceptive marriage. It becomes clear that Joan is a very good writer indeed, and she’s tired of keeping her secret.

This clever tale will make you think about what it means to invent a life both on and off the page. And that there’s no stopping a… show more.

I loved this book because it builds from the sadness of a life taken far too young to the beauty of deep reflections on the meaning of life, love, and loss. Paul Kalanithi was a brilliant neurosurgeon just completing his years of training when he was diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer.

Kalanithi, a new father, wrote much of this book while he was dying. As a writer myself, this book caused me to wonder if I could be so open about my reality, in a book or any other form, while dying. I do not know the answer, but I treasure the experience of having read a book that raised such a powerful stirring in myself. Like the other books I recommend, Kalanithi’s memoir is a gift from the book Gods.

It’s been nearly ten years since I first read this book and I can still remember what the characters were wearing in the first chapter. Now that’s visceral storytelling! The author’s ability to capture his intense obsession with his future wife is familiar, poignant, and heart-warming. Yglesias’ portrayal of the couple’s long and, at times, bumpy marriage, makes this one of the most complex and honest portrayals of a marriage that I have ever read. That this is also a book about cancer and death does nothing to diminish the feelings of hope and gratitude embodied on every page. 

The subtitle of the book helps you understand Gary Thomas’s purpose: he wants to help his readers see that marriage is not primarily for our happiness.

Although it is a gift and frequently fills us with joy, marriage is also very sanctifying, which is to say it makes us holy. Few things in life help us grow spiritually as much as marriage. When we get married we learn to be patient, gentle, and we frequently have to find ourselves being forgiving. And these are all wonderful graces.

Stacy Schiff is a master biographer. Any subject she chooses (Cleopatra, Benjamin Franklin, Antoine de St. Exupéry, the accused witches of Salem) is elevated by the passion and persistence she brings to research and writing. Her Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Véra Nabokov, the wife of Vladimir, is another pioneering work that proves you don’t have to be at center stage to be worthy of a book. What did Véra do for Vladimir, and he for her? This is no take-down, not the kind of exposé that reveals the great man’s wife as the true genius, exploited and forgotten. It’s a love story of equals, two against (and for) the world.