100 books like Follow Me to Ground

I believe that the best haunted house books are ones in which it’s the characters who are haunted. In this book by Daphne du Maurier, I’m not sure if the house is haunted by the specter of Rebecca, but I know the narrator certainly is.

I love how the author creates an atmosphere filled with dread as the new wife imagines her predecessor, tries to live up to her reputation, and finally learns who she really was. 

This is hands-down a standout for me in its unique portrayal of the Asian-American immigrant story. Set during the California Gold Rush, the novel tells the tale of Lucy, a young, orphaned Chinese-American woman, and the adventure she and her sister embark on to carve a new, secure future for themselves.

It is at once an unforgettable adventure and an unflinching exploration of sisterhood that made me consider how the female bildungsroman is often not so much about a woman growing up but rather growing into the self she wants to be, despite the confines of the society in which she lives. Plus, Zhang’s original, gleaming prose is just a delight to read.

I picked this book up from a second-hand street bookshop. It was the wisteria that did it. Something about those climbing vines made me fall right into the world of Lestat and Louis, and I’ve never fallen out again. Also, I love love, and there’s nothing more intriguing than three unrelated people/beings managing to stay together for sixty-five years.

Of course, there was murder and mayhem, but the love endured, and my secret romantic heart ate that shit up.

We have all heard of this book. We all know something about the plot either by watching the film or hearing something about it at school. If you haven’t yet read the book, you must put it on your reading list. We can only give Mary Shelley’s work full justice by reading it from beginning to end; not until then will you be able to feel Victor’s internal struggles. In his attempt to achieve immortality, he created a monster.

I never get tired of reading chapter five where Shelley describes Victor’s utter disappointment upon watching his creation coming to life. I love the choice of language. The thoughts that went through his mind and his guilty feelings mixed with pride and excitement present an unsolvable moral dilemma. Should he destroy his own creation?  

I immediately loved this book for its alternate history, detailed folklore, and dark academic vibes. I connected with the complex characters and a strong female protagonist who was fearless of social expectations. The unique combination of folklore and an archaeology background that I share with the author Heather Fawcett was something I found familiarity with instantly.

I enjoyed the alternate history where dark academia met with the more traditional Gaslamp-style fantasy fiction to create something new. This combination of dark academia, marginalized voices, and alternate history is a style I enjoy delving into the past in new, unusual ways and revealing voices that otherwise remain unheard.  

This book is like taking a step inside a dream. For me, it had everything I could ever ask for from a novel—lyrical prose, gorgeous imagery, fun and lovable characters, a little bit of quirk, and a rare depth at the heart of it. Nature is a major element, taking place in Oklahoma, Oregon, Michigan, Mississippi, and Montana. The writing is so vivid it immerses you in the adventure, making it feel as though you’re walking beneath the pines, smelling the gulf coast air, or simply marveling in the beauty of the natural world alongside Wylan, the quirky and heroic protagonist. 

Set in Victorian England, this novel begins where romances often start—with a beleaguered heroine. She is a brilliant cook with a questionable past. Her patron dies. His brother takes over the estate where—let’s say—she’s been multi-tasking. The brother has perversely cut all pleasure from his life. But oh, that food. Complications develop, including his desire to not desire the food or the cook. There are dark secrets and dark hungers including a hunger for revenge on both the hero’s and heroine’s parts. I love a sexy, twisty story that I can’t put down. This one meets all of my marks. 

About twenty years ago, I read the opening lines of this book (published in 1955) in the evening and finished the entire book in one sitting. This time, I read it in two sittings and fell in love with it again. 

I love how this short novel straddles several genres—literary fiction, magic realism, surrealist fiction, and Gothic fiction—in its own way. I always enjoy a precise and simple style, at which Juan Rulfo excels. Yet, the narrative and the plot are so complex that it's hard to believe so much fits into one hundred pages. 

This book has all the elements of Gothic fiction in the Mexican style. The gloom and eeriness are palpable in the oppressive heat of the wasteland that is the fictional town of Comala, and only Rulfo could marry such contradictions in one short novel. 

I love books that explore how ordinary people might react in extraordinary circumstances, and this one takes that to another level.

The main characters, Tengo and Aomame, see that the world has changed—the most obvious clue being that there are now two moons in the sky—and it is fascinating to watch how these two very different people cope with living in a new and mysterious context. Murakami has a knack for making the surreal seem believable, and in this book, he is at the top of his game.

This is the Tom Robbins book for me: the glorious bastard that made me want to be a writer.

It's a day lost in Tijuana, or Nice, or Beijing, or some other place you'd never thought you'd be, and you don't speak the language, but you've convinced yourself that you're fluent, and you can do it: you can get around anyway, and there's no cabs, and so you get into some guy's really old Volvo or, more ill-advised, van, and you give him the local equivalent of ten bucks to take you where you hope you want to be and not kill you, and he does it, but when he drops you off he yells at you, in his language, for being stupid enough to take a ride with a stranger.

And you do it again the next day, and you never learn your lesson.