Fans pick 100 books like Forrest Gump

As a child with older sisters, I read their books beyond my age level under the blankets with a flashlight in bed at night. I became a reading addict. Raised in The Netherlands with the Second World War casting its large shadow on our lives, I only became interested, after my parents were gone, in how people survived and had to find their courage under impossible circumstances. They would never talk about those occupation years. My search into history led me to find the answers.

In my first career as an actress, I often got cast as the “comic relief” in more serious films and plays. I cut my acting chops on improv comedy before getting my BFA in drama from NYU and performing in everything from Shakespeare to Seinfeld. I wrote and performed in stage shows at Disneyland and Disney World and screamed myself hoarse in B-horror films. As an author, I like to write about serious topics but I just can’t help being funny. I received my MFA from Antioch University and have had over 30 short stories and essays published. While I read voraciously (and genre-indiscriminately), my favorite books are often “darkly comedic” or “funny yet poignant.”

I worked for many years in business consultancy (writing many books like the bestselling “Successful Time Management [Kogan Page]) before branching into other genres, including fiction and light-hearted travel writing (e.g., Beguiling Burma [Rethink Press]). My five novels all involve ordinary people caught up in situations that involve mystery or crime (or both). Like most fiction writers, I find it difficult to recognize where ideas come from, though I do draw on various aspects of my own life; for example, Long Overdue [Stanhope Books] involves sailing and a missing person. Certainly, I relate to sailing and, for many years, owned a boat. 

Too often, I find that novelists force the endings of their books in ways that aren’t true to their characters, the stories, or their settings. Often, they do so to provide the Hollywood ending that many readers crave. That always leaves me cold. I love novels whose characters are complex, human, and believable and interact with their setting and the story in ways that do not stretch credulity. This is how I try to approach my own writing and was foremost in my mind as I set out to write my own book.

I hesitate to call myself an expert on empathy and humor, but I am absolutely passionate about both. As a performer in my earlier years, I find no greater joy than making people laugh. As a human who was lucky enough to be raised with love, I find no greater purpose, no greater hope for our survival as a species than caring for one another. The science and technology that may save humanity from extinction should spring forth from the same place as the love and humor that may save our souls (presuming we have them 😊): Compassion for one another. When you find these lessons in books, they stick.

As a travel writer, author, broadcaster, speaker, and producer, I’ve reported from over 100 countries on 7 continents for major print and digital publications worldwide and networks like National Geographic and Travel Channel.  I kicked off my career with a solo, 12-month round-the-world backpacking adventure, largely inspired by the formative books I read below. Embracing the world with insatiable curiosity, an open heart, an open mind, a sense of humour, and enthusiasm to share my stories clearly resonated. Here I am, two decades later, author of a half-dozen bestselling books that focus on my own eclectic travels, which will hopefully inspire others as these books inspired me.  

In the years since I was 15, I have been writing and publishing books. After graduating from Florida Virtual School in 2014, I am currently pursuing a liberal arts degree with a focus on disabilities education. I'm passionate about literature, and I've dedicated myself to educating others about disabilities through my love of literature. Furthermore, I own a radio station and produce several podcasts related to disability. I contribute to seven different sites, including the mighty thought catalog and unwritten, where I talk about my life as a 27-year-old with a disability. I am also an advocate for disability rights, as well as a writer and author for disability issues.

In the years since I was 15, I have been writing and publishing books. After graduating from Florida Virtual School in 2014, I am currently pursuing a liberal arts degree with a focus on disabilities education. I'm passionate about literature, and I've dedicated myself to educating others about disabilities through my love of literature. Furthermore, I own a radio station and produce several podcasts related to disability. I contribute to seven different sites, including the mighty thought catalog and unwritten, where I talk about my life as a 27-year-old with a disability. I am also an advocate for disability rights, as well as a writer and author for disability issues.

My interest in how music makes sense was first piqued when, as a music student at the Royal Academy of Music in London, I met a blind child who, despite having learning difficulties, could reproduce the most complex music on the piano just by listening. Put simply, he had a better musical ear than I did, as a prize-winning student at a top conservatoire. Since that early experience, I have devoted my life to exploring just how music works (without the need for conceptual understanding) and how teachers can use the universality of music to promote social inclusion.

I’ve lived most of my life with invisible disabilities that affect my daily activities, and I hope to encourage nuanced, empowering, and inclusive conversations about disabilities with my book, So Much More to Helen! All of my nonfiction picture books—Miep and the Most Famous Diary, Winged Wonders, Cougar Crossing, Ocean Soup, Make Way for Animals!, and more—are about “solutionaries” who help people, animals, and the planet. They’ve won Golden Kite and Eureka! Nonfiction Honor Awards, starred reviews, and spots on best book and state reading lists. Mostly, I hope they inspire compassion, curiosity, and action.