100 books like Her Last Words

By E.V. Kelly,

Here are 100 books that Her Last Words fans have personally recommended if you like Her Last Words. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of The Guest List

Kaira Rouda Author Of Best Day Ever

From my list on thrillers to take with you on vacation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love to take destination thrillers with me on vacation. It’s like a double whammy of travel. I also love to write destination thrillers and have written quite a few, including my first book, set in a charming lakefront community on Lake Erie, Ohio. My other destination thrillers include Beneath the Surface, set on a luxurious super yacht on a trip to Catalina Island from Newport Beach, California, and my latest, Under the Palms, set at a fabulous Laguna Beach luxury resort. I love to write about grown-ups behaving badly. Dropping the characters into a beautiful resort or vacation setting increases the suspense. 

Kaira's book list on thrillers to take with you on vacation

Kaira Rouda Why did Kaira love this book?

This island mystery is set on a chilly resort off the coast of Ireland, so you won’t need sunscreen here, but you will need stamina as you’re once again trapped.

I loved this cast of characters attending the wedding of a glamorous and famous bride and groom. Media celebrities are so much fun to read about. But the real star of the show is the hostile setting and the menacing characters who are all there for something, some cleverly hiding their true motives until the very end.

A fast, propulsive read. 

By Lucy Foley,

Why should I read it?

12 authors picked The Guest List as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

*The brand new thriller from Lucy Foley - THE PARIS APARTMENT - is available to pre-order now*

The No.1 Sunday Times bestseller

*Over 1 million copies sold worldwide*
*One of The Times and Sunday Times Crime Books of the Year*
*Goodreads Choice Awards winner for Crime & Mystery 2020*

A gripping, twisty murder mystery thriller from the No.1 bestselling author of The Hunting Party.

'Lucy Foley is really very clever' Anthony Horowitz
'Thrilling' The Times
'A classic whodunnit' Kate Mosse
'Sharp and atmospheric and addictive' Louise Candlish
'A furiously twisty thriller' Clare Mackintosh

On an island off the windswept Irish…


Book cover of Where I End

Amanda Cassidy Author Of The Returned

From my list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a bright bubbly person with a dark, sinister imagination. As an Irish journalist turned fiction writer, the thrillers I write reflect some of the challenging crime scenes I’ve reported from. While the whodunnit element in crime-writing is extremely important, equally, I prefer to have my readers fascinated with the whydoneit. I love writing about dark pasts, buried secrets, simmering resentments, and how they shape my characters in such a way that creates delicious unease and urgency. I like to use settings like tiny Irish villages to enhance the often insular nature of locals protecting their own. The picturesque settings in my books create mood and tension and which include the landscape as character. 

Amanda's book list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings

Amanda Cassidy Why did Amanda love this book?

Ideas of neglect and abandonment as well as isolation run throughout Where I End, a tense shocking literary debut from the Irish writer and journalist. This story is about an incapacitated mother being cared for by her teenage daughter.

I loved the desolation White created on the remote island inspired by Inis Meáin. With cliffs on one end, a sandy beach on the other, White describes how she was walking one day with her husband when she felt an explicable sense of dread.

“It wasn’t just wild and windswept and any of those clichés, it was actually more the stillness and the strangeness of it. And I noticed it was really getting to my husband as well, this kind of dread seeping up into us from the rocks and the sky and the ocean.”

This feeling is translated directly into the centre of the book, where the borders between landscape…

By Sophie White,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Where I End as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'My mother. At night, my mother creaks. The house creaks along with her ...'
Aoileann has never left the island. Her silent, bed-bound mother is the survivor of a private disaster no one will speak about. Aoileann desperately wants a family, and when artist Rachel and her baby move to the island, Aoileann finds a focus for
her relentless love.


Book cover of Death Writes

Amanda Cassidy Author Of The Returned

From my list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a bright bubbly person with a dark, sinister imagination. As an Irish journalist turned fiction writer, the thrillers I write reflect some of the challenging crime scenes I’ve reported from. While the whodunnit element in crime-writing is extremely important, equally, I prefer to have my readers fascinated with the whydoneit. I love writing about dark pasts, buried secrets, simmering resentments, and how they shape my characters in such a way that creates delicious unease and urgency. I like to use settings like tiny Irish villages to enhance the often insular nature of locals protecting their own. The picturesque settings in my books create mood and tension and which include the landscape as character. 

Amanda's book list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings

Amanda Cassidy Why did Amanda love this book?

Towering headlands, windswept beaches, derelict houses. Ruined churches. Author Andrea Carter admits that her entire Innisowen mystery series is inspired by place – landscape and buildings which gives her novels atmosphere and depth.

Her latest offering is Death Writes, set in the stunning Northern Irish location of Glendara.

In Glendara, preparations are underway for Glenfest, Glendara's literary festival. Phyllis Kettle, the local bookshop owner, is especially pleased to have persuaded Gavin Featherstone, the local best-selling recluse writer, to take part.

The festival begins, and an eager crowd awaits Featherstone's appearance on stage. He is unexpectedly engaging, but when he stands to read from his new book, he stumbles and keels over on the platform.

Solicitor and local woman Benedicta O Keefe discovers that she holds Featherstone's will at the office, drafted by her predecessor. Soon, she's drawn into a complicated legal wrangle over the man's estate involving his family…

By Andrea Carter,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Death Writes as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The next gripping book in the Ben O'Keefe series.

Praise for Andrea Carter's Inishowen Mysteries series

'Atmospheric and vivid' The Irish Times

'I adored this traditional crime novel; it's modern day Agatha Christie with Ben as Miss Marple' Irish Examiner

'The colourful cast of characters may be fictional, but the landscapes, towns and villages are instantly recognisable' Irish Daily Mail

'A beguiling heroine - clever, sympathetic and bearing a weight of guilt' The Times


Book cover of The Trap

Amanda Cassidy Author Of The Returned

From my list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a bright bubbly person with a dark, sinister imagination. As an Irish journalist turned fiction writer, the thrillers I write reflect some of the challenging crime scenes I’ve reported from. While the whodunnit element in crime-writing is extremely important, equally, I prefer to have my readers fascinated with the whydoneit. I love writing about dark pasts, buried secrets, simmering resentments, and how they shape my characters in such a way that creates delicious unease and urgency. I like to use settings like tiny Irish villages to enhance the often insular nature of locals protecting their own. The picturesque settings in my books create mood and tension and which include the landscape as character. 

Amanda's book list on nightmare thrillers that unfold in dreamy Irish settings

Amanda Cassidy Why did Amanda love this book?

Stranded on a dark road in the middle of the night, a young woman accepts a lift from a passing stranger.

It’s the nightmare scenario that every girl is warned about, and she knows the dangers all too well – but what other choice does she have? As they drive, she alternates between fear and relief – one moment thinking he is just a good man doing a good thing, the next convinced he’s a monster.

But a monster is exactly what she's looking for. When the driver drops her safely home Lucy’s heart sinks. She will have to try again tomorrow night. She’s made herself the bait, in her bid to find the man who took her sister.

Set in and around Dublin and the Dublin mountains, this gripping read from the author of The Nothing Man and 56 Days will keep you guessing until the very end. But…

By Catherine Ryan Howard,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Trap as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Stranded on a dark road in the middle of the night, a young woman accepts a lift from a passing stranger. It's the nightmare scenario that every girl is warned about, and she knows the dangers all too well - but what other choice does she have?

As they drive, she alternates between fear and relief - one moment thinking he is just a good man doing a good thing, the next convinced he's a monster. But when he delivers her safely to her destination, she realizes her fears were unfounded.

And her heart sinks. Because a monster is what…


Book cover of Our Little Cruelties

Sarah Clarke Author Of Every Little Secret

From my list on psychological thrillers with secrets from the past.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a writer of psychological thrillers. I have a keen interest in psychology and how events and experiences in our childhood shape who we become. When I work on a new book, I always build a detailed profile of my characters’ childhoods – and as I write thrillers, these are often challenging ones with issues like narcissistic parents or siblings, coping with grief, mental illness, or bullying. My plot will always be at least partly driven by the secrets my characters form in their childhood or early life, and so I also really value this depth in the psychological thrillers I read.

Sarah's book list on psychological thrillers with secrets from the past

Sarah Clarke Why did Sarah love this book?

This is a story about three brothers. It starts with the funeral of one of them (you don’t know which) and goes back over their lives to unravel the mystery. They are all very different and none of them are likeable, and yet I found myself invested in all of them, trying my hardest to like them despite what they did – to each other and more widely. The book explores some serious issues around mental health and addiction, and I felt Nugent did this incredibly well – with both sympathy and clearly lots of research. The story is also told very skillfully. It uses multiple characters and jumps between timelines but reads very smoothly.

By Liz Nugent,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Our Little Cruelties as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'Liz Nugent is a force to be reckoned with' Lisa Jewell

'Brilliantly observed family life and a plot that is part rollercoaster, part maze. Loved it!' Graham Norton

'MAGNIFICENT. Her best yet, and that's really saying something' Marian Keyes
______________

Three brothers are at the funeral. One lies in the coffin.

Will, Brian and Luke grow up competing for their mother's unequal love. As men, the competition continues - for status, money, fame, women ...

They each betray each other, over and over, until one of them is dead.

But which brother killed him?
______________

'Dark, beautiful, devastating - pure…


Book cover of Redemption in Irish History

Chris Lawlor Author Of An Irish Village: Dunlavin, County Wicklow

From my list on lesser-known aspects of Irish history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m an Irish writer and historian. I always enjoyed history, even in school, and I went on to study it at Maynooth University, receiving a BA. I became a history teacher and eventually head of the history department in Méanscoil Iognáid Rís. I began writing local history articles for the Dunlavin arts festival and the parish magazine. I went back to university and got a first-class honours MA from Maynooth, before being awarded a PhD from DCU. I’ve won the Lord Walter Fitzgerald prize and the Irish Chiefs’ Prize, and my students were winners in the Decade of Centenaries competition. Now retired, I continue to write and lecture about history!

Chris' book list on lesser-known aspects of Irish history

Chris Lawlor Why did Chris love this book?

This is an unusual, ambitious, and relevant book, focusing on the Christian values contained within Irish political thought over a period of approximately three hundred years (from the late eighteenth century to approximately the year 2000). Many Irish politicians and patriots included a Christian element in their visions of and for an independent or a self-governed Ireland. Beginning with Wolfe Tone and the United Irishmen of the 1790s, this Christian element is traced through Emmet, O’Connell, the Young Irelanders, the Fenians, the Home Rulers, and the leaders of the 1916 rising. The book goes on to trace the Christian vision through the periods of the Irish Revolution, independent Ireland, and the northern troubles of the late twentieth century. Engrossing and insightful, this excellent book provides much food for thought!

By John Marsden,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Redemption in Irish History as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Marsden, John. Redemption in Irish History. Dublin, Dominican Publications, 2005. 14 x 21cm. 219 pages. Original softcover. Excellent condition, as new other than inscription to previous owner on half-title page. Redemption in Irish History comes at a critical historical juncture for Irish society and Irish Christianity. Through bringing theology, politics, history and economics into creative dialogue, Redemption in Irish History offers an integrative vision of how Irish society might be nourished from the best of its diverse traditions and thereby truly flourish in our increasingly inter-dependent world. Topics including Pearse and Connolly, history, theology, politics, economics come together in creative…


Book cover of Autobiography of a Child

Patrick Doherty Author Of I Am Patrick: A Donegal Childhood Remembered

From my list on Irish childhood.

Why am I passionate about this?

As an experienced teacher I was fascinated by how writing personal stories helped to develop confidence as well as oral and written self-expression at different levels of complexity in children across the primary school age range. This encouraged me to embark on a MA in creative writing where I wrote an extended autobiographical piece that focused on how the relationship between my father and myself affected my childhood.  I continued this research into my doctoral studies in Irish autobiography. I explored the history of Irish autobiography, memory, and identity formation. This research provided the context to write my own childhood memoir I Am Patrick

Patrick's book list on Irish childhood

Patrick Doherty Why did Patrick love this book?

In 1899, the Irish novelist, Hannah Lynch wrote her memoir Autobiography of a Child. She caused controversy in Ireland and abroad by attempting to represent her childhood up to the age of twelve narrated through the child’s voice, a strategy I adopted but from the ageing child’s point of view where the language and thought process become more complex as I grow older. Her use of adult reflection upon the child’s unstable memory demonstrates an original understanding of the child’s point of view and its representation. Hannah uncovered the inescapable cycle of harsh treatment by her parents within a large family and the physical abuse by nuns at school. Her book reinforces the unreliability of memory for autobiography and helped me to accept that total veracity is not possible.

By Hannah Lynch,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Autobiography of a Child as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

It is a powerful first-person narrative follows the story of a young Irish girl from her earliest memory to around twelve years of age, tracing the shaping of "the Dublin Angela" into "the English Angela" and ultimately Angela of Lysterby, "the Irish rebel." This tale is told from the perspective of her older self, now "a hopeless wanderer" with youth and optimism behind her.
The narrative opens with a startling sketch of Angela's mother, "a handsome, cold-eyed woman, who did not love me," before relating fragmented memories of an idyllic time spent in rural Kildare while "put out to nurse"…


Book cover of Life Sentences

Anne Griffin Author Of Listening Still

From my list on Irish books by Irish authors I like to rave about.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love great writing and great storytelling too. As a child I liked nothing more than when my father made up bedtime stories for me. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to appreciate how writers work exceptionally hard not just at getting the plot of a story right but in the words they chose. Being Irish, I love to support the wealth of enviably good writers that seem to spill out from these shores. In each of these books you will find love and loss and laughter. It never fails to make me smile when abroad to see one of these guys on the shelves of the bookshops I visit. 

Anne's book list on Irish books by Irish authors I like to rave about

Anne Griffin Why did Anne love this book?

Set over three generations of the one family, this is the story of their fight for survival. What I love here is not just the prose, because there is no one finer than O’Callaghan, but also because it touches on the depopulation of Ireland’s small islands during the famine and the small island to which he refers has a very significant family connection for me. Partly based on O’Callaghan’s own family, Life Sentences tells an epic story of working-class life in Ireland from famine right through to modern-day. It is an unforgettable tale of love, abandonment, and reconciliation.

By Billy O'Callaghan,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Life Sentences as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

*THE #3 IRISH BESTSELLER*
*A SINEAD & RICK 'MUST READS' PICK*

An unforgettable tale of love, abandonment, hunger and redemption, from a rising star of Irish fiction

'O'Callaghan is one of our finest writers . . . and this is his best work yet' JOHN BANVILLE

*****

At just sixteen, Nancy leaves the small island of Cape Clear for the mainland, the only member of her family to survive the effects of the Great Famine. Finding work in a grand house on the edge of Cork City, she is irrepressibly drawn to the charismatic gardener Michael Egan, sparking a love…


Book cover of Battle For Arohanui

Gail Notestine Author Of The Seven Foot Long Dog

From my list on Irish Wolfhounds as the main character.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a Wolfhound parent and the author of books about this majestic breed. I have studied everything I could find about the Wolfhound since I first lost my heart to one many years ago, meeting breeders and owners alike to learn everything I could about their temperament and health. I have attended many dog shows and symposiums to further my knowledge of my breed. Having shared my life with this dog, unlike any other, I devour books written by other Wolfhound owners. 

Gail's book list on Irish Wolfhounds as the main character

Gail Notestine Why did Gail love this book?

This is one of my special favorites. I know Amanda personally and knew and grew to love the real Millie and Bridie.

Arohuani is a magical kingdom ruled by Irish Wolfhound Queen Millie. When a dark force rises in the land, her daughter, Princess Bridie leads an army of wolfhounds to defeat the evil. This is one of my favorite books because it transports the reader to a world ruled by gently, loving hounds. I reread it yearly.

By Amanda Susan Van Vliet,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Battle For Arohanui as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 13, 14, and 15.

What is this book about?

In the magical kingdom Arohanui, ruled by the wise and gentle Wolfhounds of the royal house of Kuri te Aroha, a dark force rises. The queen's daughter Bridie commands the guard of the only passage into the kingdom but as vigilant as she and her ladies are, evil finds its entry into their stronghold. They must forge unexpected alliances with others of their kind, along with the magical and unusual creatures of the kingdom, if they are to defeat this evil.

The Battle for Arohanui will be fierce, from the mountains, across the plains and to the shores of the…


Book cover of Nothing But Blue Sky

Anne Griffin Author Of Listening Still

From my list on Irish books by Irish authors I like to rave about.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love great writing and great storytelling too. As a child I liked nothing more than when my father made up bedtime stories for me. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to appreciate how writers work exceptionally hard not just at getting the plot of a story right but in the words they chose. Being Irish, I love to support the wealth of enviably good writers that seem to spill out from these shores. In each of these books you will find love and loss and laughter. It never fails to make me smile when abroad to see one of these guys on the shelves of the bookshops I visit. 

Anne's book list on Irish books by Irish authors I like to rave about

Anne Griffin Why did Anne love this book?

David has lost his wife far too early. A man in mourning, he relives their twenty years together and sees that the ground beneath them had shifted and he had simply not noticed, or was it more that he had chosen not to. The writing here is spectacular and the theme of love and loss so very moving. Set between Ireland and Spain, McMahon captures the sublime and mundane nature of long-term love with exceptional skill. Another reason I like this book is that in my debut novel, my main character Maurice Hannigan, while very different from David, was also a widower, and naturally, the issue of loss figured heavily so I feel a bond to this book that is very special.

By Kathleen MacMahon,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Nothing But Blue Sky as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'A poignant, gentle and astutely observed novel about marriage and the evolution of love' Sunday Times, NOVELS OF THE YEAR 2020
________________

Is there such a thing as a perfect marriage?

David thought so. But when his wife Mary Rose dies suddenly he has to think again. In reliving their twenty years together David sees that the ground beneath them had shifted and he simply hadn't noticed. Or had chosen not to.

Figuring out who Mary Rose really was and the secrets that she kept - some of these hidden in plain sight - makes David wonder if he really…


5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in the Irish, Italy, and Ireland?

The Irish 64 books
Italy 406 books
Ireland 303 books