Here are 100 books that Hollow fans have personally recommended if you like
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As a child in Oklahoma and Texas during the 1960s and 1970s, I remember being told two things: “Oklahoma is OK” and “The Eyes of Texas” were upon me. My grandparents and great-grandparents helped carve the new state of Oklahoma out of nothing within the span of only a few years. For a long time, I accepted the party line, but as an adult, I realized I wasn’t—the picture was incomplete. Underneath the inspiring tales of grit and heroism was something darker. That’s a big part of what my writing is about.
As an ex-pat Oklahoma who writes crime fiction, I’ve long been enamored of my homeboy, the great noir-ist Jim Thomson, whose best novel this is. Like most of Thompson’s work, this is set in Texas, not Oklahoma, but as in all my choices, the world he evokes is indistinguishable, the one from the other.
Lou Ford, the main character, is the kind of guy who makes you want to sleep with both eyes open. A psychotic, small-town Deputy Sheriff, Ford openly mocks the idea of justice; he is a purely malign force, a glad-handing menace who rules his petty fiefdom with the wisdom of Josef Goebbels and the kind-heartedness of Charles Manson. Ford’s first-person narration reads like it’s been scrawled in Magic Marker on the walls of a men’s room in hell. No one did nihilism better than Jim Thomson.
Deputy Sheriff Lou Ford is a pillar of the community in his small Texas town, patient and thoughtful. Some people think he's a little slow and boring but that's the worst they say about him. But then nobody knows about what Lou calls his 'sickness'. It nearly got him put away when he was younger, but his adopted brother took the rap for that. But now the sickness that has been lying dormant for a while is about to surface again and the consequences are brutal and devastating. Tense and suspenseful, The Killer Inside Me is a brilliantly sustained masterpiece…
When I was participating on a crime fiction panel in 2022, we were all asked to recommend books, and I was struck that none of us mentioned a book by a writer of color. Since I knew there were many excellent books by writers of color, I felt this was something I needed to fix. This past summer I decided to make a concerted effort to read more books by writers of color/#OwnVoices, and looked to members of Crime Writers of Color as a starting point. Encouraged by that very exciting read, I went to Bouchercon in Minneapolis where the association Crime Writers of Color was actively promoting the works of their members.
Edgar Award-winner Bluebird, Bluebird, is the first in the Jay Porter Series. Black Texas Ranger, Jay Porter, tried to escape East Texas and become a lawyer, but his home and people clawed him back. Jay is on the verge of losing his prestigious job, his reputation in tatters, when he heads to a tiny rural town to investigate the death of a visiting Black lawyer from Chicago and the seemingly separate death of a local white woman. Locke deftly reveals how the persistent stain of racism continues to poison many facets of life, while the law enforcement hierarchies and jurisdictional infighting threaten to undo Jay’s best efforts.
Winner of the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award 2018 2018 Edgar Award Winner for best novel
When it comes to law and order, East Texas plays by its own rules - a fact that Darren Mathews, a black Texas Ranger working the backwoods towns of Highway 59, knows all too well. Deeply conflicted about his home state, he was the first in his family to get as far away from Texas as he could. Until duty called him back.
So when allegiance to his roots puts his job in jeopardy, he travels up Highway 59 to the small town…
I was born and raised in Texas, and I’ve lived here most of my life. For good or for ill, Texas looms large in the American consciousness and, since everything is bigger in Texas, so are the stereotypes. While you can definitely still find cattle ranches and oil wells in our state, modern Texas is much more complex and diverse than many people might think. While I love books that show those traditional elements of Texas (looking at you, Lonesome Dove!), I have always delighted in finding books that give me a new lens on what it means to be a Texan. I hope you’re delighted by these too.
I tend to be a language-driven reader, as delighted by an unexpected and beautiful sentence as I am by a thrilling turn of a plot. On the second page of Flores’s novel about genetic manipulation and organized crime near the Texas/Mexico border, we get this stunner: “It was a roosterless dawn, in the part of South Texas where no beast yawned.” I knew from that moment that I was in excellent hands and would follow the book wherever the author wanted to take me. Flores takes multiple genres—sci-fi, surrealism, crime, and others—and gives us an utterly original tale that defies easy summary. And it’s very funny!
Near future. South Texas. Narcotics are legal and there's a new contraband on the market: ancient Olmec artifacts, shrunken indigenous heads, and filtered animals - species of animals brought back from extinction to clothe, feed, and generally amuse the very wealthy. Esteban Bellacosa has lived in the border town of MacArthur long enough to know to keep quiet and avoid the dangerous syndicates who make their money through trafficking.
But his simple life starts to get complicated when the swashbuckling investigative journalist Paco Herbert invites him to come to an illegal underground dinner serving filtered animals. Bellacosa soon finds himself…
I was born and raised in Texas, and I’ve lived here most of my life. For good or for ill, Texas looms large in the American consciousness and, since everything is bigger in Texas, so are the stereotypes. While you can definitely still find cattle ranches and oil wells in our state, modern Texas is much more complex and diverse than many people might think. While I love books that show those traditional elements of Texas (looking at you, Lonesome Dove!), I have always delighted in finding books that give me a new lens on what it means to be a Texan. I hope you’re delighted by these too.
I spent my twenties watching in horror as Texas and then-Governor Bush executed more prisoners than any other governor in modern American history, only to be replaced by Gov. Rick Perry who executed even more. In Chammah’s deeply researched non-fiction exploration of the death penalty, he focuses on Texas, “the epicenter of capital punishment.” I better understood our justice system through his intimate focus on the individuals impacted by the larger system. And the book gave me a measure of hope, too—the societal problems that seem intractable can actually improve over time, through the work of many.
NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • A deeply reported, searingly honest portrait of the death penalty in Texas—and what it tells us about crime and punishment in America
“If you’re one of those people who despair that nothing changes, and dream that something can, this is a story of how it does.”—Anand Giridharadas, The New York Times Book Review
WINNER OF THE J. ANTHONY LUKAS AWARD
In 1972, the United States Supreme Court made a surprising ruling: the country’s death penalty system violated the Constitution. The backlash was swift, especially in Texas, where executions were considered part of the cultural…
I grew up in a small village in India. The nearest library was in the next town, two bus rides and a long walk away and comprised of one bookshelf, half full, the books with several pages missing. I read and reread those books, making up my own narratives for the missing pages. I suppose this was the crucial first step in my journey to author. I write stories featuring diverse protagonists. In my books, I explore themes of displacement and belonging, how people brought up in different cultures and during different times respond to challenges, how their interactions and reactions are informed by their different upbringings and values.
This book deals with knife crime and its devastating aftereffects and is told from the point of view of the victim’s mother as she comes to terms with her son’s death. A mother myself, this was a heartbreaking read, very topical and ultimately uplifting. Beautifully written, this is a very powerful book. I think it should be part of the curriculum for teenagers in secondary schools. A truly wonderful book.
Chosen by Bernadine Evaristo as one of her Top 20 Books by Black British Womxn Writers, Yvvette Edwards' second novel, The Mother, tells Marcia's story.
Today, Marcia is heading to the Old Bailey. She's going there to do something no mother should ever have to do: to attend the trial of the boy accused of her son's murder.
She's not meant to be that woman; Ryan, her son, wasn't that kind of boy. But Tyson Manley is that kind of a boy and, as his trial unfolds, it becomes clear that it's his girlfriend Sweetie who has the answers Marcia…
Since I was a tween, I’ve been fascinated by romance. That happily ever after has always taken my breath away. Growing up in Detroit, Michigan, suspense and mystery have always surrounded my life, and intertwining these two elements in my own stories was a norm, but reading them was required and loved. I’m a part of several groups that focus on these genres and I share my readings with them along with my own group on Facebook. I know you will enjoy reading these books as much as I have.
A friend recommended this
book to try to get me out of a reading slump, and man, this book had me crawling out fast. I was impressed with just a darn good story that had me from the start.
Not only did this story contain the elements of suspense and romance that I enjoy, but the intricate lives of the characters had me rooting and emotional, wanting more of them by the end. I would highly recommend this
to other readers.
*INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* One of Barack Obama's Recommended Reads for Summer • New York Times Notable Book • NPR’s Best Books of 2021 • Washington Post’s Best Thriller and Mystery Books of the Year • TIME Magazine’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2021 • New York Public Library’s Best Books of the Year • Goodreads Choice Award Nominee • Book of the Month’s Book of the Year Finalist “Provocative, violent — beautiful and moving, too.” —Washington Post “Superb...Cuts right to the heart of the most important questions of our times.” —Michael Connelly “A tour de force – poignant, action-packed,…
A fast-paced literary thriller with a strong sci-fi element and loaded with existential questions. Beyond the entertainment value, this book takes a hard look at the perilous world of publishing, which is on a crash course to meet the nascent, no-holds-barred world of AI. Could these worlds co-exist, or will…
I've always been fascinated by the way history feels inherently uncanny, as we inhabit the same places as people long dead. I suppose that’s why the novels I write tend to be in historical settings, and they tend to have a speculative twist. For much of my working life, I was a journalist, so I love the research part of writing historical fiction. I tend to be drawn to old stories, and I especially love looking at those stories from angles I haven't seen before. Two of my novels bookend the European Middle Ages: The Valkyrie, set in the 5th century CE, and The Chatelaine, set in the 14th century CE.
Some novels lean into the alienness of their historical settings, making them feel almost like secondary worlds.
The Buried Giant is one of those. It takes place partly in legend, after the death of King Arthur, and follows an elderly married couple in a society that has quite literally lost its memory. I struggled with this book at first because the prose is so unassuming, but it got under my skin.
Ishiguro's simple prose creates a feeling of unsettling ordinariness, like the way your dreaming brain accepts a logic your waking brain never could.
*Kazuo Ishiguro's new novel Klara and the Sun is now available*
The Romans have long since departed, and Britain is steadily declining into ruin.
The Buried Giant begins as a couple, Axl and Beatrice, set off across a troubled land of mist and rain in the hope of finding a son they have not seen for years. They expect to face many hazards - some strange and other-worldly - but they cannot yet foresee how their journey will reveal to them dark and forgotten corners of their love for one another.
I’ve been in the funeral profession my entire professional career, and my family has deep roots in the profession too. My great-great-great grandfather was a cabinet maker, or “tradesman undertaker” in rural Milford, Delaware prior to the Civil War. In addition to being a funeral director and embalmer, I’m a certified post-mortem reconstructionist and cremationist, and the president of the Delaware State Funeral Directors Association. I’ve written five books on the subject of the funeral profession and am an associate editor for Southern Calls, “The Journal of the Funeral Profession.”
Thomas Lynch does a masterful job in The Undertaking offering a behind-the-scenes look at the funeral profession. Using beautiful, lyrical prose to present a topic (i.e., death) that is often ugly and hard to stomach, and rears its head at the most inopportune times, Lynch offers an unflinching look at what he calls the dismal trade. His deep connection with death and dying translates to the reader not only feeling connected with the subject matter, but empowering the reader to connect with the next death event in their life. Take it from me, someone in the profession, this book is as authentic as they come. A must-read.
"Every year I bury a couple hundred of my townspeople." So opens this singular and wise testimony. Like all poets, inspired by death, Thomas Lynch is, unlike others, also hired to bury the dead or to cremate them and to tend to their families in a small Michigan town where he serves as the funeral director.
In the conduct of these duties he has kept his eyes open, his ear tuned to the indispensable vernaculars of love and grief. In these twelve pieces his is the voice of both witness and functionary. Here, Lynch, poet to the dying, names the…
I love middle-grade books (for eight to twelve-year-olds), which is why I write in that genre. My Summer of L.U.C.K. trilogy is sprinkled with magical adventures, but each one has real-life kids struggling with real-life problems and finding real-world solutions. I believe that books whose characters experience magical elements along with themes of friendship, perseverance, and self-acceptance will help them learn, as I did when I was a young reader, that whatever troubles they're experiencing, other kids have those troubles too, that they're not alone, and that help is possible.
I’m a sucker for books about restored faith, particularly one with a Victorian house on the cover (see The Diamond in the Window below). That’s what caught my eye about Jess Redman’s beautifully written book, but the main character, a kid named Wunder, really drew me in and kept me reading.
I loved following Wunder’s journey as his faith in miracles falters after the death of his newborn sister. What touched me the most was how his connection with a woman–maybe a witch–who resides in the crumbling Victorian house helps reawaken his belief in everyday magic. This is one of my top favorite magical middle grade books of all time.
In the tradition of heartwrenching and hopeful middle grade novels such as Bridge to Terabithia comes Jess Redman's stunning debut about a young boy who must regain his faith in miracles after a tragedy changes his world.
Eleven-year-old Wunder Ellis is a miracologist. In a journal he calls The Miraculous, he records stories of the inexplicable and the extraordinary. And he believes every single one. But then his newborn sister dies, at only eight days old. If that can happen, then miracles can’t exist. So Wunder gets rid of The Miraculous. He stops…
Ophelia, a professor of Dante, is stricken when she discovers that her husband Andy has been cheating on her with a winsome colleague. What follows is Ophelia’s figurative descent into hell as she obsessively tracks her subjects, performs surveillance in her beat-up Volvo, and moves into the property next door…
I’m a novelist with a PhD in Literature from NYU. My background is Modern British, and I’ve always been drawn to literary stylists. But, over the years, I’ve developed a passion for reading and writing novels that deal with themes of betrayal either within families or between close friends. I’m drawn to domestic suspense in which the characters’ psychological growth isn’t secondary to the plot.
This book by Celeste Ng is one of my favorite novels. It’s a beautifully told literary mystery that examines the lives of the five members of the Lee family. Ng masterfully writes from several points of view while unraveling the narrative that led to the death of the oldest Lee daughter by drowning. Was it suicide, or was she killed?
The story weaves in and out of the past, presenting each character’s aching need to belong and be accepted by those they love. There are no villains, but there are flawed parents who push their children to be reflections of their own desires and are driven to fit into a society that rejects them on the basis of either race or gender.
The acclaimed debut novel by the author of Little Fires Everywhere and Our Missing Hearts
"A taut tale of ever deepening and quickening suspense." -O, the Oprah Magazine
"Explosive . . . Both a propulsive mystery and a profound examination of a mixed-race family." -Entertainment Weekly
"Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet." So begins this exquisite novel about a Chinese American family living in 1970s small-town Ohio. Lydia is the favorite child of Marilyn and James Lee, and her parents are determined that she will fulfill the dreams they were unable to pursue. But when Lydia's body…
