100 books like Master Slave Husband Wife

By Ilyon Woo,

Here are 100 books that Master Slave Husband Wife fans have personally recommended if you like Master Slave Husband Wife. Shepherd is a community of 10,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of The Nightingale

Robert McParland Author Of The Last Alchemist

From my list on books where history meets mystery.

Why am I passionate about this?

I once had a history advisor in school whom I informed that I was studying history so I could write fiction better. I saw him cringe a bit at that. Even so, I think that history and fiction–and the mystery–go together well. I am always drawn by mystery dramas–and by the drama of real lives facing and unraveling their way through real events. Of course, that led to graduate studies in cultural and intellectual history, to many years of teaching literature, and to passionate reading of mystery novels. Sparkling fiction and strong narrative history, for me, continue to stimulate a sense of wonder at human experience and this incredible universe we live in.    

Robert's book list on books where history meets mystery

Robert McParland Why did Robert love this book?

I read this book quickly. Its historically informative and inspirational quality caught my interest immediately. From the first chapters, the author brings us into World War II France, which will become a tangled web of occupation by the Nazis.

I discovered in this powerful story a relationship between two sisters that weaves secrets of the heart and key decisions. The characters are caught in a difficult situation: a predicament that reflects the struggle experienced by many people in France during the war years. The story stimulates a sense of empathy and curiosity about what will come next.

The historical setting is drawn colorfully. This novel is valuable both for gaining a broader historical sense and for the sheer you-are-there experience. The narrative skill with which the author weaves this tale and its inherent drama should sustain the reader’s interest, as it did mine. This story touches the core of human…

By Kristin Hannah,

Why should I read it?

25 authors picked The Nightingale as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Soon to be a major motion picture, The Nightingale is a multi-million copy bestseller across the world. It is a heart-breakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the endurance of women.

This story is about what it was like to be a woman during World War II when women's stories were all too often forgotten or overlooked . . . Vianne and Isabelle Mauriac are two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals and passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path towards survival, love and freedom in war-torn France.

Kristin Hannah's…


Book cover of Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom

Richard J.M. Blackett Author Of Samuel Ringgold Ward: A Life of Struggle

From my list on abolitionist biographies about African American history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was not trained in African American history, but first developed a passion for it during my first teaching job in Pittsburgh, where a number of my colleagues were interested in locating the origins of Black Nationalism and began researching the life of a local black physician, Martin R. Delany. That led me to a wider exploration of nineteenth-century African American history.

Richard's book list on abolitionist biographies about African American history

Richard J.M. Blackett Why did Richard love this book?

A giant of the nineteenth century and the leader of the struggle to end slavery needs a giant book and Blight’s is the most penetrating and comprehensive biography we have of the person many consider the voice and soul of the abolitionist movement and the struggle to win the right guaranteed in the Constitution.

By David W. Blight,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked Frederick Douglass as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

**Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History**

"Extraordinary...a great American biography" (The New Yorker) of the most important African-American of the nineteenth century: Frederick Douglass, the escaped slave who became the greatest orator of his day and one of the leading abolitionists and writers of the era.

As a young man Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) escaped from slavery in Baltimore, Maryland. He was fortunate to have been taught to read by his slave owner mistress, and he would go on to become one of the major literary figures of his time. His very existence gave the lie to slave owners: with…


Book cover of All the Light We Cannot See

Bruce Borgos Author Of The Bitter Past

From my list on a protagonist who has extraordinary capabilities.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always loved peculiar heroes and heroines. Characters with strange gifts and an equal number of challenges. It started with Sherlock Holmes, whose mind fascinated me. As a child, I gravitated to the unnatural protagonist, Tarzan, in the Edgar Rice Burroughs novels and Bilbo Baggins in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I was never a big fan of Superman, I preferred people who adapted quickly to new surroundings and could think on their feet. Once I began my writing career, I kept those protagonists in my mind. Four novels in, I do my best to capture their spirit and determination to overcome whatever lands in front of them.

Bruce's book list on a protagonist who has extraordinary capabilities

Bruce Borgos Why did Bruce love this book?

I loved this book because it’s a World War II story (my favorite time period), which I can’t get enough of, and its protagonist, Marie-Laure, is a young blind girl. By the time she’s twelve, she has learned to navigate Nazi-occupied Paris from a miniature of the city her father has built for her.

This is a girl with many fears, her blindness being just one, but she pushes through them all in order to help her country overcome its worst nightmare. Her bravery is off the charts!

By Anthony Doerr,

Why should I read it?

38 authors picked All the Light We Cannot See as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

WINNER OF THE 2015 PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
WINNER OF THE CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR FICTION

A beautiful, stunningly ambitious novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II

Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever.'

For Marie-Laure, blind since the age of six, the world is full of mazes. The miniature of a Paris neighbourhood, made by her father to teach her the way home. The microscopic…


Book cover of The Diaries of Hannah Cullwick: Victorian Maidservant

Lydia Murdoch Author Of Daily Life of Victorian Women

From my list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a professor of modern Britain with a specialty in nineteenth-century social history. I’m drawn to sources and topics that tell us about how everyday people lived and thought about their lives. One favorite part of my job is the challenge of discovering more about those groups, like working-class women or children, who weren’t the main focus of earlier histories. Since 2000, I’ve taught classes at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on Victorian Britain, the British Empire, the First World War, and the history of childhood.

Lydia's book list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes

Lydia Murdoch Why did Lydia love this book?

This is one of the first books that I remember buying for myself in graduate school. Cullwick’s descriptions of her relationship with upper-class Arthur Munby (whom she eventually married) and the photographs of her dressed as a maid-of-all-work, a lady, a “slave,” an agricultural worker, and a valet highlight Victorian power negotiations and performativity.

Cullwick started working as a servant at the age of eight. From her diaries, I learned much about the daily lives of domestic servants: their relationships with employers, the different levels of service and employment networks, and the sheer amount of hard, physical labor that it took to run a Victorian household.

By Liz Stanley, Hannah Cullwick,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Diaries of Hannah Cullwick as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Hannah Cullwick (1833-1909) worked all her life as a maidservant, scullion, and pot-girl. In 1854 she met Arthur Munby, 'man of two worlds,' upper-class author and poet, with a lifelong obsession for lower-class women. And so began their strange and secret romance of eighteen years and marriage of thiry-six, lived largely apart. Hannah's diaries, written on Munby's suggestion, offer an obsorbing account of life 'below stairs' in Victorian England. But they reveal, too, a woman of extraordinary independence of will, whose chosen life of drudgery gave her the freedom not to 'play the Lady,' as Munby demanded. Rescued from obscurity.…


Book cover of Vigilance: The Life of William Still, Father of the Underground Railroad

Richard J.M. Blackett Author Of Samuel Ringgold Ward: A Life of Struggle

From my list on abolitionist biographies about African American history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was not trained in African American history, but first developed a passion for it during my first teaching job in Pittsburgh, where a number of my colleagues were interested in locating the origins of Black Nationalism and began researching the life of a local black physician, Martin R. Delany. That led me to a wider exploration of nineteenth-century African American history.

Richard's book list on abolitionist biographies about African American history

Richard J.M. Blackett Why did Richard love this book?

A child of slavery, Still became a major figure in the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia which worked to undermine slavery by aiding the enslaved to reach freedom.

Wish I had this book when I was writing my book. There is no better book on the movement in eastern Pennsylvania and Still’s roll in it.

By Andrew K. Diemer,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The remarkable and inspiring story of William Still, an unknown abolitionist who dedicated his life to managing a critical section of the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia—the free state directly north of the Mason-Dixon Line—helping hundreds of people escape from slavery.

Born free in 1821 to two parents who had been enslaved, William Still was drawn to antislavery work from a young age. Hired as a clerk at the Anti-Slavery office in Philadelphia after teaching himself to read and write, he began directly assisting enslaved people who were crossing over from the South into freedom. Andrew Diemer captures the full range…


Book cover of Alexander Crummell: A Study of Civilization and Discontent

Richard J.M. Blackett Author Of Samuel Ringgold Ward: A Life of Struggle

From my list on abolitionist biographies about African American history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was not trained in African American history, but first developed a passion for it during my first teaching job in Pittsburgh, where a number of my colleagues were interested in locating the origins of Black Nationalism and began researching the life of a local black physician, Martin R. Delany. That led me to a wider exploration of nineteenth-century African American history.

Richard's book list on abolitionist biographies about African American history

Richard J.M. Blackett Why did Richard love this book?

A penetrating story of the person many considered the intellectual leader of nineteenth-century African American.

A man who rose from poverty in New York City to gain a degree from Cambridge University, spent almost thirty years in Liberia, wrote some of the most incisive analyses of African civilization before returning to America where he mentored W.E. B. DuBois and other leaders of the new Civil Rights Movement.

By Wilson Jeremiah Moses,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Alexander Crummell (1819-1898) was one the most prominent Afro-American intellectuals of the nineteenth-century. This biography places Crummell's ideas within the context of his life and times.


Book cover of David Ruggles: A Radical Black Abolitionist and the Underground Railroad in New York City

Richard J.M. Blackett Author Of Samuel Ringgold Ward: A Life of Struggle

From my list on abolitionist biographies about African American history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was not trained in African American history, but first developed a passion for it during my first teaching job in Pittsburgh, where a number of my colleagues were interested in locating the origins of Black Nationalism and began researching the life of a local black physician, Martin R. Delany. That led me to a wider exploration of nineteenth-century African American history.

Richard's book list on abolitionist biographies about African American history

Richard J.M. Blackett Why did Richard love this book?

An early proponent of the rights of Black Americans, Ruggles, a free black, devoted his life to protecting Blacks from the scourge of kidnapping and protecting the enslaved who managed to make it to freedom in New York City.

Everyone should know about this early fighter against slavery and racial discrimination.

By Graham Russell Gao Hodges,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

David Ruggles (1810-1849) was one of the most heroic--and has been one of the most often overlooked--figures of the early abolitionist movement in America. Graham Russell Gao Hodges provides the first biography of this African American activist, writer, publisher, and hydrotherapist who secured liberty for more than six hundred former bond people, the most famous of whom was Frederick Douglass. A forceful, courageous voice for black freedom, Ruggles mentored Douglass, Sojourner Truth, and William Cooper Nell in the skills of antislavery activism. As a founder of the New York Committee of Vigilance, he advocated a ""practical abolitionism"" that included civil…


Book cover of Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands

Lydia Murdoch Author Of Daily Life of Victorian Women

From my list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a professor of modern Britain with a specialty in nineteenth-century social history. I’m drawn to sources and topics that tell us about how everyday people lived and thought about their lives. One favorite part of my job is the challenge of discovering more about those groups, like working-class women or children, who weren’t the main focus of earlier histories. Since 2000, I’ve taught classes at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on Victorian Britain, the British Empire, the First World War, and the history of childhood.

Lydia's book list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes

Lydia Murdoch Why did Lydia love this book?

I love this book for what it teaches us about the global nineteenth century and the complexities of identity.

Seacole traveled widely as a medical practitioner—from Kingston to London, Cruces to the Crimea, and eventually settled in England. Identifying herself as a “doctress,” an “unprotected female,” and “Mother Seacole,” she underscored the plasticity of Victorian gender ideals of separate spheres as she claimed her role on the battlefront.

She condemned the racism she faced as a Black Creole woman, yet also supported the British empire. Most of all, as my students often point out, she had the bravery to tell her own story.

By Mary Seacole, Sara Salih (editor),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Written in 1857, this is the autobiography of a Jamaican woman whose fame rivalled Florence Nightingale's during the Crimean War. Seacole's offer to volunteer as a nurse in the war met with racism and refusal. Undaunted, Seacole set out independently to the Crimea where she acted as doctor and 'mother' to wounded soldiers while running her business, the 'British Hotel'. A witness to key battles, she gives vivid accounts of how she coped with disease, bombardment and other hardships at the Crimean battlefront.
"In her introduction to the very welcome Penguin edition, Sara Salih expertly analyses the rhetorical complexities of…


Book cover of Caroline Norton's Defense: English Laws for Women in the 19th Century

Lydia Murdoch Author Of Daily Life of Victorian Women

From my list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a professor of modern Britain with a specialty in nineteenth-century social history. I’m drawn to sources and topics that tell us about how everyday people lived and thought about their lives. One favorite part of my job is the challenge of discovering more about those groups, like working-class women or children, who weren’t the main focus of earlier histories. Since 2000, I’ve taught classes at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on Victorian Britain, the British Empire, the First World War, and the history of childhood.

Lydia's book list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes

Lydia Murdoch Why did Lydia love this book?

I’m captivated by Caroline Norton’s spirit and contradictions. She fought against inequality in English laws regarding child custody, marriage, divorce, contracts, property, and wages. But she continually maintained that she was against the idea of women’s suffrage or equality with men, writing instead that she claimed only one right: the right of women’s protection under the law.

I appreciate how she makes us think about the law in new ways, and also admire her candid writing about domestic violence. When her brutal husband destroyed her letters, attacked her, and took away her children and her income, she promised that as long as he held her copyrights, all her future writings would address only the issue of women and the law.

By Caroline Norton,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Caroline Norton's Defense as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This account of the author's experience at the hands of an "imperfect state of law" in early 19th-century England makes a passionate plea for equal justice for women. Largely as a result of this book the passage of the Married Women's Property Act and reform of the English Marriage and Divorce Laws occurred some years later.


Book cover of Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management: The 1861 Classic with Advice on Cooking, Cleaning, Childrearing, Entertaining, and More

Lydia Murdoch Author Of Daily Life of Victorian Women

From my list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a professor of modern Britain with a specialty in nineteenth-century social history. I’m drawn to sources and topics that tell us about how everyday people lived and thought about their lives. One favorite part of my job is the challenge of discovering more about those groups, like working-class women or children, who weren’t the main focus of earlier histories. Since 2000, I’ve taught classes at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on Victorian Britain, the British Empire, the First World War, and the history of childhood.

Lydia's book list on Victorian women who defied stereotypes

Lydia Murdoch Why did Lydia love this book?

Yes, this is a domestic guide on how to create the ideal household, but it’s so much more than that!

I love that Beeton opens her book by comparing the mistress of the house to an army commander. The book includes hundreds of recipes, along with all kinds of domestic advice: how to hire servants, how to purchase a house, how to revive a child from a coma, how to set a broken bone, and how to treat opium overdose.

Best of all is the irony that the author of this middle-class domestic ideal worked outside the home alongside her publisher husband not only on The Book of Household Management but also as journalist and co-editor of The Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine.

5 book lists we think you will like!

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