100 books like Nobody Told Me

Yes, I know this is a novel, but Mantel’s historical research is impeccable and no one has done more to bring to light the shadowy, intrigue-filled court of Henry VIII. Mantel explores the intersection of political power and personal ambition as she traces the career of Thomas Cromwell, a rags-to-riches courtier.

I could almost taste the food, smell the decay, and touch the damp walls of the buildings. She took me deep into the consciousness of the unlikeable yet sympathetic and lonely main character, as he serves his monarch and defeats his enemies.

The drama is gripping.

A story I read so often in my childhood that I could recite it nearly verbatim. I read it frequently to my son. Then my grandchildren. Although they were inexplicably drawn to Bartholomew and the Oobleck by Dr. Seuss and, of course, their grandmother’s books, smart boys.

Here, a naughty boy, Max, runs away and enters a world of wild creatures and becomes their king. Max has a blast being king until he misses home. The transition from foe to friend to king moves quickly but is a topic worth exploring more in-depth.

Kids love the Wild Things dance scene done with rhythmic grunts and book shaking. I love its unique view on a child’s desire for independence and simultaneous need to come home. 

Any book set in suburban life with a dark underbelly has me hooked.

I loved the themes of privilege, race, and motherhood within the context of suburban life. I also enjoyed the contrast between such different ways to parent: a wealthy and seemingly perfect family compared to a nomadic and unconventional mother-daughter duo.

I think the story also raised some interesting questions about the intricacies of motherhood and, of course, how we always feel the weight of the choices we make as mothers and the impact of those choices on our lives and the lives of our children. Not to mention, what a great title!

A shooter in a zoo might not sound like the premise for an exploration of motherhood, but this brilliantly paced thriller is just that. On a day trip to the zoo with her four-year-old son, Joan must flee from a gunman, a task made all the more complicated by having to simultaneously negotiate the quotidian questions and tasks of parenting.

A hungry child, or one who needs the toilet, can be challenging at the best of times, let alone while hiding in an empty animal enclosure trying to avoid imminent death! Ultimately, the primary role of any parent is to keep their child alive. Fierce Kingdom puts this ordinary occupation in extraordinary circumstances, and the result is utterly compelling. 

I read this book as quickly as I could, picking it up whenever I had the chance to, and thinking about it in the moments in between. I found it in an outdoor library, in a small village in France. It was the only book in English, so it was complete chance that I started to read it. And this book is all about chance. What would happen if you bumped into someone who looked so exactly like you that they could step into your life and live it for you, and no one would notice? This book constantly questions how much of our identity is shaped by things outside of our control. It is set in a world we recognise but under the ordinary façade, something eerier and more fatalistic simmers.

I was born in a fishing village in Yorkshire and although I live in the city now, I always feel the pull of the sea. This book is a memoir set in Orkney and London. It is about the writer’s struggle with addiction and her recovery – partly through reconnecting to the natural landscape again. Amy’s prose is clean and bright. She constructs sentences with no fat on them. Her descriptions are sharply accurate. I really related to her need to get away from London to find her way back to health. London life is intense and although I love it here, it is a constantly demanding city. Reading this novel reinforced my desire to look at things closely, notice them anew, and to remember to go and visit the sea, whenever I can. 

As a guy with no children, motherhood has always intrigued me.

What does motherhood actually feel like? How does it change you? How to describe the bond between mother and child? I had questions that would be difficult to ask any mother. In this soaring memoir, Clover has answered them all for me. She has a skill to convert the most mundane into life-changing and the routine into extraordinary.

Clover’s style is engaging and intimate. She leaves no stone unturned in this ‘heart on her sleeve’ book about what it really means to be a mother.

As Spilt Milk’s protagonist Bea Straw is a mum-blogger, I was keen to read experiences of real-life “mummy influencers”. Braithwaite’s book – part memoir, part manifesto – was of particular interest because she is Black, somewhat of a rarity in the picture of motherhood painted by social media that tends to be both very white and very middle class. 

Documenting the difficult birth of her daughter and the subsequent mishandled complications, Braithwaite exposes the many and varied ways in which women of colour are disadvantaged and endangered by racial bias. 

While light in tone, there’s a power and vulnerability in Braithwaite’s writing, and I learnt so much from this brilliant book.

This book is a bit of a gut punch, as it’s asking one of the hardest questions for those of us who are parents: how do we raise our kids in this scary, modern world? The heart of the dilemma buried in this question is that we want to do everything we can for our kids, but in a world of dwindling resources, spending so many of them and passing on as much privilege as we can feels like trying to best position our children on a sinking ship.

While I have come to terms with the idea that I ought to sacrifice my own interests in the name of calming a world on fire, it’s quite something else to realize that perhaps I ought to sacrifice some interests of the person whom I love most in the world—that perhaps they’re not entitled to everything I want to give them.… show more.

The most frustrating and sometimes enraging moments for me as a parent have been when one of my kids hurts the feelings (or the body) of another. Why can’t they just get along??

This book will tell you why! And also, what you can do about it. It’s chock full of humorous and relatable true stories that will give you insights and solutions for your own family.