Fans pick 96 books like Old Filth

I've loved just about everything that I've read by Gordimer, so it's hard to pick a favorite (The Lying Days is on another of my Shepherd shortlists!), but I've chosen one of her later titles here for balance.

One of the Novel Laureate's great post-apartheid works, this is a book with implications sadly not particular to South Africa—about freedom and accountability, love and family, and the normalization of violence. The style is a little unorthodox and can be tricky to follow, but Gordimer rewards readers who make the effort, which, to my mind, is very much worth the struggle.

The best aspect to love about this book is that a curious twenty-four-year-old law student not only does what others couldn’t do, solve the murders of two Supreme Court justices, but her doing so manages to put one of the world’s richest men on the run from federal officers and keep the president from running for reelection.

Grisham finds a way to give hope to all the amateur sleuths and conspiracy theorists in the world that they can crack the code that elite professionals who are trained to do so somehow cannot.

This book is about defending justice, using a legal system to fight something you know is wrong, and sticking to what is right at all costs. It is about knowing what’s right and what’s wrong.

My main character, too—Miss Pink sticks to what is right at all costs. This touching, powerful story shows the worst of people and the best. 

I love books that help us understand our present and Dolen Perkins-Valdez’s latest novel, Take My Hand, helps us do just that.

Civil, the protagonist, is a young nurse who’s just secured her first job at a federally funded reproductive health clinic in her hometown of Montgomery, Alabama. When she’s sent out on a house call to administer birth control shots to the Williams sisters, ages 11 and 13, Civil must grapple with what she’s being asked to do and why. 

Loosely based on the Relf sisters, the two young defendants at the heart of the Relf vs. Weinberger case, which exposed the involuntary sterilization of thousands of poor women and women of color across the South, this novel takes on a weighty subject with great finesse and care.

I always wanted to be a writer, but after university and a year of traveling and trying to write a book, I went to law school. A fish out of water there, all I did was criminal law. To me, this novel was a beacon. Turow was a criminal lawyer and a novelist—I could do the same one day. 

I loved everything about the book, from the first line to the complex and ambiguous ending. In my first novel, I ended it in the same way. One of the wonderful things about being a published author is meeting writers whose books I’ve read and loved. When I met Turow, we mostly talked about baseball: Cubs versus Blue Jays. (Writers I’ve learned don’t like to talk about writing with each other). What was unspoken but clear was my admiration and thanks for his inspiration. 

This book has so much to teach us about race and misconceptions. Faced with the decision of intervening to save a newborn baby’s life and the orders she’s been given not to touch the child of white supremacists, a NICU nurse, Ruth, hesitates for a moment then provides care. Her hesitation causes her to be charged with a serious crime. She is assigned a white public defender who wants to plead out and keep race out of the equation, but Ruth stands her ground. The women have to learn to trust each other and to find common ground. This is the most beautiful struggle about race from both perspectives that leaves you with a deeper understanding of both sides of the issue. 

I was blown away by the sheer scope and precision of the observation in this book. No part of New York life in the 1980s or the then-iconic finance industry is left unexposed. From the pretensions of the plutocrats to the dishonesty of the activists, this book mercilessly skewers it all.

It’s like being in a pleasantly dimly lit room when someone turns on a bright floodlight, and suddenly, you see all the ugliness and tawdriness of the people and things in it. Not for the weak of heart.

Remember Presumed Innocent? I remember finding it one of the most astonishing legal thrillers at the time. But the sequel Turow wrote after 23 years is the mother of all sequels.

Judge Rusty Sabich is suspected of murder yet again (wife, this time; it was his mistress in the previous one). Presumably, Rusty’s wife has died of a heart attack induced by one of her own medicines. Rusty is, once again, prosecuted by the same relentless prosecutor, Tommy, who has had a hard-on for Rusty since they were both prosecutors. He believes Rusty got away with murder the last time around. To add to Tommy’s anguish, Rusty hires the same devious and deceitful defense attorney, Sandy Stern.

 If you, like me, think that sequels are never as good, this one will change your opinion too.

Connally is not a lawyer, but he does a great job of accurately portraying the nitty gritty of the practice of street law, where the clients are usually on the lower economic rung of society. Mikey Haller is a lawyer who practices law from the back seat of a Lincoln Town Car, and these are his typical clients. Haller is a likable, memorable character who can sometimes sail close to the wind but has a solid inner moral compass.

In this novel, the first in the series, Haller takes on the defense of a rich playboy type. While he is happy to have a good fee, and it looks like he may, for a change, have an innocent client, things get complicated quickly, and Haller finds himself facing an ethical dilemma. How he resolves the conflict between his professional duty and his individual moral compass is clever and entertaining. And… show more.

I love the way Wolfe brings one of the more arcane areas of the financial markets to life - namely bankruptcy workout - and skewers the greed and ambition of real estate investors in the 1990s.

I’m a huge admirer of Wolfe’s technique of writing a novel using journalistic interviews, and I’m struck by the way he nails the characters and actions when he describes how the bankruptcy process works. And all while keeping the reader absolutely hooked on the narrative.

I go back to Wolfe’s novels again and again, not just to be amused and entertained but to get a real insight into the dark heart and often absurd workings of the financial system.