Here are 100 books that Prince of Spies fans have personally recommended if you like
Prince of Spies.
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I have a passion
for writing, and whenever I can, I try to help new writers improve their
expertise so that one day they’ll complete their first book. My first book,
born from a few-hundred-word short story at my writing group, turned into a
three-book thriller series called FAVOURS. Since then, I’ve branched out by
publishing a rom/com, a humorous ghost story as well as a standalone thriller.
Agatha Christie published her first book as the result of a dare, which proves
you can do it if you really want to.
CJ Sansom, a renowned historian, released
this first fiction novel to huge acclaim. I was fascinated to find the investigator
was a London lawyer during the reign of Henry VIII. It ticked all the boxes: history, a juicy murder, crime, and mystery. I was not disappointed. In my own writing, I endeavour to make my
characters individual and memorable and, therefore, look for that in books I
read.
The protagonist, lawyer Matthew Shardlake,
has the brain, persistence, and vision of a Holmes or Poirot in uncovering the
clues and is admired by all for his ability to win cases. Despite this, one
thing continually erodes his confidence: he is a hunchback. Not restricted by
twenty-first-century political correctness, his enemies take delight in
reminding him of this. I loved the way the author handled that.
I enjoyed the detective story in an
entirely different setting. It is a magnificent first book;…
Awarded the CWA Diamond Dagger - the highest honor in British crime writing
From the bestselling author of Winter in Madrid and Dominion comes the exciting and elegantly written first novel in the Matthew Shardlake Tudor Mystery series
Dissolution is an utterly riveting portrayal of Tudor England. The year is 1537, and the country is divided between those faithful to the Catholic Church and those loyal to the king and the newly established Church of England. When a royal commissioner is brutally murdered in a monastery on the south coast of England, Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII's feared vicar general, summons…
I’ve been fascinated by spy stories since childhood, never sure which character is a friend or foe within the stories. As I grew older, I became interested in fictional mysteries, including those with settings in the Medieval era, turn-of-the-century England, and World War II. Unsure of who to trust is a theme through my Detective Henry Ike Pierce series, of which I'm working on the third book now. False hearts abound in my stories, and Detective Pierce must sort through a seemingly flexible definition of trust, including uncertainty of his closest colleagues’ loyalty. If you're a fan of seeking the truth, I hope these books are as enjoyable to you as they were to me.
The Red Hillis a medieval murder mystery set in late-15th-century Muslim Spain. The sultan demands an English doctor living in Granada to investigate a series of brutal murders at the Alhambra palace on top of a red hill that towers over the city. The sultan’s request for Dr. Thomas Berrington’s skills cannot be ignored.
This book is another example of a closed community with a killer murdering its members yet the community still shields itself from outsiders. As an Englishman and, nominally, a Christian, Dr. Berrington must find the killer by sifting through lies and obfuscations within the palace walls. Who can be trusted amid the palace intrigue and self-serving agendas?
1482: Granada, Andalucia When death comes to the Alhambra palace a hero is needed … but did they pick the right man? A demand is made of Englishman and physician Thomas Berrington – to investigate a series of deaths, each displaying the marks of a savage attack. At first reluctant he is drawn deeper into the investigation when one of the Sultan's wives is brutally murdered. Teaming up with the eunuch Jorge the pair pursue the killer before another victim is chosen. As the investigation continues they discover nothing is as it seems and nobody can be trusted. Al-Hamra, the…
I’ve been fascinated by spy stories since childhood, never sure which character is a friend or foe within the stories. As I grew older, I became interested in fictional mysteries, including those with settings in the Medieval era, turn-of-the-century England, and World War II. Unsure of who to trust is a theme through my Detective Henry Ike Pierce series, of which I'm working on the third book now. False hearts abound in my stories, and Detective Pierce must sort through a seemingly flexible definition of trust, including uncertainty of his closest colleagues’ loyalty. If you're a fan of seeking the truth, I hope these books are as enjoyable to you as they were to me.
As the tagline says: “The darkest secrets often hide in plain sight…” This is a British detective novel set in present-day Norfolk along the east coast of England. The story presents a community with many secrets and a dead young woman that knew many of them. Detective Tom Janssen must find a killer in a community trying to hide its dirty laundry.
This book has quite a twist at the end. It’s an example of many underlying subplots interacting within the local population's resistance to opening their lives to an investigation, including the reluctance of the dead girl’s parents to help.
When a body is found on a lonely cliff top path, the angelic face of a murdered teenager lies facing the rising sun. Strangled by the hands of an unknown killer, it falls to DI Tom Janssen and his fledgling team to find out how she came to be there. Destined for a career in medicine, one to rival that of her parents, Holly Bettany’s future was as bright as it had been privileged. Seemingly, all that could threaten this promising teenager’s life was Holly herself.
I’ve been fascinated by spy stories since childhood, never sure which character is a friend or foe within the stories. As I grew older, I became interested in fictional mysteries, including those with settings in the Medieval era, turn-of-the-century England, and World War II. Unsure of who to trust is a theme through my Detective Henry Ike Pierce series, of which I'm working on the third book now. False hearts abound in my stories, and Detective Pierce must sort through a seemingly flexible definition of trust, including uncertainty of his closest colleagues’ loyalty. If you're a fan of seeking the truth, I hope these books are as enjoyable to you as they were to me.
Detective Tom Shawn interrupts a young woman’s suicide attempt. She professes to know a man that predicts the future, including her father's death. The clairvoyant man predicts his own death, but Detective Shawn suspects foul play.
I enjoyed this story. I could not figure out until the end whether most of the events were within the woman’s runaway imagination, a series of happenstances, or whether the clairvoyant man was the killer. The author slowly peels back a few layers as the story progresses, but there always seems to be more, leading to a surprise ending.
NIGHT HAS A THOUSAND EYES is Woolrich's longest and most ambitious novel. The noir classic follows Detective Tom Shawn on his nightly walk along the river which is interrupted when he follows a trial of money on the ground leading to a woman attempting suicide. After saving her life, he is drawn into her story. She tells him of a clairvoyant man that has recently predicted many strange and extreme events with stunning accuracy, and has now ensured the death of her father, with whom she is incredibly close. The man predicts that he will die in the coming days…
When I was in my early 40’s I walked into the hospital room of a 99-year-old near-death relative who mistook me for my father’s brother who had been killed on the beachhead in Normandy during World War II. I was always a history buff, but this moment changed my life. I directed my energies to military history, starting with memoirs and writing a column for Armchair General magazine when it was in circulation. Published official histories (American Iliad, Aachen, Old Hickory) followed that were reliant on well-expressed memoirs written by participants, so full circle I’ve come back to my passion for writing, and reading war memoirs.
In Europe it is a tradition to pass down from generation to generation the stories of survival during the German occupation of their countries. I have met some families that actually traveled to the United States to attend military reunions of the units who freed their homelands back in 1944-45.
Tveskov takes you into the terrifying world of Copenhagen during the war and remembers it through the eyes and experiences of a young boy. His book makes one appreciate how G.I. Joe came to be loved by so many Europeans.
On the morning of April 9, 1940, Peter Tveskov awoke to the roar of airplanes flying low overheadmore airplanes than hed ever heard or seen before. The invasion leading to the five-year German occupation of Denmark had begun. The Occupation was a dark and difficult time for the Danish people, but for five-year-old Peter, it was an exciting adventure that would in many ways shape both his future and that of his beloved country.
In Conquered, Not Defeated, Peter Tveskov blends vivid childhood memories with historical fact to tell the story of how the occupying army of the Third Reich…
I’ve been fascinated by history my whole life, and have been reading historical fiction for as long as I can remember. I have a particular passion for the history of Italy, in all its complicated, bloody, and dazzling glory, from the politics to the music to the art to, of course, the food and wine. There is so much within Italian history that captivates, and as a woman of Italian descent it holds a special interest for me. I try to capture the drama, beauty, and complexity of Italy in my own historical novels, and the books on this list all do that in the most compelling way.
I just recently read this wonderful debut novel, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since! Courage, My Lovetells the story of two women living in Nazi-occupied Rome who become involved in the Italian resistance and its effort to rid their country of fascism. This is a beautiful, heart-wrenching, timely novel of ordinary people living in extraordinary times, and the courage they have in standing up to evil.
When the Nazi occupation of Rome begins, two courageous young women are plunged deep into the Italian Resistance to fight for their freedom in this captivating debut novel.
Rome, 1943
Lucia Colombo has had her doubts about fascism for years, but as a single mother in an increasingly unstable country, politics are for other people--she needs to focus on keeping herself and her son alive. Then the Italian government falls and the German occupation begins, and suddenly, Lucia finds that complacency is no longer an option.
Francesca Gallo has always been aware of injustice and suffering. A polio survivor who…
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.
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!
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…
I am the granddaughter of Irish and Italian immigrants, raised Catholic, and educated by nuns. Years ago, I heard a friend’s story about his parents: an Italian prisoner of war and a French Quarter Sicilian woman who met during World War II in New Orleans. I became determined to find out more, and connected with scholars, researchers, and families who’ve been piecing together the little-known stories of some of the 51,000 Italian POWs held in the US from 1943-1945. Their stories, and the plight of women working on the home front, inspired The Italian Prisoner.
Castellani’s warm and beautiful prose takes us on a journey with Maddelana, an innocent young woman in a tiny Italian village where everyone knows everyone. As she embarks on a journey that will change her life, we watch her future unfold across the ocean and through generations of the family she starts, immigrant descendants making a life in America. The best part is there are two more books following this one!
It is 1943, and Santa Cecilia has become a village of women. All the young men are away at war, except for Vito Leone, his best friend, and the shopkeeper's son. When Vito falls in love with Maddalena Picinelli, the shy and beautiful daughter of the town's most powerful family, a few obstacles appear in his path. Maddalena's sassy, iron-willed sister Carolina thinks he's a penniless fool. Her parents think his crazy mother has turned him into a mammoni, a mama's boy. But Maddalena sees another side of Vito. He's romantic. He builds a bicycle for the girls to ride.…
I’m a Canadian author and I set my novels here. When I first attempted to write a book, I chose historical fiction because I thought it would be easier to get my characters into trouble—without cell phones and other modern conveniences to bail them out. I wasn’t wrong. However, the research involved with writing good historical fiction soon gave me a whole new appreciation for the genre and I was hooked. I find the WWII era far enough in the past to provide historical insight into humanity’s many weaknesses and strengths, yet near enough to make it relatable. I’ve been thrilled with the feedback on my faith-based stories.
I love how Tolsma sets up a very believable story of a Dutch war widow who ends up harboring a wounded Resistance worker. Although saving him means risking everything and although liberation is within sight, Cornelia’s faith won’t allow her to turn the man out. Fearing their story will end before it even begins, she must make an impossible choice between relative safety for her brother and herself, or joining Gerrit in the Resistance. I learned so much about what the Dutch went through during WWII.
A stranger's life hangs in the balance. But to save him is to risk everything.
The war is drawing to a close, but the Nazis still occupy part of the Netherlands. After the losses she's endured, war widow Cornelia is only a shadow of the woman she once was. She fights now to protect her younger brother, Johan, who lives in hiding.
When Johan brings Gerrit Laninga, a wounded Dutch Resistance member, to Cornelia's doorstep, their ives are forever altered. Although scared of the consequences of harboring a wanted man, Cornelia's faith won't let her turn him out.
I became very interested in this topic when I moved to Italy and met and married Andrea Meloni. I had never been particularly interested in wars and battles but, when he began to tell me about his very personal experience growing up in Mussolini’s Fascist Italy, I was captivated and felt that his unique story was important. I, therefore, encouraged him to write his memoirs. My book is based on them, and so it is more his book than mine. However, I did extensive research to set his story in a coherent historical context.
Origo was an English woman married to a wealthy Italian.
They were living on their estate in Italy (Tuscany) when Mussolini came to power and soon allied himself with Hitler. Her personal account of how they, both anti-Fascists, lived during this very difficult period brings history to life. They often put themselves in harm’s way by helping others hide from Fascist pursuers.
The bestselling diaries of WWII in Tuscany, with a new introduction by writer and social historian Virginia Nicholson, and stunning rediscovered photographsAt the height of the Second World War, Italy was being torn apart by German armies, civil war, and the eventual Allied invasion. In a corner of Tuscany, one woman - born in England, married to an Italian - kept a record of daily life in a country at war. Iris Origo's compellingly powerful diary, War in Val d'Orcia, is the spare and vivid account of what happened when a peaceful farming valley became a battleground.
