Fans pick 100 books like Summer House with Swimming Pool

By Herman Koch,

Here are 100 books that Summer House with Swimming Pool fans have personally recommended if you like Summer House with Swimming Pool. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Luster

Theodore Carter Author Of Stealing the Scream

From my list on Book starring tortured artists.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m the descendant of three generations of visual artists, a gene I thought had skipped me. However, art popped up in many of my stories when I started writing fiction. In 2012, I published The Life Story of a Chilean Sea Blob, and to promote it, I launched a street art campaign that included putting plaster blobs on the streets of Washington, D.C. This blossomed into several other street art projects and earned attention from The Washington Post and several D.C. TV news stations. My next two books centered around Frida Kahlo and Edvard Munch.

Theodore's book list on Book starring tortured artists

Theodore Carter Why did Theodore love this book?

At the beginning of this book, I recognized the ingredients that make up popular erotic novels. The main character, Edie, a Black woman and struggling artist, is beginning a relationship with an older, wealthy, successful white man in an open marriage. There’s a power imbalance. To a certain extent, this excites Edie, and in this way, the book fits neatly into the parameters of the genre.

However, the relationship becomes messy, and Edie’s life, both with and away from Eric, is fraught with bad decisions. Race, wealth, and gender intersect with sex in a complex and uncomfortable milieu. Through all of this, and with the guidance of Eric’s wife, Edie begins to make progressive, less destructive choices, and as she does, her art progresses.

By Raven Leilani,

Why should I read it?

6 authors picked Luster as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A New York Times Notable Book of the Year

WINNER of the NBCC John Leonard Prize, the Kirkus Prize, the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Dylan Thomas Prize, and the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award

One of Barack Obama's Favorite Books of 2020
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: NPR, The New York Times Book Review, O Magazine, Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times, Glamour, Shondaland, Boston Globe, and many more!

"So delicious that it feels illicit . . . Raven Leilani’s first novel reads like summer: sentences like ice that crackle or…


Book cover of The Husband's Secret

Ricardo Sosa-Melo Author Of Men

From my list on instilling a fear of men.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been obsessed with psychological thrillers ever since I was young. The messed-up characters, the unreliability of narrators, and the plot twists gripped me as a young reader. As I’ve grown older, my passions have stayed in this general field, but now with more of an emphasis on the effects of masculinity, power, and relationships (both platonically and romantically). There is something so fascinating to me about the complexity of men: their emotions, their motivations, their violence, etc. I have compiled a list of my favorite novels that delve deep into these interests and, truthfully, fears.

Ricardo's book list on instilling a fear of men

Ricardo Sosa-Melo Why did Ricardo love this book?

When a wife finds a letter addressed to her from her husband stating that it can only be opened once he is dead because it contains his darkest secret, she decides to open it while he is alive.

What ensues is a journey through deception, shocking truths, and the fallout of the secret being exposed.

With the secret revealed, finishing the novel leaves you wondering if you can truly trust anyone, even the ones closest to you. 

By Liane Moriarty,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked The Husband's Secret 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 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER FROM THE AUTHOR OF BIG LITTLE LIES AND APPLES NEVER FALL

One of the Best Books of the Year—Entertainment Weekly
One of the Top Ten Books of the Year—People

At the heart of The Husband’s Secret is a letter that’s not meant to be read…

My darling Cecilia,
If you’re reading this, then I’ve died…
 
Imagine your husband wrote you a letter, to be opened after his death. Imagine, too, that the letter contains his deepest, darkest secret—something with the potential to destroy not only the life you…


Book cover of The People in the Trees

Heather Parry Author Of Orpheus Builds A Girl

From my list on compelling creepy.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a fiction and nonfiction writer originally from Rotherham, South Yorkshire but I now live and work in Glasgow. I have always loved dark books, even when I was a kid; I was firmly on the Goosebumps-Point Horror-Stephen King pipeline, and ended up in dark literary fiction. I love work that challenges the reader, makes them complicit, forces them to keep going despite everything because the writing is just so good. Here are five books I come back to time and time again. 

Heather's book list on compelling creepy

Heather Parry Why did Heather love this book?

I first picked this up in a bookshop in Bangalore, knowing nothing about it or the (now very famous) author.

I was unprepared for a novel that managed to evoke the lush and intense vibrancy of South Pacific Islands, the depravity of a real-life Nobel Prize winner who was accused of heinous crimes, and the heartbreak of losing someone to dementia – all at the same time.

This is an uncomfortable but unputdownable novel, and one that affected me so deeply I now have a tattoo of it; on my thumb is the symbol carved into wood to signal that the ’people in the trees’ live there, in memory of my beloved grandmother. 

By Hanya Yanagihara,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The People in the Trees as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A thrilling anthropological adventure story with a profound and tragic vision of what happens when cultures collide—from the bestselling author of National Book Award–nominated modern classic, A Little Life

“Provokes discussions about science, morality and our obsession with youth.” —Chicago Tribune

It is 1950 when Norton Perina, a young doctor, embarks on an expedition to a remote Micronesian island in search of a rumored lost tribe. There he encounters a strange group of forest dwellers who appear to have attained a form of immortality that preserves the body but not the mind. Perina uncovers their secret and returns with it…


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Book cover of Kanazawa

Kanazawa By David Joiner,

Emmitt’s plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of purchasing their dream home. Disappointed, he’s surprised to discover her subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo.

In his search for a meaningful life in Japan, and after quitting his job, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law…

Book cover of Bath Haus: A Thriller

Michael Kiggins Author Of And the Train Kept Moving

From my list on unreliable and morally compromised characters.

Why am I passionate about this?

Since I was introduced to many authors published by Grove Press, I have been intrigued by transgressive literary fiction, especially stories and novels that feature narrators and protagonists whose unreliability and moral culpability fuel plots to surprising yet inevitable climaxes. Lesser writers of such works use the shocking and revolting as crutches for vapid prose, failing to lead readers to revelations that can be found in the darkest places and in the unlikeliest of people. What better accomplishment can any writer ask for except getting readers, in some way, to identify with characters whom they would avoid in real life?

Michael's book list on unreliable and morally compromised characters

Michael Kiggins Why did Michael love this book?

This thriller is a compulsively readable novel.

In dueling POVs of a gay couple, Vernon explores their relationship, with its power imbalances and manipulations, in all its messiness. Neither narrator is being honest with the other, and the novel is set in motion when Oliver decides to visit a bathhouse where a would-be trick attacks him, making him fear for his life.

The rest of the novel ping-pongs between the narrators, both of whom are concealing so much from each other for very different reasons. 

By P. J. Vernon,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Bath Haus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Nominated for a 34th annual Lambda Literary Award • A scintillating thriller with an emotional punch: “The tension builds to unbearably claustrophobic levels. To say more would rob readers of the 'no, he didn’t' suspense that makes Bath Haus an unexpectedly twisted, heart-pounding cat-versus-mouse thriller" (Los Angeles Times).

Oliver Park, a recovering addict from Indiana, finally has everything he ever wanted: sobriety and a loving, wealthy partner in Nathan, a prominent DC trauma surgeon. Despite their difference in age and disparate backgrounds, they've made a perfect life together. With everything to lose, Oliver shouldn't be visiting Haus, a gay bathhouse.…


Book cover of You Can Stop Humming Now: A Doctor's Stories of Life, Death, and in Between

Jacob M. Appel Author Of Who Says You're Dead? Medical & Ethical Dilemmas for the Curious & Concerned

From my list on challenging ethical dilemmas in modern medicine.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a physician and attorney, I’ve always been fascinated by the nexus where my two professions meet.   During the course of my career, I have been asked to advise colleagues on topics as far-reaching as whether a death row inmate should receive an organ transplant to how to offer psychotherapy ethically to a conjoined twin. Although questions like these do not arise every day, even the everyday questions in my field – on such topics as confidentiality, boundaries, and informed consent – never grow old.

Jacob's book list on challenging ethical dilemmas in modern medicine

Jacob M. Appel Why did Jacob love this book?

Lamas, an ICU physician in Boston and New York Times guest columnist, has a distinctive gift for rendering the stories of her patients in three dimensions. Lamas is the Oliver Sachs of the ICU, exploring the ethical and emotional challenges of critical illness with eloquence and insight. By focusing on the personal elements of critical care, rather than the technological ones, she renders the complex experience of ICU patients vivid and indelible.   

By Daniela Lamas,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked You Can Stop Humming Now as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'Gripping, soaring, inspiring . . . Read it' - Atul Gawande, author of the international bestseller Being Mortal

'You Can Stop Humming Now is essential reading on what it means to be human in an age of medical technology. I couldn't put it down' - Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich, author of The Fact of a Body

'In turns anguishing, gripping, and hopeful, You Can Stop Humming Now is a must-read for anyone contemplating what medicine holds in store for us.' - Danielle Ofri, MD, PhD, author of What Patients Say, What Doctors Feel

Modern medicine is a world that glimmers with new…


Book cover of Principles of Biomedical Ethics

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Author Of The Right to Die with Dignity: An Argument in Ethics, Medicine, and Law

From my list on medical ethics and end-of-life.

Why am I passionate about this?

Raphael Cohen-Almagor, DPhil, St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford, is Professor of Politics, Olof Palme Visiting Professor, Lund University, Founding Director of the Middle East Study Centre, University of Hull, and Global Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Raphael taught, inter alia, at Oxford (UK), Jerusalem, Haifa (Israel), UCLA, Johns Hopkins (USA), and Nirma University (India). With more than 300 publications, Raphael has published extensively in the field of political philosophy, including Liberal Democracy and the Limits of Tolerance; Challenges to Democracy; The Right to Die with Dignity; The Scope of Tolerance; Confronting the Internet's Dark Side; Just, Reasonable Multiculturalism, and The Republic, Secularism and Security: France versus the Burqa and the Niqab.

Raphael's book list on medical ethics and end-of-life

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Why did Raphael love this book?

This is a classic book.

It is probably the most influential book in the field of medical ethics since the field was established during the 1960s.

I use this book and its invoked Georgetown Mantra of Bioethics, which includes the principles of beneficence, non-maleficence, autonomy, and justice, in all my medical ethics courses, and refer to this book often when I'm writing about medical ethics and end-of-life concerns.

Its guiding principles are relevant today as they were when the book was written. 

I invited Tom Beauchamp to one of the conferences I organised. Tom subsequently contributed a chapter to my edited volume Medical Ethics at the Dawn of the 21st Century (New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 2000), Vol. 913 of the Annals.

He also invited me to present my book at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown University. When I was teaching at Johns Hopkins I also…

By Tom L. Beauchamp, James F. Childress,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Principles of Biomedical Ethics, eighth edition, provides a highly original, practical, and insightful guide to morality in the health professions. Acclaimed authors Tom L. Beauchamp and James F. Childress thoroughly develop and advocate for four principles that lie at the core of moral reasoning in health care: respect for autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice.Drawing from contemporary research, and integrating detailed case studies and vivid real-life examples and scenarios, they demonstrate how these prima facie principles can be expanded to apply to various conflicts and dilemmas. Ideal for courses in biomedical ethics, bioethics, and health care ethics, the text is enhanced…


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Book cover of At What Cost, Silence?

At What Cost, Silence? By Karen Lynne Klink,

Secrets, misunderstandings, and a plethora of family conflicts abound in this historical novel set along the Brazos River in antebellum Washington County, East Texas.

It is a compelling story of two neighboring plantation families and a few of the enslaved people who serve them. These two plantations are a microcosm…

Book cover of The Soul of Care: The Moral Education of a Husband and a Doctor

Karen Laura Thornber Author Of Global Healing: Literature, Advocacy, Care

From my list on aging and end-of-life decisions and care.

Why am I passionate about this?

Karen Thornber is Harry Tuchman Levin Professor in Literature and Professor of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard. Her work brings humanistic insights to global challenges.  Thornber is the author of the award-winning scholarly books Empire of Texts in Motion and Ecoambiguity as well as most recently Global Healing: Literature, Advocacy, Care. Current projects include books on gender justice in Asia, mental health, inequality/injustice, sustainability/climate change, and indigeneity.

Karen's book list on aging and end-of-life decisions and care

Karen Laura Thornber Why did Karen love this book?

Professor and psychiatrist Arthur Kleinman’s The Soul of Care movingly explicates the practical, emotional, and moral aspects of caregiving. Based on Kleinman’s experiences as the primary caregiver for his late wife Joan after she developed early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, this book skillfully reveals caregiving – however grueling, however much about enduring the unendurable – as resonating with emotional, moral, and, for many, religious meaning, and ultimately enabling us to realize our humanity most fully. Moreover, inspired by the work of Anne-Marie Slaughter, Kleinman poignantly argues for the importance of recognizing care as a basic human right.

By Arthur Kleinman,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

A moving memoir and an extraordinary love story that shows how an expert physician became a family caregiver and learned why care is so central to all our lives and yet is at risk in today's world.

When Dr. Arthur Kleinman, an eminent Harvard psychiatrist and social anthropologist, began caring for his wife, Joan, after she was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease, he found just how far the act of caregiving extended beyond the boundaries of medicine. In The Soul of Care: The Moral Education of a Husband and a Doctor, Kleinman delivers a deeply humane and inspiring story of…


Book cover of For the Patient's Good: The Restoration of Beneficence in Health Care

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Author Of The Right to Die with Dignity: An Argument in Ethics, Medicine, and Law

From my list on medical ethics and end-of-life.

Why am I passionate about this?

Raphael Cohen-Almagor, DPhil, St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford, is Professor of Politics, Olof Palme Visiting Professor, Lund University, Founding Director of the Middle East Study Centre, University of Hull, and Global Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Raphael taught, inter alia, at Oxford (UK), Jerusalem, Haifa (Israel), UCLA, Johns Hopkins (USA), and Nirma University (India). With more than 300 publications, Raphael has published extensively in the field of political philosophy, including Liberal Democracy and the Limits of Tolerance; Challenges to Democracy; The Right to Die with Dignity; The Scope of Tolerance; Confronting the Internet's Dark Side; Just, Reasonable Multiculturalism, and The Republic, Secularism and Security: France versus the Burqa and the Niqab.

Raphael's book list on medical ethics and end-of-life

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Why did Raphael love this book?

Edmund (Ed) D. Pellegrino was a man of many qualities and achievements.

He was one of the forefathers of medical ethics. He was a learned Catholic. He was hailed as a “complete physician” among “a handful of other high-profile physician leaders of the twentieth century.

In a long and remarkable career that spanned over 55 years of research and scholarship, Pellegrino published more than 550 scholarly books and articles.

In For the Patient's Good, the authors discuss the notion of beneficence as a guiding principle in medical ethics. They examine the content of the concept of 'patient good' from ethical, philosophical, and practical aspects, speaking about the duties of the medical professionals to their patients.

Ed and I used to meet during my visits to Washington. We had lengthy conversations about medical ethics, philosophy, religion (Catholicism, Judaism), and education.

He was the keynote speaker in one of the conferences I…

By Edmund D. Pellegrino, David C. Thomasma,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked For the Patient's Good as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Beneficence - doing the right and good thing - is the fundamental principle of medical ethics. It points all medical decisions and actions toward advancing the patient's best interests. Yet in our normally pluralistic society where rights are asserted more frequently than obligations, this ancient principle tends to be obscured or confused with paternalism.

This book attempts to rejuvenate and redevelop the notion of beneficence as a guiding principle within the ethics of medicine. The authors examine the content of the concept of 'patient good' from both philosophical and practical viewpoints, and they strive to supplement and in some ways…


Book cover of Debating Euthanasia

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Author Of The Right to Die with Dignity: An Argument in Ethics, Medicine, and Law

From my list on medical ethics and end-of-life.

Why am I passionate about this?

Raphael Cohen-Almagor, DPhil, St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford, is Professor of Politics, Olof Palme Visiting Professor, Lund University, Founding Director of the Middle East Study Centre, University of Hull, and Global Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Raphael taught, inter alia, at Oxford (UK), Jerusalem, Haifa (Israel), UCLA, Johns Hopkins (USA), and Nirma University (India). With more than 300 publications, Raphael has published extensively in the field of political philosophy, including Liberal Democracy and the Limits of Tolerance; Challenges to Democracy; The Right to Die with Dignity; The Scope of Tolerance; Confronting the Internet's Dark Side; Just, Reasonable Multiculturalism, and The Republic, Secularism and Security: France versus the Burqa and the Niqab.

Raphael's book list on medical ethics and end-of-life

Raphael Cohen-Almagor Why did Raphael love this book?

The book brings together two contradictory viewpoints.

While Jackson argues that we should legalise assisted suicide in order to enable ‘good death’ and honour patients’ wishes, Keown opposes such a legislation, thinking that voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide are gravely unethical and what we need to do is to improve care, not to offer death.

This is an excellent exchange of ideas that I have used in my classes on end-of-life concerns.

John Keown and I meet in Washington every once and a while. Although we disagree on whether physician-assisted suicide should be offered, we agree on the need to preserve the dignity of the person as well as on many other fundamental issues.

I greatly appreciate John’s scholarship.

By Emily Jackson, John Keown,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

In this new addition to the 'Debating Law' series, Emily Jackson and John Keown re-examine the legal and ethical aspects of the euthanasia debate.

Emily Jackson argues that we owe it to everyone in society to do all that we can to ensure that they experience a 'good death'. For a small minority of patients who experience intolerable and unrelievable suffering, this may mean helping them to have an assisted death. In a liberal society, where people's moral views differ, we should not force individuals to experience deaths they find intolerable. This is not an argument in favour of dying.…


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Book cover of Rooted in Sunrise

Rooted in Sunrise By Beth Dotson Brown,

Ava Winston likes her life of routine in Lexington, Kentucky. Then a tornado blows it away. Ava is safe in the basement, but when she emerges, only one corner of her home stands. Rather than crumbling under the loss, she feels a load lifted. Maybe something beyond the familiar is…

Book cover of Strangers at the Bedside: A History of How Law and Bioethics Transformed Medical Decision Making

Allen M. Hornblum Author Of Against Their Will: The Secret History of Medical Experimentation on Children in Cold War America

From my list on human experimentation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I began working in prisons 50 years ago. I was just out of grad school and I accepted the challenge of starting a literacy program in the Philadelphia Prison System. The shock of cellblock life was eye-opening, but the most unexpected revelation was the sight of scores of inmates wrapped in bandages and medical tape. Unknown to the general public, the three city prisons had become a lucrative appendage of the University of Pennsylvania’s Medical School. As I would discover years later, thousands of imprisoned Philadelphians had been used in a cross-section of unethical and dangerous scientific studies running the gamut from simple hair dye and athlete’s foot trials to radioactive isotope, dioxin, and US Army chemical warfare studies. My account of the prison experiments, Acres of Skin, helped instill in me an abiding faith in well-researched journalism as an antidote to societal indiscretions and crimes.

Allen's book list on human experimentation

Allen M. Hornblum Why did Allen love this book?

Rothman was one of the first to examine the culture of research medicine and its relationship to science and American culture at large. Doctors on the cutting edge of new procedures, much desired medical elixirs, and scientific advancement used a utilitarian calculus to determine what was ethical and what the public was willing to accept. Scientific breakthroughs were celebrated with few - certainly no one of renown - taking notice that the breakthroughs were coming at the expense of vulnerable, powerless populations.

By David J. Rothman,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Strangers at the Bedside as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

David Rothman gives us a brilliant, finely etched study of medical practice today. Beginning in the mid-1960s, the practice of medicine in the United States underwent a most remarkable--and thoroughly controversial--transformation. The discretion that the profession once enjoyed has been increasingly circumscribed, and now an almost bewildering number of parties and procedures participate in medical decision making.

Well into the post-World War II period, decisions at the bedside were the almost exclusive concern of the individual physician, even when they raised fundamental ethical and social issues. It was mainly doctors who wrote and read about the morality of withholding a…


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