100 books like The Athenian Murders

By Jose Carlos Somoza,

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

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Book cover of Vignettes of Modern Greece

Linda Reid Author Of Deep Waters

From my list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece.

Why am I passionate about this?

I wrote my first thriller at age 8 about a girl who ran away and joined the circus. For later works, I, a pediatric physician, did opt to follow my English teachers’ guidance to write about what you know, including science, medicine, psychology, journalism, and my twin home countries of America and Greece. As YS Pascal, I wrote the Zygan Emprise Trilogy, which blended ancient Greek history, mythology, and literature. As Linda Reid, I co-authored the award-winning Sammy Greene thriller series with Dr. Deborah Shlian and was eager to fly investigative reporter Sammy and her ex-cop friend Gus Pappajohn to the shores of modern Athens to solve an ancient and modern mystery.

Linda's book list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece

Linda Reid Why did Linda love this book?

An American scientist and her Greek-American professor husband relocate to Greece with their young children as the millennium approaches. Dr. Orme, now back in the USA and a Vice President for Boeing, writes eloquently about her family’s decision to establish their home in Greece, a country whose language and customs are new and often challenging for an American immigrant. Her journey into the arms of a warm Greek community is shared through a series of vignettes that give readers an honest glimpse into the life and culture of modern Greece, and its positive impact on her own life and her family’s future.

By Melissa Orme-Marmarelis,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

These "vignettes" describe the idiosyncrasies and charm of the modern Greek culture as seen through the eyes of an American woman married to a Greek man. Her vividly illustrated and often amusing vignettes chronicle her journey into the understanding and appreciation of Greece and the Greek people. This book was written with a fresh and descriptive style where the words bring to life the images of family, friends, lore and nature.


Book cover of Murder in Mykonos

Linda Reid Author Of Deep Waters

From my list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece.

Why am I passionate about this?

I wrote my first thriller at age 8 about a girl who ran away and joined the circus. For later works, I, a pediatric physician, did opt to follow my English teachers’ guidance to write about what you know, including science, medicine, psychology, journalism, and my twin home countries of America and Greece. As YS Pascal, I wrote the Zygan Emprise Trilogy, which blended ancient Greek history, mythology, and literature. As Linda Reid, I co-authored the award-winning Sammy Greene thriller series with Dr. Deborah Shlian and was eager to fly investigative reporter Sammy and her ex-cop friend Gus Pappajohn to the shores of modern Athens to solve an ancient and modern mystery.

Linda's book list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece

Linda Reid Why did Linda love this book?

In Book 11, Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis, fresh from Athens to the picturesque Greek island, must find the perpetrators of a gruesome murder of a young woman found dead in a rural church. Siger, via his blunt investigator Kaldis, is an expert in sprinkling the beautiful Greek landscape with notes of suspense and mystery, and, like the earlier entries in this attractive series, Murder in Mykonos does not disappoint.

By Jeffrey Siger,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Mykonos has always had a romantic reputation, until the body of a blonde female tourist is discovered on a pile of bones under the floor of a remote mountain church. When the island's new police chief - the young, politically incorrect, former Athens homicide detective Andreas Kaldis - starts finding bodies, bones and suspects almost everywhere he looks, he's forced to admit that the island paradise is harbouring a ritualistic serial killer.

Mykonos's character is at stake, but political niceties no longer matter when another blonde vanishes. Andreas must delve into ancient myths and forgotten island hideaways as he races…


Book cover of American Kid

Linda Reid Author Of Deep Waters

From my list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece.

Why am I passionate about this?

I wrote my first thriller at age 8 about a girl who ran away and joined the circus. For later works, I, a pediatric physician, did opt to follow my English teachers’ guidance to write about what you know, including science, medicine, psychology, journalism, and my twin home countries of America and Greece. As YS Pascal, I wrote the Zygan Emprise Trilogy, which blended ancient Greek history, mythology, and literature. As Linda Reid, I co-authored the award-winning Sammy Greene thriller series with Dr. Deborah Shlian and was eager to fly investigative reporter Sammy and her ex-cop friend Gus Pappajohn to the shores of modern Athens to solve an ancient and modern mystery.

Linda's book list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece

Linda Reid Why did Linda love this book?

Katherine, a Greek immigrant to the US, took her American children to Greece in the late 1930s to live on her family’s farm and escape from the Great Depression. Unfortunately, the arrival of the Nazi invaders trapped the family in Greece during the Occupation and the end of World War II. Based on a true family story, American Kid movingly describes the experiences of the children in the remote mountain village of Katherine’s birth, and their efforts to survive the occupation of their home by Nazis. Would they ever see their beloved America again? An authentic glimpse of the devastating war’s impact on innocent youth and the value of hope.

By Constance M. Constant,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

For Katherine and her three American children, Greece was meant to be a one-year refuge from the late 1930’s Depression. Her husband’s family-owned orchard should have provided for their well-being, but instead embroiled them in legal debate. WWII Axis bombings of Kalamata prompted the young family to flee to the remote mountain village of Katherine’s birth, but Nazi invasion—and seemingly endless occupation of their village and their house—trapped them there until the war's end. Told through the eyes of John, Katherine’s youngest child, he shares a universal story of fear and frustration faced by all innocent civilians during war in…


Book cover of Legacy of Courage: A Holocaust Survival Story in Greece

Linda Reid Author Of Deep Waters

From my list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece.

Why am I passionate about this?

I wrote my first thriller at age 8 about a girl who ran away and joined the circus. For later works, I, a pediatric physician, did opt to follow my English teachers’ guidance to write about what you know, including science, medicine, psychology, journalism, and my twin home countries of America and Greece. As YS Pascal, I wrote the Zygan Emprise Trilogy, which blended ancient Greek history, mythology, and literature. As Linda Reid, I co-authored the award-winning Sammy Greene thriller series with Dr. Deborah Shlian and was eager to fly investigative reporter Sammy and her ex-cop friend Gus Pappajohn to the shores of modern Athens to solve an ancient and modern mystery.

Linda's book list on virtual odyssey in ancient and modern Greece

Linda Reid Why did Linda love this book?

Frederic Kakis, a brilliant scientist and moving writer, shares a personal story of survival and fortitude for a Jewish family in Northern Greece during the Nazi occupation. Close to 80,000 were relocated to Nazi concentration campus far from their homes in Thessaloniki and close to 60,000 did not survive the Holocaust. Dr. Kakis describes the terror experienced as well as the courage shown by Greek Jews and their local Christian neighbors during this tragic invasion, and how their efforts helped as many of the vulnerable as possible survive. 

By Frederic Kakis,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Armed only with sheer guts and determination this Jewish family took on the whole German Army. Stubbornly refusing to surrender, they remained defiant throughout the occupation of Greece and survived by fighting and outsmarting the Nazis. This is their fascinating story.


Book cover of Athens: City of Wisdom

Roderick Beaton Author Of The Greeks: A Global History

From my list on old and new Greece and Greek civilization.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was only thirteen when I first travelled to Greece and began to learn the ancient Greek language at school. That double impression of a vibrant, living country and its people, and the extraordinary fact that there they still speak a language that was first written down more than 3000 years ago, set me upon a lifetime of studying and teaching, and inspired me to communicate my love of Greece and Greeks to others. I’ve written several books, all of them Greek-themed in one way or another. These are some of the books that have accompanied me along the way – and new ones that may inspire you too.

Roderick's book list on old and new Greece and Greek civilization

Roderick Beaton Why did Roderick love this book?

Athens is where I lived as a student in the 1970s, and I’ve loved the place ever since! People who visit Greece often miss out on the capital or find the modern city ugly and noisy. But this book explains the magic effect that Athens has exercised on natives and visitors for at least two thousand years – all the way from the legendary wisdom of Solon the lawgiver to the gritty problems of a decade of enforced austerity (only recently overcome), and of a new multi-culturalism that comes with mass migration across Europe’s front line into Greece.

By Bruce Clark,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

A sweeping narrative history of Athens, telling the three-thousand-year story of the birthplace of Western civilization.

Even on the most smog-bound of days, the rocky outcrop on which the Acropolis stands is visible above the sprawling roof-scape of the Greek capital. Athens presents one of the most recognizable and symbolically potent panoramas of any of the world's cities: the pillars and pediments of the Parthenon – the temple dedicated to Athena, goddess of wisdom, that crowns the Acropolis – dominate a city whose name is synonymous for many with civilization itself.

It is hard not to feel the hand of…


Book cover of Aristotle Detective

Fred Van Lente Author Of Never Sleep

From my list on historical mysteries/thrillers set before World War II.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love historical fiction because it’s the next best thing to the invention of time travel. Books can immerse you in a time and a place in a way that comics and movies can only gesture at. For books like Never Sleep I even make sure to cook the foods my characters are eating, to make sure the era is evoked for the readers in all five sense. I love fantasy and science fiction as the next person, but the idea of transporting people to times and places that actually happened, to the best of my skill as a dramatist and researcher, is a challenge I find irresistible as an author. 

Fred's book list on historical mysteries/thrillers set before World War II

Fred Van Lente Why did Fred love this book?

Strap on your toga, Watsonus, the game is afoot…or something like that.

Who needs Consulting Detective when you’ve got the literal inventor of logic on the case? The ancient Greek philosopher gets drawn into a messy case of murder defending the family of a former student.

I read this just after coming back from Athens—I wish I had it while I was there to compare the mentions in the text to real-life sites! 

By Margaret Doody,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Athens, 332BC - an unhappy city under the rule of the Macedonian 'barbarian' Alexander the Great. In the midst of this unrest, Boutades, an eminent citizen, is found brutally murdered. Suspicion falls heavily on young Philemon, and, by Athenian law, his cousin Stephanos is elected to defend his name in court. In desperation, Stephanos seeks assistance from Aristotle, his former mentor - and Aristotle turns Detective. The young, inexperienced boy and the great philosopher form a classically uneven partnership. Their efforts culminate in the gripping trial scene when Stephanos uses all the powers of rhetoric and oratory instilled in him…


Book cover of The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens and the Search for the Good Life

Paul Anthony Cartledge Author Of Democracy: A Life

From my list on freedom and freedom of speech in Ancient Greece.

Why am I passionate about this?

My Democracy book was the summation of my views to that date (2018) on the strengths and weaknesses of democracy as a political system, in both its ancient and its modern forms. I’d been an activist and advocate of democracy since my undergraduate days (at Oxford, in the late 1960s – interesting times!). As I was writing the book the world of democracy suddenly took unexpected, and to me undesirable turns, not least in the United States and my own U.K. An entire issue of an English-language Italian political-philosophy journal was devoted to the book in 2019, and in 2021 a Companion to the reception of Athenian democracy in subsequent epochs was dedicated to me.

Paul's book list on freedom and freedom of speech in Ancient Greece

Paul Anthony Cartledge Why did Paul love this book?

I have collaborated with Bettany over many years—in her scholarly documentary filmmaking, including programmes on Socrates of Athens (469-399). Socrates never wrote or published in written form a word of his philosophy, yet through his immediate and succeeding disciples (above all Plato and Aristotle) has been hugely influential. But was he a democrat, as his fellow Athenians understood that term? In 399 a jury of 501 of his peers, chosen randomly by lot, delivered their resoundingnegativeverdict, and condemned him to death by hemlock poison for being undemocratically irreligious and for teaching his pupils undemocratic values. Plato violently disagreed, and the debate over Socrates has continued ever since. Since it can be made to appear that he was convicted by an illiberal jury on grounds of his use of (democratic) freedom of speech, his condemnation has often been used as a stick to beat the ‘tyranny of…

By Bettany Hughes,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

We think the way we do because Socrates thought the way he did; in his unwavering commitment to truth and in the example of his own life, he set the standard for all subsequent Western philosophy. And yet, for twenty-five centuries, he has remained an enigma: a man who left no written legacy and about whom everything we know is hearsay, gleaned from the writings of Plato, Xenophon and Aristophanes. Now Bettany Hughes gives us an unprecedented, brilliantly vivid portrait of Socrates and of his homeland, Athens in its Golden Age.

His life spanned “seventy of the busiest, most wonderful…


Book cover of The Athenian Revolution: Essays on Ancient Greek Democracy and Political Theory

Jack A. Goldstone Author Of Revolutions: A Very Short Introduction

From my list on discover the power of revolutions across history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied revolutions for over forty years, trying to understand how people fought for liberty and democracy--but also to understand how things so often went wrong!  I have worked at universities in the US, the UK, Japan, Germany, Russia, and Hong Kong, gaining a global view of how societies change. I have learned that everywhere people have to struggle for their rights.  Whether in ancient Greece or in modern Cambodia, the resulting revolutionary drama unfolds sometimes with wonderful results, but sometimes with tragedy.  No events better display the very best and worst that we can accomplish.  I’ve chosen the books on this list to convey the power of revolutions, their grand successes and tragic failures.

Jack's book list on discover the power of revolutions across history

Jack A. Goldstone Why did Jack love this book?

All through my school years, I heard that democracy began in Athens, in ancient Greece. But I never understood how that could have happened. To me, constitutions and democracy began with the American and French Revolutions. It turns out that Athenian democracy too began with a revolution! And it was a situation very similar to our own origins: A democratic revolution in a slave-owning society! And at a time when a “national” identity was just being formed out of local and regional ones. This is a book of essays, and you don’t have to read them all. But Josiah Ober is the foremost modern expert on Athenian society and the origins of its democracy, and his essays on that topic in this book are the best accounts we have.

He clearly presents a world that is thousands of years away from us and very strange, but shows how they confronted…

By Josiah Ober,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Where did "democracy" come from, and what was its original form and meaning? Here Josiah Ober shows that this "power of the people" crystallized in a revolutionary uprising by the ordinary citizens of Athens in 508-507 B.C. He then examines the consequences of the development of direct democracy for upper-and lower-class citizens, for dissident Athenian intellectuals, and for those who were denied citizenship under the new regime (women, slaves, resident foreigners), as well as for the general development of Greek history. When the citizens suddenly took power into their own hands, they changed the cultural and social landscape of Greece,…


Book cover of Guide to Greece: Volume 1

Tony Spawforth Author Of What the Greeks Did for Us

From my list on travel in Greece, ancient and modern.

Why am I passionate about this?

I became passionate about ancient Greece as a teenager when I studied the ancient languages and history at school. I was also lapping up ancient Greece on film—back then the so-so Burton-Taylor Cleopatra really impressed. I got enthused by historical novels too, Mary Renault’s especially. My first visit to Greece as a university student hooked me on modern Greece as well. Since then, I’ve become a professional academic specialising in ancient Greece and have been lucky enough to develop a lifelong relationship with modern as well as ancient Greeks. I lived in Greece for six years in my twenties, and have gone back repeatedly ever since. I’ve published widely on Greece’s ancient history and archaeology.

Tony's book list on travel in Greece, ancient and modern

Tony Spawforth Why did Tony love this book?

This is the daddy of travel books about Greece, penned by a Greek from western Turkey who toured the sights during the pax Romana (2nd century AD).

Catching ancient Greece before it fell into ruin, he enthusiastically wrote up the buildings and artworks and the local history of places both famous and obscure. My own copy, decidedly battered, has been a companion of my academic career since my twenties.

You can still follow Pausanias on certain archaeological sites, like Delphi or Olympia. On others it’s fascinating, after visiting them, to turn to this ancient guide to read how he described the same places when they were intact.

Peter Levi’s translation is highly readable and well equipped, but not overladen, with footnotes.  

By Pausanias, Peter Levi (translator),

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Guide to Greece as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Written in the second century AD by a Greek traveller for a predominantly Roman audience, Pausanias' Guide to Greece is an extraordinarily literate and well-informed guidebook. A study of buildings, traditions and myth, it describes with precision and eloquence the glory of classical Greece shortly before its ultimate decline in the third century. This volume, the first of two, concerns the five provinces of central Greece, with an account of cities including Athens, Corinth and Thebes and a compelling depiction of the Oracle at Delphi. Along the way, Pausanias recounts Greek legends that are unknown from any other source and…


Book cover of Democracy: A Life

Robert Garland Author Of The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World

From my list on making Ancient Greece come alive.

Why am I passionate about this?

I became enthralled by the ancient world when as a child I first saw those sand and sandals movies back in the sixties, Ben Hur and Spartacus especially. I began learning Latin aged nine and Greek aged twelve. I started a Ph.D., abandoned it, went to drama school, became a schoolteacher, worked as a professional gardener, became a schoolteacher again, eventually finished my Ph.D., and was lucky to get a job at Colgate University. Over time I realised that what really fascinated me about history was trying to insert myself imaginatively into the ancient world, so I began to ask questions about what it was like to be disabled, to be a refugee, to be a child, and so on.

Robert's book list on making Ancient Greece come alive

Robert Garland Why did Robert love this book?

It’s impossible to enter the mindset of the ancient Greeks without understanding that democracy runs deeply in their cultural bloodstream. There are numerous books on the subject – I did a course called Athenian Democracy: An Experiment for the Ages for The Great Courses – but Cartledge’s book, as the title suggests, offers a biography from its beginnings down to the present day. It also provides a nuanced exploration of the connection between Greek politics and society. Democracy: A Life depicts democracy not as a theoretical model but at work, and, in the challenges it faces today, a work in progress. Get A Life!

By Paul Cartledge,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Democracy is either aspired to as a goal or cherished as a birthright by billions of people throughout the world today - and has been been for over a century. But what does it mean? And how has its meaning changed since it was first coined in ancient Greece?

Democracy: A Life is a biography of the concept, looking at its many different manifestations and showing how it has changed over its long life, from ancient times right through to the present. For instance, how did the 'people power' of the Athenians emerge in the first place? Once it had…


Book cover of Vignettes of Modern Greece
Book cover of Murder in Mykonos
Book cover of American Kid

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,479

readers submitted
so far, will you?

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in Greece, Athens, and Plato?

Greece 184 books
Athens 53 books
Plato 72 books