Fans pick 86 books like The Crown in the Heather

Through the pages of this book, unfolds a tangible reality of the birth and boyhood of Merlin the magician, leading up to his central position in the legend of Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

As I read, I saw how Stewart wove a story using some accepted historical facts and myths, to create something new and solid. I saw the way Stewart used mystical moments and magical spells to sit above common logic.

Her ability to write in this imaginative way makes her characters more believable. And I do believe it. I have feelings of satisfaction at the end of the book, which inspired me to write my own historical story.

In 1812 Britain ruled the waves and Napoleon ruled everything else. We in the twenty-first century don’t realise how difficult and dangerous those times really were, how much of an analogy can be drawn with the dark days of World War II, when Britain stood alone against the forces in Europe. While the main plot line appears to be a simple romance, in fact Bennetts has gathered together strand after strand of conflict into a rich, absorbing tapestry. There's code-breaking, social mores, how to partake of snuff, politics, the assassination of the British PM. The story is utterly absorbing and very, very real.

This book will transport you straight back to the Crete of the Bronze Age. I felt I was taking every step with the characters. Each setting, whether it be the marketplace in the village, the palace, and the underground prison cells, is meticulously described. The society, bound by ritual and ruled by a queen and her priestesses who are constantly searching for signs of approval from the goddess, is utterly believable. It's a fascinating mix of actual history and myth, where the Gods and Goddesses are as real as they were to the people living in those times.

This book takes place at the end of WW2 on a Pacific island. Jack has survived the war, but can't give up the places where he fought. For me, the book reads like a succession of short stories held together with the underlying theme of Jack’s search for himself. It tells tales from Jack’s childhood with his twin brother and stories from the war, some funny, some poignant, some a little eerie. Through it all, the author’s knowledge of aircraft and the Pacific theatre of WW2 lends authenticity. 

This isn't a fast-paced cliff-hanger. I could dip in and out and re-read sections, laugh a little, cry a little, live the war in the Pacific vicariously. It feels real.

Nigel Tranter’s Bruce Trilogy was the first historical fiction series I ever read. It fired a love of the genre that still drives my reading habits and writing today. The story of Robert the Bruce’s rise to the throne of Scotland and his fight to free Scotland from English domination can be found in history books, but Tranter made this hero of Scottish independence come alive like no straight history book could.

Set upon the Isle of Skye in the early 14th Century, The Chief is an exciting historical romance, with a lot of depth. The hero, Tormod MacLeod, is a man on a mission, to support Robert the Bruce in his struggle against the English. When he’s tricked into marrying Christina Fraser, a young noblewoman whose father was imprisoned for supporting William Wallace, he’s determined to keep his wife in her place. He has no time, or interest, in love. However, control slowly slips from his grip. This novel has one of the best kiss scenes I’ve ever read, and the setting at Dunvegan Castle upon the Isle of Skye is beautifully researched and depicted.

James is sent away to live with his mill-town relatives in this nostalgic, coming-of-age novel set against the backdrop of Dundee during WW1.

Some summers were made for growing up…

Dundee, 1917. When his father goes to fight in the war, 11-year-old James is sent to live with his mill-town relatives and his cousin, Billy. At first, James feels lost and alone: his cousin hates him, the school bully is after him, and he is worried about his father’s safety. Gradually, he finds a new world of friendship, freedom, fun, and The God of All Small Boys, in a summer that will change his life forever...

I found this story both funny and sad, and altogether emotionally gripping. Highly engaging, and full of historical details of Dundee during the First World War – a sure favourite for middle grade readers.

A Trocchi renaissance, including a film of Young Adam starring A-Listers Ewan McGregor, Tilda Swinton, and Emily Mortimer, added to a growing reappraisal of Trocchi as a great Scottish writer, his reputation having been tarnished, fairly or unfairly, with drug use, indolence, and writer’s block.

Young Adam is a Scots crime novel the way James Hogg’s The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner is a high-jinx picaresque, which is to say only technically, and on the understanding that Hogg and Trocchi sit head, shoulders and in fact a full body length above these genres. But moment of madness there is, and arrest, trial, judgment, and condemnation. But the twist is that Trocchi’s own judgment and condemnation of society is what matters.

I think understanding the intellectual background to a historical period is always important, and I was introduced to the Scottish Enlightenment at West Virginia Wesleyan College through this book. I have since had the pleasure to meet and work with Alexander Broadie while at Glasgow, and he is a kind, generous, and supportive scholar.

The Scottish Enlightenment covers the significant breakthroughs in the thought of the movement, and the contributions of the characters behind it such as David Hume and Adam Smith. The importance of studying history, morality in civil society, religion, and art. The Enlightenment laid the groundwork for our modern society, so how could anyone not study it?

Hard Nox is set in Scotland and is brilliantly written. It's the start of series two and I fell in love with the world that Jolie had built. I did put this book down a few chapters in to find the first book of the first series. I wanted to read them in order and I'm so glad I did. It was hard at the time to find books showing the Scots dialect and Jolie does it well. So much so, I'm one of her ARC readers and I have started collecting the paperback copies. This is my favourite of all her books.