79 books like The Disappeared

This riveting novel by an infectious disease physician demonstrates how something as seemingly stereotypic as a medical career can be profoundly shaped by circumstance, accident, location, and political events, as well as by family and personality.

The practice of surgery—be it closing a wound or removing a lesion—can be both of those things for the emotions of the person performing it. There is an analogous message for other fields of medicine—practice and practitioner become interrelated at a deeply personal level.

Set at the end of WWII, when the UN authorized the founding of the State of Israel, I thoroughly enjoyed the merging of historical facts with fictional characters to depict the birth of a nation from the Jewish point of view.

I loved the diverse characters, including an American gentile female nurse and teenage Jewish children orphaned during the war as they settled in a hostile land.

It was eye-opening to see what it means to be constantly under attack, on the one hand, fighting militants physically and, on the other hand, fighting various countries politically in order to be acknowledged worldwide.

I also love that the author gives me an authentic look at the behind-the-scenes decision-making by British officials during this chaotic time. 

Set in Holland during WWII, this autobiography gives an up close and personal look at life in a German concentration camp.

The vivid descriptions of the horrid living conditions and prevailing illnesses made me feel like I was there. Most memorable was the discussion of the flea-infested straw bedding and the notion of being thankful for the fleas. The author and her sister were devout Christians, but why be thankful for fleas? However, the guards left the women alone because of the fleas.

I will also always remember how the author was given a small bottle of liquid vitamin D and how she never hesitated to share it with the sick, yet it never ran dry. She makes it clear this was God’s work. 

Dave Robicheaux is a New Iberia, Louisiana, sheriff’s detective in a series by James Lee Burke. You don’t want to get on the wrong side of Dave. He is righteous, but flawed. He regularly attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, struggles with nightmares of Viet Nam and other unseen demons, but has an acute sense of right and wrong. In Crusader’s Cross, his loyal sidekick, Cletus Prucell says of Dave, "He's got polka dot giraffes running around in his head, but he's the best guy I've ever known.” I’m a Burke fan, and I like everything he writes. In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead, and Purple Cane Road are my personal favorites. In Electric Mist, Dave is drawn into a 40-year-old unsolved murder that he witnessed as a college freshman. In the midst of his investigation, Dave has regular conversations with the ghost of Confederate General John Bell Hood.… show more.

Dave Robicheaux is one of my favorite characters, perhaps because I can relate to him so easily. James Lee Burke is a master of metaphors and he can offer descriptions of the sky like no other. His storytelling is enjoyable and almost philosophical at times.

In this book Burke's firsthand knowledge of the pristine scenery in Northern Montana shines above his usual inside look at the Louisiana bayou country. Robicheauxs's sidekick, Clete Purcel, is a colorful and easily likable character.

Swan Peak wasn’t as exciting as the other Robicheaux novels I’ve read but it was still a great page-turner and good story.

Yeah, I know, naming Jack Reacher as one of the badasses of crime fiction is the equivalent of a six-inch putt. A gimme. Child has taken a totally implausible premise—a six-foot-five former Army MP wandering around the United States and finding trouble with nothing but an ATM card in his pocket—and created one of the best characters in suspense literature. When Reacher is on the hunt, the results are never in doubt, which is why we love him. He’s the fullback coming through the line, time and time again, and no one can stop him. One reviewer of Child’s books said that Reacher is never the underdog. That’s a perfect description.

Walt Longmire is the sheriff of fictional Absaroka County, Wyoming. Longmire is a decorated Marine and played offensive line at the University of Southern California. He’s big, and he can brawl. He can be the cerebral Sherlock Holmes or Rambo, depending on the situation. In most of his books, Longmire teams up with Henry Standing Bear, but in Depth of Winter, Longmire is largely on his own as he sneaks into Mexico in search of his only child, Cady, who has been kidnapped by the leader of a Mexican drug cartel. Longmire is a bulldozer in his quest to rescue his daughter.

In this novel, the US president needs a campaign issue, so he makes the Columbian cartels a “clear and present danger” and sends covert forces into that country.

I love that Clancy shows me two worlds that I don’t really know: the powerful American politicians who will do anything to stay in power and the inside workings of the Columbian cartels who deeply care about their families.

Published in 1989, Clancy dared to show US politicians eagerly using our military in covert missions to further their own political agenda and that they would also readily sacrifice those troops if it suited their political needs. In this way, he broke the glass ceiling that would later be followed by Brad Thor, Vince Flynn, and others. 

Frankie Elkin doesn’t know the woods, but she knows how to find people.

As she and her rescue team head into the Wyoming wilderness in search of a lost hiker, it quickly becomes clear that someone is tracking them; someone who will do whatever it takes to stop them. Gardner is an avid hiker, and her intimate knowledge of the rugged Wyoming backcountry shines on every terrifying page.

This immersive, propulsive, utterly chilling, and yet deeply moving wilderness thriller is one of the best books I read all year.

No matter how much you may love a certain genre, you can inevitably fall into a reading slump. Too much of a good thing, right?

I will begrudgingly admit, the “missing” or “murdered girl” trope can sometimes get a bit dull without a new touch. Which is why when I came across Megan Miranda’s adult debut told entirely in reverse (from Day 15 to Day 1) was I ever floored with delight!

How absolute genius is it to take a twisty, shocking story about the disappearance of two girls, decades apart but give it to reader backwards? I found myself deeply engrossed not only in the propulsive story but intrigued by the unique way I had to process the timeline.