Love The Harp in the South? Readers share 100 books like The Harp in the South...

By Ruth Park,

Here are 100 books that The Harp in the South fans have personally recommended if you like The Harp in the South. 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 Breath

Karin Cox Author Of What the Sea Wants

From my list on understanding the Australian spirit.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m an author, poet, and editor who works in natural history and social history publishing by day, explaining the unique flora and fauna, culture, and spirit of this ancient continent. By night, I moonlight as a fiction author, writing whatever takes my fancy. Seeing Australia and understanding Australia arenā€™t always the same thing in a country with unforgiving stony desert at its heart, more venomous creepy-crawlies than you can ā€˜poke a stick atā€™ (but please donā€™t!), the oldest living culture in the world, and a complex history. So, here are my recommendations for novels that travel deep into the Australian spirit.

Karin's book list on understanding the Australian spirit

Karin Cox Why did Karin love this book?

Winton is one of Australiaā€™s most celebrated authors for his effortless prose. In Breath, he vividly captures the moment restless ennui of life in a small town meets the Australian desire to push boundaries, building background tension that eventually crashes Aussie surf culture down like a dumper and leaves everything broken. While the award-winning Cloudstreet is often considered Wintonā€™s ā€˜Great Australian Novelā€™, the historic setting and vernacular felt somewhat contrived to me. I consider Breath Wintonā€™s true masterpiece, which stays with you long after you finish the final page.

By Tim Winton,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

'Exhilarating' Sunday Times
'Rapturous' Sunday Telegraph
'A remarkable tale of grace and danger' Financial Times

When paramedic Bruce Pike is called out to deal with another teenage adventure gone wrong, he knows better than anyone what happened and how. Thirty years before, that dead boy could have been him. Bruce remembers what it was like to be a risk-taking kid, to feel that thrill and that fear . . .

Breath by Tim Winton is the story of Bruce and his best friend Loonie, and the surfing obsession that changed both of their lives. It is about the exhilaration ofā€¦


Book cover of The Yield

Courtney Angela Brkic Author Of The First Rule of Swimming

From my list on really complicated families.

Why am I passionate about this?

My mother, father, and I were each born in different countries, and into different languages. In my childhood, we were a hybridized wonderā€”one part jetsam, one part flotsamā€”and a country unto ourselves. Our house was filled with all kinds of books, our dinnertimes with lively conversation (and occasional shouting), our plates with food cooked according to the recipes of family ghosts. I can honestly say that no other family was like ours, especially not in the American suburbs of the 1980s. As a writer, I have always been fascinated by the tug-and-pull of intergenerational trauma, and by the dislocation of immigration and exile.   

Courtney's book list on really complicated families

Courtney Angela Brkic Why did Courtney love this book?

When Augustā€™s grandfatherā€”the bedrock of a multi-generational Wiradjuri familyā€”dies, she must return to Australia, and to the town of Prosperous. There, she comes face-to-face with the things that have driven her out, a process that began long before her birth. The bookā€™s three narrators chart the casualties of colonialism: the loss of indigenous culture, the stamping out of language, the land that is taken and forever altered. But the book is so much more than a catalogue of losses, and Winchā€™s song is ultimately one of identityā€”and historyā€”reclaimed.  

By Tara June Winch,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

"A beautifully written novel that puts language at the heart of remembering the past and understanding the present."-Kate Morton

"A groundbreaking novel for black and white Australia."-Richard Flanagan, Man Booker Prize winning author of The Narrow Road to the Deep North

A young Australian woman searches for her grandfather's dictionary, the key to halting a mining company from destroying her family's home and ancestral land in this exquisitely written, heartbreaking, yet hopeful novel of culture, language, tradition, suffering, and empowerment in the tradition of Louise Erdrich, Sandra Cisneros, and Amy Harmon.

Knowing that he will soon die, Albert "Poppy" Gondiwindiā€¦


Book cover of Seven Little Australians

Karin Cox Author Of What the Sea Wants

From my list on understanding the Australian spirit.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m an author, poet, and editor who works in natural history and social history publishing by day, explaining the unique flora and fauna, culture, and spirit of this ancient continent. By night, I moonlight as a fiction author, writing whatever takes my fancy. Seeing Australia and understanding Australia arenā€™t always the same thing in a country with unforgiving stony desert at its heart, more venomous creepy-crawlies than you can ā€˜poke a stick atā€™ (but please donā€™t!), the oldest living culture in the world, and a complex history. So, here are my recommendations for novels that travel deep into the Australian spirit.

Karin's book list on understanding the Australian spirit

Karin Cox Why did Karin love this book?

First published in 1894, this is definitely a nostalgic choice; however, thereā€™s a good reason why it became the first Australian novel to be continuously in print for 100 years in 1994. Esther Turnerā€™s classic novel is Australiaā€™s answer to Little Women, and if you donā€™t fall in love with the seven boisterous Woolcot children and end up in tears over the tragic events at Yarrahappini, Iā€™m afraid youā€™re even harder-hearted than Captain Woolcot himself!

By Ethel Turner,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

This collection of literature attempts to compile many of the classic, timeless works that have stood the test of time and offer them at a reduced, affordable price, in an attractive volume so that everyone can enjoy them.


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Book cover of The Ballad of Falling Rock

The Ballad of Falling Rock by Jordan Dotson,

Truth told, folks still ask if Saul Crabtree sold his soul for the perfect voice. If he sold it to angels or devils. A Bristol newspaper once asked: ā€œAre his love songs closer to heaven than dying?ā€ Others wonder how he wrote a song so sad, everyone who heard itā€¦

Book cover of Boy Swallows Universe

Karin Cox Author Of What the Sea Wants

From my list on understanding the Australian spirit.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m an author, poet, and editor who works in natural history and social history publishing by day, explaining the unique flora and fauna, culture, and spirit of this ancient continent. By night, I moonlight as a fiction author, writing whatever takes my fancy. Seeing Australia and understanding Australia arenā€™t always the same thing in a country with unforgiving stony desert at its heart, more venomous creepy-crawlies than you can ā€˜poke a stick atā€™ (but please donā€™t!), the oldest living culture in the world, and a complex history. So, here are my recommendations for novels that travel deep into the Australian spirit.

Karin's book list on understanding the Australian spirit

Karin Cox Why did Karin love this book?

Equal parts quirky, literary, humorous, and touching, Daltonā€™s debut novel won him a record four Australian Book Industry Awards in 2019, and itā€™s not hard to see why. Boy Swallows Universe follows the ups and downs of teen protagonist Eliā€™s descent into a world of drug-lords and prison barons, all while caring for his messed-up parents and mute brother and seeing the world in a uniquely beautiful way. Ex-journalist Daltonā€™s prose will sometimes take your breath away in this modern classic about life in the far-outer suburbs of Brisbane, Australia, where a ā€˜normalā€™ life seems simultaneously too far away and too close for comfort.

By Trent Dalton,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Boy Swallows Universe as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'The most extraordinary writer - a rare talent' Nikki Gemmell

An utterly wonderful novel of love, crime, magic, fate and coming of age from one of Australia's most exciting new writers.

Brisbane, 1983: A lost father, a mute brother, a mum in jail, a heroin dealer for a stepfather and a notorious criminal for a babysitter. It's not as if Eli's life isn't complicated enough already. He's just trying to follow his heart, learning what it takes to be a good man, but life just keeps throwing obstacles in the way - not least of which is Tytus Broz, legendaryā€¦


Book cover of Voss

Maggie Joel Author Of The Unforgiving City

From my list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past.

Why am I passionate about this?

I arrived in Sydney in the 90s knowing as much as one brief peruse the Berlitz Guide could provide me. For the next 25 years I immersed myself in its beautiful harbour and beaches whilst writing four novels, all set in my hometown of London. But when I sat down to write my fifth novel, The Unforgiving City, set in 1890s Sydney, I drew a complete blank. What was my adopted cityā€™s history? Did it even have one? If so, where was it? By the time Iā€™d finished the novel Iā€™d unearthed a whole other, hidden, Sydney. I will never view my new home town the same way again. 

Maggie's book list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past

Maggie Joel Why did Maggie love this book?

I first read Voss ā€“ Patrick Whiteā€™s 1957 fictionalised account of the doomed expedition and eventual disappearance of German explorer Ludwig Leichhardt - 25 years ago at university. I returned to it a couple of years ago as I embarked on my fifth novel, similarly set in 19th century Sydney, recalling how I enjoyed the novel in my earlier reading but finding myself, in this my second reading two decades later, utterly blown away by Whiteā€™s stunning and bitingly witty evocation of mid-1800s Sydney society. 

By Patrick White,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Voss describes an epic journey, both physical and spiritual. The eponymous hero, Johann Voss, is based on Ludwig Leichhardt, the nineteenth-century German explorer and naturalist who had already conducted several major expeditions into the Australian outback before making an ambitious attempt to cross the entire continent from east to west in 1848. He never returned.
White re-imagines his story with visionary intensity. Voss's last journey across the desert and the waterlogged plains of central Australia is a true 'venture to the interior'. But Voss is also a love story, for the explorer has become inextricably bound up with Laura Trevellyn,ā€¦


Book cover of Seven Poor Men of Sydney

Maggie Joel Author Of The Unforgiving City

From my list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past.

Why am I passionate about this?

I arrived in Sydney in the 90s knowing as much as one brief peruse the Berlitz Guide could provide me. For the next 25 years I immersed myself in its beautiful harbour and beaches whilst writing four novels, all set in my hometown of London. But when I sat down to write my fifth novel, The Unforgiving City, set in 1890s Sydney, I drew a complete blank. What was my adopted cityā€™s history? Did it even have one? If so, where was it? By the time Iā€™d finished the novel Iā€™d unearthed a whole other, hidden, Sydney. I will never view my new home town the same way again. 

Maggie's book list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past

Maggie Joel Why did Maggie love this book?

Published in 1934, this is Steadā€™s first novel, and its Modernistic portrayal of a loosely connected group of young men and women existing and interacting in a poverty-wracked but rapidly changing between-the-Wars Sydney caused a literary storm at the time. The City, caught between its Colonial heritage and its future as a modern Twentieth Century metropolis is the real star of the novel even as its seven bewildered, beleaguered characters roam its bay and suburbs, its libraries, university, and pubs, attempting to negotiate their changing city and their place in it. I couldnā€™t write a novel about Sydney without visiting Christina Steadā€™s Sydney first.

By Christina Stead,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Seven Poor Men of Sydney as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Originally published in 1934, Seven Poor Men of Sydney is Christina Stead's first novel, a brilliant portrayal of a group of men and women living in Sydney in the 1920s amid conditions of poverty and social turmoil.
Set against the vividly drawn backgrounds of Fisherman's (Watson's) Bay and the innercity slums, the various characters seek to resolve their individual spiritual dilemmas through politics, religion and philosophy.
Their struggles, their pain and their frustrations are portrayed with consummate skill in this memorable evocation of a city and an era.


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Book cover of Flowers and Stone

Flowers and Stone by Jan Sikes,

The year is 1970 when the lives of Darlina Flowers, a young fledgling go-go dancer, and Luke Stone, a wild rebel Texas musician, become powerfully intertwined. The wild ride of their love story journey will make you laugh, cry, and root for their success.

This is a riveting true storyā€¦

Book cover of Shady Acres: Politicians, Developers & Sydney's Public Transport Scandals 1872-1895

Maggie Joel Author Of The Unforgiving City

From my list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past.

Why am I passionate about this?

I arrived in Sydney in the 90s knowing as much as one brief peruse the Berlitz Guide could provide me. For the next 25 years I immersed myself in its beautiful harbour and beaches whilst writing four novels, all set in my hometown of London. But when I sat down to write my fifth novel, The Unforgiving City, set in 1890s Sydney, I drew a complete blank. What was my adopted cityā€™s history? Did it even have one? If so, where was it? By the time Iā€™d finished the novel Iā€™d unearthed a whole other, hidden, Sydney. I will never view my new home town the same way again. 

Maggie's book list on to uncover Sydneyā€™s past

Maggie Joel Why did Maggie love this book?

A librarian friend recommended Lesley Muirā€™s explosive exposĆ© of the scandal and corruption that underpinned the development of Sydneyā€™s transport networks in the late Nineteenth Century. Spanning the decades immediately preceding Australiaā€™s Federation, Shady Acres uncovers, as Elizabeth Farrelly says in her introduction, "the perennial crookedness of Sydneyā€™s planning." As I immersed myself in 1890s Sydney for my own novel ā€“ and with my story and characters focussed on these very men who sat in the New South Walesā€™  parliament - I found the book provided the sort of rich vein of detail that allowed me to really bring this time and these people to life. 

By Lesley Muir,

Why should I read it?

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


Book cover of The Timeless Land

Patsy Trench Author Of The Worst Country in the World

From my list on the beginnings of colonial Australia.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m a Pom, as Aussies would say, born and bred in England to an Australian mother and British father. I emigrated to Australia as a ten-pound Pom way back when and though I eventually came home again Iā€™ve always retained an affection and a curiosity about the country, which in time led me to write three books about my own family history there. The early days of colonial Australia, when around 1400 people, half of whom were convicts, ventured across the world to found a penal colony in a country they knew almost nothing about, is one of the most fascinating and frankly unlikely stories you could ever hope to come across. 

Patsy's book list on the beginnings of colonial Australia

Patsy Trench Why did Patsy love this book?

A bold and broad-sweeping book, written in the 1940s, described as a novel but featuring a mix of real and fictional characters, The Timeless Land is a beautifully imaginative telling of the arrival of the First Fleet in what became Sydney in 1788, as seen through the eyes of the Aboriginal people, the Governor and his officers, convicts and the odd settler. The depiction of the part-real, part-invented Aboriginal people may cause raised eyebrows nowadays, but the book is based on thorough research and written with great imagination and sensitivity. I love the mix of the real and the imaginary, while never distorting the facts. Itā€™s a brilliant way to paint a vivid portrait of a subject, Iā€™ve done it myself (if I may be presumptuous enough to bracket myself with Ms. Dark).

By Eleanor Dark,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

An outstanding literary achievement, meticulously researched and deeply felt, this portrait of the earliest days of the European settlement of Australia remains unrivalled. the year 1788: the very beginning of European settlement. these were times of hardship, cruelty and danger. Above all, they were times of conflict between the Aborigines and the white settlers. Eleanor Dark brings alive those bitter years with moments of tenderness and conciliation amid the brutality and hostility. the cast of characters includes figures historical and fictional, black and white, convict and settler. All the while, beneath the veneer of British civilisation, lies the baffling presenceā€¦


Book cover of Upside Down

Kieran Frank Author Of Squishy Crushy Something

From my list on positive asexual representation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm Kieran Frank, author of sexless romances. I write books with asexual characters because they're underrepresented. I write them with positive representation to avoid harmful stereotypes, and I highlight the nuances of a-spec people without sounding too preachy. I don't claim to be an expert in asexuality, but I'm passionate about writing asexual themes because it's what I want to see more of in fiction. Men are often expected to enjoy sex, especially at a younger age. I can personally relate to the harmful pressure, which is another reason I write asexual books. It can help combat toxic views that societies have instilled in many people.

Kieran's book list on positive asexual representation

Kieran Frank Why did Kieran love this book?

Many asexual romances tend to be written in a harmful way because they are often written by allosexual authors who do not do enough research to understand asexuality. Not this book, though. And while some asexual people can and do enjoy sex, I prefer a sexless, sweet romance that focuses on the emotional development and deep human connection, that this one offers. I understand not every reader is a fan of the MC because of his personality, but I tend to be pretty open to different kinds of personalities (within reason).

By N.R. Walker,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Jordan O'Neill isn't a fan of labels, considering he has a few. Gay, geek, a librarian, socially awkward, a nervous rambler, an introvert, an outsider. The last thing he needs is one more. But he when he realises adding the label 'asexual' might explain a lot, it turns his world upside down.

Hennessy Lang moved to Surry Hills after splitting with his boyfriend. His being asexual had seen the end of a lot of his romances, but he's determined to stay true to himself. Leaving his North Shore support group behind, he starts his own in Surry Hills, where heā€¦


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Book cover of Vivian Amberville - The Weaver of Odds

Vivian Amberville - The Weaver of Odds by Louise Blackwick,

Vivian AmbervilleĀ® is a popular dark fantasy book series about a girl whose thoughts can reshape reality.

First in the series, The Weaver of Odds introduces 13-year-old Vivian to her power to alter luck, odds, and circumstances. She is a traveler between realities, whose imagination can twist reality into impossibleā€¦

Book cover of The Dying Trade

Katherine Kovacic Author Of The Shifting Landscape

From my list on Australian crime fiction.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m an Australian crime writer and I love reading crime with a real sense of place and/or time. Growing up in Australia, most of the time I read international authors, so finding fabulous books by local authors was a thrill every time, and that excitement has never left me. This list crosses the genre from cosy to hard-boiled crime, which hopefully means something for everyone. If nothing here grabs you, thereā€™s a lot more fantastic Australian crime fiction to discover (did you know Australian author Charlotte Jay won the first ever Edgar Award in 1954?) and I can passion-talk about it anytime!

Katherine's book list on Australian crime fiction

Katherine Kovacic Why did Katherine love this book?

Corris and his protagonist, the hard-scrabble private detective Cliff Hardy, are quintessentially Australian. The Dying Trade introduces Cliff (smoker, drinker, ex-boxer) and sets the standard for all the books that follow in this series. Itā€™s dry and laconic, with a wonderful sense of place (a very gritty 1980s Sydney). Thereā€™s a definite nod to the greatsā€” Chandler and Hammett in this series; you know Cliff Hardy probably shouldnā€™t take this job, itā€™s odds-on heā€™ll cop a beating along the way, possible heā€™ll find love and lose it again. I enjoy the authorā€™s economy with words and the moral complexity of his characters. If you like hard-boiled crime, this series is worth a look!

*Note: Sydney is much nicer than it may seem when you walk in Corrisā€™s shoes!

By Peter Corris,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Meet Cliff Hardy. Smoker, drinker, ex-boxer. And private investigator.

The Dying Trade not only introduces a sleuth who has become an enduring Australian literary legendā€”the antihero of thirty-seven thrillersā€”but it is also a long love letter to the seamy side of Sydney itself.


Book cover of Breath
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