100 books like The Matchmaker's Gift

In a 2019 interview with NPR, Etaf Rum—the daughter of Palestinian immigrants who was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York—said one of her struggles in writing the book was the fear that she was in a way confirming stereotypes about Arabs and Middle Easterners, including “oppression, domestic abuse, and terrorism.” Thankfully Rum overcame these struggles to deliver a courageous, beautiful, and incredibly authentic debut novel that follows the lives of three generations of Palestinian-American women trying to find their voices and identities within the confines of patriarchal and conservative milieus. In a way, the struggles of Rum and her characters mirror the battles that young people throughout the Middle East have been waging against tyranny and oppression since the start of the Arab Spring in 2010.

Marzano-Lesnevich was a Harvard law student working a summer internship when they encountered the case of Ricky Langley, who was being held on death row in Louisiana. That case opened up a personal wound for the author, and they vividly and powerfully intertwine the two stories. The author uses speculation and imagination to attempt to fill in blanks that are unanswerable. I recently taught this book in a seminar at Columbia on creative license in nonfiction, and my students were floored. 

It has a great plot and wonderful scenery and is definitely not as ‘twisted’ as the other four on the list. Saying that I had to mention it because the writing is so beautifully descriptive, and the mystery about the "eight dresses" got me hooked until the very end.

Set in 1950s Paris and London in 2017, the novel is as gorgeous as the exquisite dresses and an absolutely worthwhile read.

I love characters that make me feel like I’m in the room with them and both Louisiana and her Granny check that box. Quirky personalities abound in this sweet but often sad story about a girl who hits the road with her eccentric caretaker grandmother in the middle of a starry night. Granny insists that the time has come to leave Florida and confront the curse that hangs over their heads. That means leaving everything familiar and dear to Louisiana far behind: Her friends, her cat, her home. The two end up in a small town in Georgia and as Louisiana’s grandmother’s world gets smaller, Louisiana is left to her own devices in a world that seems too big to handle. 

When it comes to Constance Greene, I hardly know where to begin.

She’s certainly the oldest and most deadly character in fiction writing today. I say she’s the oldest because she’s trapped in the body of a thirty-something-year-old woman even though she was born in 1873, long story.

She appears as a supporting character in multiple novels, as the love interest of Detective Aloysius Pendergast, but she is so much more than that. She’s eloquent, brilliant, and does not succumb to emotional distress under any threat of death.

In Blue Labyrinth, eight highly trained mercenaries pursue her and none of them live to tell the tale. At her most ruthless, she can kill with any tool at her disposal and she is loyal to the man she loves.

I could recommend this book for the writing, which is remarkable—layered and incisive and beautiful—or for the plotting, which is dense and chaotic in all the best ways, even as Veselka displays the patience of a confident master. Or for the multitude of richly drawn, intriguing characters and how they move around the country and one another. As they wander from Alaska to Seattle to New England in search of a family secret—and in search of themselves—Veselka brings readers along on their quest as she slowly reveals the mystery of a dysfunctional family dynamic and the systems that create so many others like it.  

A widow with a new lease on life thanks to her secretly wealthy aunt becomes involved in a murder.

Multigenerational, with the Italian grandma, her newbie journalist granddaughter, plus an ex-nun sister and an ex-sister-in-law.

This story involves food, jokes, and family love, albeit with much more brashness and outspokenness than any of the other books I listed, and also a lot more Italian, though the book is set in New Jersey.

Amanda’s dual-time novel is like reading a poem—the prose is breathtaking, the story compelling, the characters real and wounded, and the love story! In the wake of WWII, a grieving fisherman, Robert Bliss, submits a poem to a local newspaper and his humble words change the tide of a nation. Decades later, Annie Bliss is summoned back to Ansel-by-the-Sea when she learns her Great-Uncle Robert, the man who became her refuge during the hardest summer of her youth, is now the one in need of help. The time slip is expertly done, the story wild and wonderful, and again, I was inspired to try my hand at a time-slip novel after having soaked up every last drop of the water on the sand in Whose Waves These Are.

I love James Patterson books, particularly his Alex Cross series, and I confess I have gorged on them this summer. I appreciate the remarkably short chapters, making it easy to pick up and put down if interrupted. This one is particularly interesting as we learn more about the family and their relationship dynamics. The fact his relative is accused of murder in what appears to be a slam dunk case, Cross is not satisfied. After a plea from his lawyer niece, Cross goes to investigate. Going back to his roots in his hometown dredges up good and bad memories for him and Nana-Mama. Readers who like suspense and a complicated mystery will enjoy this story. Investigations are fraught with danger for the whole family and Cross is a man who protects his family. This is not a typical whodunnit. The case is solved but not in the way one might… show more.

The Son of Good Fortune (Excel) has an outrageous single mother who defies societal expectations. Maxima, a former B-movie action star in the Philippines, runs an online scam siphoning money from men.

She dominates the book with her humor and zest for life, even as she is forced to live in the margins as an undocumented immigrant, raising a child all on her own.

This is a funny and smart and poignant book. I loved the mother in this book and felt for her son, Excel, deeply.