83 books like The Tin Roof Blowdown

By James Lee Burke,

Here are 83 books that The Tin Roof Blowdown fans have personally recommended if you like The Tin Roof Blowdown. 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 The Alienist

Irving Belateche Author Of The Origin of Dracula

From my list on refresh legends, myths, and historical events.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always loved novels that reinvent and refresh history and legends. They take these building blocks of culture and make them personal and emotional. These novels breathe new life into ancient tales and historical events, so they resonate with relevance. They reveal hidden depths and connections within familiar stories, transforming them into vibrant tales. This genre makes legend and history feel personal by taking me on one character’s unique journey, transforming the exploration of the past into a deeply engaging experience.

Irving's book list on refresh legends, myths, and historical events

Irving Belateche Why did Irving love this book?

This novel captivated me from the very first page. It masterfully blends historical figures and facts to create a gripping thriller. I was immediately drawn into New York City in 1896 and the groundbreaking investigation.

The alienist, which is what psychologists were at the turn of the century, uses a unique, untested, and ridiculed method to track down a serial killer: psychological profiling. The appearance of real historical figures, like Theodore Roosevelt, then police commissioner, and J.P. Morgan, added a rich layer of authenticity and intrigue to the story. For me, the meticulous details of the era made each twist in the investigation come to life.

By Caleb Carr,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The internationally bestselling historical thriller, now a major Netflix series starring Luke Evans, Dakota Fanning and Daniel Bruhl.

Some things never change.

New York City, 1896. Hypocrisy in high places is rife, police corruption commonplace, and a brutal killer is terrorising young male prostitutes.

Unfortunately for Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt, the psychological profiling of murderers is a practice still in its infancy, struggling to make headway against the prejudices of those who prefer the mentally ill - and the 'alienists' who treat them - to be out of sight as well as out of mind.

But as the body count…


Book cover of Isle of Dogs

Mary Maurice Author Of Burtrum Lee

From my list on exciting your imagination.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always enjoyed the intrigue of the mystery and the constant back and forth of the twists and turns offer in a well-written novel. The tremor of my nerves at the base of my neck as I try to figure out the culprit and their intentions, has always enticed my imagination. To, me, those sensations are mind stimulating, and are only born through reading.

Mary's book list on exciting your imagination

Mary Maurice Why did Mary love this book?

If you like reading fast action and involved mysteries, you’ll enjoy Patricia Cromwell’s novel, Isle of Dogs. This action-packed story delves into the historical plots surrounding a small island off the coast of Virginia, where it is said ancestors of long-ago pirates reside, and to this day a sunken treasure remains at the bottom of the sea off their shores. The Governor of Virginia decides to build speed bumps on the small island where the preferred mode of transportation is golf carts. Disarrays begin, so State Trooper Andy Brazel is assigned to investigate and discovers a gang’s intentions to raid the island in search of the treasure.

By Patricia Cornwell,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Isle of Dogs is the final book in the Andy Brazil series, following the success of Hornet's Nest and Southern Cross, from bestselling author Patricia Cornwell.

Chaos breaks loose when the Governor of Virginia orders that speed traps be installed on all streets and highways, and warns that motorists will be caught by monitoring aircraft flying overhead. But the eccentric inhabitants of Tangier, fourteen miles off the coast of Virginia in the Chesapeake Bay, respond by threatening to secede and set up an independent state, claiming that their independence lies in the history of America's first settlers, those who set…


Book cover of The Target

Mary Maurice Author Of Burtrum Lee

From my list on exciting your imagination.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always enjoyed the intrigue of the mystery and the constant back and forth of the twists and turns offer in a well-written novel. The tremor of my nerves at the base of my neck as I try to figure out the culprit and their intentions, has always enticed my imagination. To, me, those sensations are mind stimulating, and are only born through reading.

Mary's book list on exciting your imagination

Mary Maurice Why did Mary love this book?

Jessica Reel and Will Robie are CIA assassins who have found themselves as The Target after a mission has been botched and one of their own was killed. Now, being watched under the microscope they are assigned to an almost impossible mission where their only option is kill or be killed. The partners know that they have marks on their backs but have no choice but to obey the orders that have been dealt to them. Will they be able to stave off the unknown mercenary from murdering the first family, as Reel and Robie find themselves once again in the throes of the spy wars.  

By David Baldacci,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The world's greatest assassins are on a high-risk mission for the President--but a powerful mastermind wants them dead in this #1 New York Times bestselling thriller.

The President knows it's a perilous, high-risk assignment. If he gives the order, he has the opportunity to take down a global menace, once and for all. If the mission fails, he would face certain impeachment, and the threats against the nation would multiply. So the president turns to the one team that can pull off the impossible: Will Robie and his partner, Jessica Reel.

Together, Robie and Reel's talents as assassins are unmatched.…


Book cover of The Gray Ghost

Mary Maurice Author Of Burtrum Lee

From my list on exciting your imagination.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always enjoyed the intrigue of the mystery and the constant back and forth of the twists and turns offer in a well-written novel. The tremor of my nerves at the base of my neck as I try to figure out the culprit and their intentions, has always enticed my imagination. To, me, those sensations are mind stimulating, and are only born through reading.

Mary's book list on exciting your imagination

Mary Maurice Why did Mary love this book?

Remi and Sam Fargo world-renowned crime detectives are asked to search for the truth about The Gray Ghost, a specialized prototype designed by Rolls Royce. The vehicle, stolen from Manchester, England in 1906, and then found by Detective Isaac Bell, has gone missing again one hundred years later. Sam and Remi are in for a treat with this case as they unfold the mysteries from decades ago to find the obscure Gray Ghost.  

By Clive Cussler, Robin Burcell,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The search for a legendary automobile almost puts an end to both the careers and the lives of husband-and-wife team Sam and Remi Fargo, in the thrilling new adventure from the #1 New York Times-bestselling master of adventure

In 1906, a groundbreaking Rolls-Royce prototype known as the Grey Ghost vanishes from the streets of Manchester, England, and it is only the lucky intervention of an American detective named Isaac Bell that prevents it from being lost forever. Not even he can save the good name of Jonathon Payton, however, the man wrongly blamed for the theft, and more than a…


Book cover of Zeitoun

Vanessa Lee Author Of High Rise

From my list on celebrating the bravery of everyday heroes.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an Australian writer living in Europe. Returning to my hometown on the East Coast of Australia post-COVID, I confronted relentless rain and king tides threatening the beach promenade cafes. Witnessing the potential demise of these familiar spots sparked the idea for my novel. Opening with a dystopian scene of future tourists exploring submerged coastal cafes with snorkels, my work delves into the realm of "cli-fi" (climate fiction). Against the backdrop of imminent climate danger, my characters, a lovable yet obstinate Australian ensemble, navigate a world profoundly altered by the impacts of climate change. I hope what I have written is an exaggeration. I fear it may not be.

Vanessa's book list on celebrating the bravery of everyday heroes

Vanessa Lee Why did Vanessa love this book?

Humans can be brave, and humans can be stubborn. Abdulrahman Zeitoun is both.

Refusing to leave New Orleans as Hurricane Katrina built strength out at sea in 2005, he stays and finds himself stranded in an eerily flooded city, seemingly alone and without help. He paddles the watery “streets” in an old kayak and finds others who could not or did not leave, offering help, and for his efforts, is arrested as a suspected terrorist and looter.

This book is not a simple tale of an everyday hero. We meet a character that downplays the dangers of a brewing storm but, despite his stubbornness, is also capable of great selflessness and bravery. The negligence of the institutions we expect to protect us is an insidious theme that runs throughout.

By Dave Eggers,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

WINNER OF THE AMERICAN BOOK AWARD AND THE LA TIMES BOOK AWARD

'Masterly. Brilliantly crafted, powerfully written and deftly reported' Guardian

The urgent and unforgettable true story of post-Katrina New Orleans . . .

In August 2005, as Hurricane Katrina blew in, the city of New Orleans has been abandoned by most citizens. But resident Abdulrahman Zeitoun, though his wife and family had gone, refused to leave. For days he traversed an apocalyptic landscape of flooded streets by canoe. But eventually he came to the attention of those 'guarding' this drowned city. Only then did Zeitoun's nightmare really begin.

Zeitoun…


Book cover of Weathering Katrina: Culture and Recovery among Vietnamese Americans

Daniel P. Aldrich Author Of Building Resilience: Social Capital in Post-Disaster Recovery

From my list on the importance of community during disasters.

Why am I passionate about this?

We moved to New Orleans in July 2005. We had six weeks in our first home, filling it with furniture, buying a new car, and taking advantage of my first job. When Hurricane Katrina collapsed the levees holding back the nearby lakes, our home – and those of 80% of the city – filled with water. As I waited for FEMA and insurance to help us, I saw instead it was our friends, friends of friends, and faith-based organizations that helped us get back on our feet. Using our own experiences as a start, I traveled to India and Japan to study how communities around the world survived and thrived during shocks. 

Daniel's book list on the importance of community during disasters

Daniel P. Aldrich Why did Daniel love this book?

As someone who lived in New Orleans before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina, I often wondered why different communities bounced back from that terrible flooding. Mark van Landingham finds that, despite low levels of English fluency, education, and income, the Vietnamese and Vietnamese-American community of Village De L’Est brought back more people and businesses than any other part of the city. Within a year they were back to 90% capacity of pre-Katrina levels. This community's residents – connected to each other through Catholicism and a shared language and history – worked collectively to help evacuees who had scattered across the country. Through collective action, they rebuilt their community even better, adding in new schools, medical centers, and even urban farms.

By Mark J. VanLandingham,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. The principal Vietnamese-American enclave was a remote, low-income area that flooded badly. Many residents arrived decades earlier as refugees from the Vietnam War and were marginally fluent in English. Yet, despite these poor odds of success, the Vietnamese made a surprisingly strong comeback in the wake of the flood. In Weathering Katrina, public health scholar Mark VanLandingham analyzes their path to recovery, and examines the extent to which culture helped them cope during this crisis.


Contrasting his longitudinal survey data and qualitative interviews of Vietnamese residents with the work of other research teams,…


Book cover of The Yellow House: A Memoir

Marlene G. Fine and Fern L. Johnson Author Of Let's Talk Race: A Guide for White People

From my list on the experiences of Black people in the US that white people don’t know but should.

Why we are passionate about this?

We grew up in predominantly white communities and came of age during the Civil Rights and Black Power movements. As academics, we focused on issues of race in our research and teaching. Yet, despite our reading and writing about race, we still hadn’t made a connection to our own lives and how our white privilege shielded us and made us complicit in perpetuating racial inequities. We didn’t fully see our role in white supremacy until we adopted our sons. Becoming an interracial family and parenting Black sons taught us about white privilege and the myriad ways that Blacks confront racism in education, criminal justice, health care, and simply living day-to-day. 

Marlene and Fern's book list on the experiences of Black people in the US that white people don’t know but should

Marlene G. Fine and Fern L. Johnson Why did Marlene and Fern love this book?

A memoir that haunted both of us about Broom’s love for the New Orleans house she grew up in, her family, and a neighborhood torn apart by the institutional racism embedded in banking practices, zoning laws, highway development, and other corporate and government policies and practices.

Broom’s mother purchased the house in 1961 in a then “promising” neighborhood. Over the years, the neighborhood was cut off from the city by the growth of the interstate highway, which left this largely Black area in decline from years of indifference by New Orleans elected officials. The house was eventually destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

The book provides a harrowing description of the destructive effects of institutional racism.

By Sarah M Broom,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR NONFICTION

'A major book that I suspect will come to be considered among the essential memoirs of this vexing decade' New York Times Book Review

In 1961, Sarah M. Broom's mother Ivory Mae bought a shotgun house in the then-promising neighborhood of New Orleans East and built her world inside of it. It was the height of the Space Race and the neighborhood was home to a major NASA plant - the postwar optimism seemed assured. Widowed, Ivory Mae remarried Sarah's father Simon Broom; their combined family would…


Book cover of A Private Cathedral

Bill Lynch Author Of Mekong Belle: Love's Impossible Choice

From my list on time travel on lonely roads.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up in a family of journalists. My great-grandfather, grand-aunt, and father were newspaper editors and master raconteurs. I followed in their footsteps, spending 50 years as a small-town newspaper editor. Among family, friends, and neighbors, I was expected to know the stories behind the headlines, and in so doing, I became a raconteur. In a good story, there is a fine line between fact and fiction. The novels I chose for a long road trip are as believable as the true stories I was told and ended up telling when it was my turn. It only takes asking “What if?” to cross the line from fact to fiction.

Bill's book list on time travel on lonely roads

Bill Lynch Why did Bill love this book?

Whether I’m reading or listening to one of James Lee Burke’s novels featuring Detective Dave Robicheaux, the main character in his gritty crime stories set in New Iberia, not far from New Orleans, I have a hard time stopping.

I’m sucked into the story as Robicheaux and his rough-and-tumble partner Clete Purcel follow leads while dealing with their own personal demons, including PTSD and alcohol addiction. They are imperfect heroes, perhaps the only kind who can deal with the sick and twisted criminals they must stop.

Even in their hostile environment, I want to join in their efforts, which means I don’t want to stop until the end.

By James Lee Burke,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Detective Dave Robicheaux is caught in the crossfire of Louisiana's oldest and bloodiest gangland feud...

From the wreckage of Louisiana's oldest and family rivalry, Detective Dave Robicheaux faces his most sinister enemy yet . . .
Isolde and Johnny - the star-crossed teenage heirs to New Iberia's criminal empires - have run away together, and Robicheaux is tasked with finding them. But when his investigation brings him too close to both Isolde's mother and her father's mistress, the venomous mafioso orders a hit on Robicheaux and his partner, Clete Purcel.

In order to rescue the young lovers, and save hi…


Book cover of Jesus Out to Sea

Lynn A. Higgins Author Of Bertrand Tavernier

From my list on to read in with the eccentric movie adaptations.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a recently retired Professor of French literature and cinema studies at Dartmouth College. Because I love both books and movies, I developed a course on adaptation, which I taught with pleasure for many years. I wanted to give students the opportunity to learn how to analyze literary texts and films, separately and in juxtaposition, and they especially enjoyed discovering how the “same” story works quite differently in different media. In addition to the two volumes on Tavernier, my published books include New Novel, New Wave, New Politics: Fiction and the Representation of History in Postwar France; Parables of Theory: Jean Ricardou’s Metafiction; and Rape and Representation (co-edited with Brenda Silver).

Lynn's book list on to read in with the eccentric movie adaptations

Lynn A. Higgins Why did Lynn love this book?

The book is a collection of short stories by my favorite mystery novel writer. Burke’s series detective, Dave Robicheaux, who is both a Louisiana cop and a moral philosopher, repeatedly strives to overcome his own flaws and set right the cruel catastrophes wrought by human ignorance, stupidity, and cruelty. Jesus Out to Sea is infused with the same narrative and poetic ferocity, but without Robicheaux this time. The collection is set in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and probes the human costs of the devastation wrought by nature and exacerbated by administrative corruption and bad faith. 

A surprising and powerful adaptation of one of the stories—“Winter Light”—will be released theatrically in the fall of 2022 with the title God’s Country. It’s the first feature by Julian Higgins, a promising young director (who happens to be my son). The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to enthusiastic reviews and…

By James Lee Burke,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Jesus Out to Sea as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This powerful new collection of James Lee Burke's short fiction ranges across landscapes that he has made his own, from rural Louisiana and Mississippi to war-torn Vietnam and a New Orleans ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. Told with his trademark blend of lyrical prose and hard-eyed realism, they bring a host of extraordinary characters to vivid life: soldiers and prostitutes, nuns and children, musicians and gangsters, all the while movingly exploring 'the near certainty of tragedy to come and the smoldering embers of possibility in the ashes of blighted lives' (BOOKLIST). Whether bittersweet evocations of childhood and a New Orleans that…


Book cover of A Thin Dark Line

Kel O'Connor Author Of Broken Bits

From my list on romantic suspense with forced proximity as a trope.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been a fan of romantic suspense since I was a teen (many decades ago) and started writing my DAG Team Series in 2016. I adore everything about this genre – the puzzles, the intrigue and how they affect the budding relationship between the main characters. Dating is difficult when you are trying to catch a killer or on the run! Despite the central mystery, the focus is on the romance between the couple. The issues serve to add a layer of non-sexual tension. 

Kel's book list on romantic suspense with forced proximity as a trope

Kel O'Connor Why did Kel love this book?

The first in the Doucet series and a real nail-biter. A killer has been set free and the couple must team up to catch him. The trail leads them through the bayous of Louisiana and the author does a great job at escalating the tension between them and the environment. 

By Tami Hoag,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Thin Dark Line as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A botched investigation - and a killer walks free...

The death of a beautiful woman ... an arrogant man who claimed to be her suitor but was probably her murderer ... a cop accused of planting evidence ... and a town steeped in secrets and shadows.

Deputy Annie Broussard is still haunted by the case of Pamela Bichon. The killer walked free, and Annie can't forget the sight of Pamela's mutilated body.

But her obsessive search for justice lands her with a dilemma where she must defend or accuse a fellow cop ...


Book cover of The Alienist
Book cover of Isle of Dogs
Book cover of The Target

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