85 books like We Only Want What's Best

I started this book for the unlikely main character–Sister Holiday, a chain-smoking, tattooed, queer nun–but it was the mystery that kept me reading. I always love it when a writer can make me feel like I am the one on the line, like I am fighting for my life or to prove my innocence. This book did just that.

I found I was holding myself tightly as Sister Holiday investigated but just kept finding more evidence against herself. The snippets of her past life made me feel for her more and more, taking the character from an unlikely hero to someone I cared deeply about. I can’t wait to get my hands on the second in the series.

I love a good slow reveal of backstory in a mystery. Pair that with a tense, high-stakes present-day mystery, and I cannot put the book down. The backstory in this book is complex, and the perfect number of hints were given throughout to keep me wanting to know more.

I also loved that the author had chosen a young (perhaps unreliable) narrator, which made seeing the story through her eyes all the more compelling. There were times when it felt like I understood more of what was happening than the character did, and I wanted to do the classic horror-movie-watching moment of yelling at the characters to get away. A great read that I thought about for a long time afterwards.

I love that this book focuses on the “who,” not the “what.” Most often, with mysteries, the focus is on learning about the perpetrator of the crime. In this one, I loved that the real mystery is in discovering who the victim, Alice, was. I especially love that we get to hear her story in her own words, as a second narrator telling her history after her death.

The other part of the story–events after Alice’s death and the discovery of her body–is told by another compelling character, Ruby. I’m normally wary when I see the words “strong female character,” but these are two strong, beautiful women whose heartbreaking stories held me captive in these pages.  

This is one of those books that’s hard to talk about without giving too much away because the magic is in the twists and turns. At a certain point in reading, I closed the book, letting out a little “oh no” because I’d just realized what was coming, and I was both dreading it happening and couldn’t turn the pages fast enough to get to that scene.

This is very much a car crash-in-slow-motion story. I hated the antagonist. I also knew I probably would have been drawn in by her charisma if I’d met her in real life–beautiful malice is the perfect term to describe her. This book was one that I felt physically, carrying it around for several days afterward as I relived moments in my head.

Do you ever think how great it’d be if you could walk through your closet door and end up in New York?  No waiting around; it’d be so much quicker than a long-haul flight. Well, now you can... at least in your mind, as you travel through doors on a wonderful adventure. If you enjoy beautifully written characters, humorous dialogue, portal travel and unravelling mysteries, then T L Brown’s Door to Door series is a fabulous place to start.

I wanna live in Janus Lake, and you will too when you read Barbara Kellyn’s Forever Endeavor. She’s my favorite romantic comedy author. Forever Endeavor is funny, charming, and a little angsty. When Billie and Sonny meet, the sparks fly, but so do the quips. Ms. Kellyn is the Queen of Witty Banter. She’ll have you laughing out loud and blushing so hard, you’ll definitely want to move to her small, fictional Midwest town. And her secondary characters fill the pages full of small-town gossip and community. What more could you want from a rom com?

Evelyn Waugh’s 1947 visit to Hollywood to negotiate a movie deal for Brideshead Revisited was a failure. But a trip to Forest Lawn Cemetery provided the gist for The Loved One, his last great satire. Waugh transforms Forest Lawn into Whispering Glades, a grandiose Disneyland of Death where cosmetician Aimée Thanatogenos puts the finishing touches on elite Los Angelenos under the lustful eye of mortician Mr. Joyboy. The naïve Aimée meets Dennis Barlow, a British expat and failed writer who passes off the works of Tennyson and Keats as his own. When she discovers Barlow works at the Happy Hunting Ground Pet Cemetery, even advice columnist Guru Brahmin can’t console her. Waugh’s piercing prose exposes the pretense and hypocrisy of the American Way of Life (and Death). 

This is an excellent book on understanding how Disneyland developed and some of the crazy things that Walt Disney was advised to do for his theme park. What I love about this book is the full behind-the-scenes look at how Disneyland came into being and the philosophy behind the decisions that were made in those early years.   

One of the best books ever about stand-up.

Steve Martin talks about perfecting his craft and really gives comedians and fans of stand-up a front row seat to what goes into being a comedian. The grind on the way up, and performing in near-empty places, will make you empathize with Martin and all the comics who started just like him.

From the bright colors and mid-century modern style to the story behind a woman artist who created my favorite ride at Disneyland, there is so much I love about this fun picture book biography. With words like sienna, azure, and veridian, it is a great jumping off point for exploring color and color theory.

This book is also fantastic inspiration for designing your own colorful castles!