Here are 100 books that Why the Whales Came fans have personally recommended if you like
Why the Whales Came.
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Like a caricature, satire lets you see reality better by exaggerating it. When satire is done right, every element, from the overall plot to the characters to paragraph-level details, is there to cast an exposing light on some part of our real world. They are books that exist on many levels, expose hubris and essential misunderstandings, and generally speak truth to power. They should leave the reader reassessing core assumptions about how the world works. I’ve written a best-selling nonfiction book about machine learning in the past, and I probably could have taken that approach again, but AI and American politics are both ripe for satire.
I couldn’t look at society the same way after reading this tale of how a group of schoolboys stranded on an island descends, step by step, into savagery. The savagery is inside all of us, and the veneer of civilization that our education puts on it is very thin and easily cracks. Haunting.
A plane crashes on a desert island and the only survivors, a group of schoolboys, assemble on the beach and wait to be rescued. By day they inhabit a land of bright fantastic birds and dark blue seas, but at night their dreams are haunted by the image of a terrifying beast. As the boys' delicate sense of order fades, so their childish dreams are transformed into something more primitive, and their behaviour starts to take on a murderous, savage significance.
First published in 1954, Lord of the Flies is one of the most celebrated and widely read of modern…
I love adventure—I'm an adventurist. I love escaping—through creative writing and the written word! And, I love the sea—I have served over 30 years in the US Coast Guard at sea and ashore and recently drove Zodiacs in Alaska and Norway for Seabourn Cruise ships. Since publishing my first book, So Others May Live about heroic US Coast Guard rescue swimmers and aircrews (read by Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher who both told me they loved my book and used it for their roles in film, The Guardian), I have become a TEDx speaker and coach, award-winning author and rose to the senior rank of captain in the USCG.
This is an adventure! Turn the pages of this book to find waves and many kinds of waves: rogue, freak, and giant waves of the ocean and the people who try to surf them. I am a retired US Coast Guard officer and sailed many ships at sea. As a mariner we know of or have seen waves, some of them tossing our ships in the middle of the night as we try to sail home. Any number of ships have vanished in the ocean, quickly, with no time to put out an SOS call for help. This is a great book to learn more while having an adventure reading it from the safety of your chair.
The have long been mariners' tales of 100-foot rogue waves - gargantuan monsters that sink super-tankers in the blink of an eye.
But waves that high violate the laws of physics, so science has dismissed them as myth. Until now.
In February 2000 the research ship, RRS Discovery, was trapped by a vortex of mammoth waves in the North Atlantic. Amazingly the ship survived and its state-of-the-art equipment registered waves nearing 100-feet. Something scary is brewing in the planet's waters. And with 72% of earth covered by sea, this is serious business.
I grew up as a closeted homosexual in a fundamentalist Christian home, enduring nearly two decades in a crisis of faith. Sermons frequently warned of damnation for my natural inclinations, pushing me to fast, pray, and achieve to resist temptation. This crisis gradually resolved over the eight years I spent writing Playing by the Book, the first coming-out novel to win a National IPPY Medal in religious fiction. Although I don’t consider myself a spiritual writer, I am drawn to stories that explore existential struggles and triumphs, including those related to a crisis of faith—much like the characters in the novels on this list.
I loved this book for its fantastical portrayal of a Pacific voyage that mirrors the internal conflicts many of us face. Like Pi, who embraced multiple faiths during his ordeal, I searched for answers to reconcile my faith and sexuality across various denominations, religions, and philosophies.
Pi’s story as he journeys across the Pacific, a tiger in tow, allowed me to reflect on the moments when I felt alone, wrestling with my faith in the face of an overwhelming challenge, given my fundamentalist upbringing.
After the sinking of a cargo ship, a solitary lifeboat remains bobbing on the wild blue Pacific. The only survivors from the wreck are a sixteen-year-old boy named Pi, a hyena, a wounded zebra, an orangutan—and a 450-pound Royal Bengal tiger.
Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi Patel, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with the tiger, Richard Parker, for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his…
I romantically believe that the sea runs in my blood. On the Norwegian side of my family, my grandfather was a boat builder, and my uncle a whaler. I’m a surfer, and I’ve worked in whale and dolphins conservation for many years. So I’m drawn to the ocean and – as work and family duties keep me inland more than I’d like – when unable to get in or on the water, I get my fix with salty tales; some of which I read and some of which I write. The books on this list are all classics, in my view; they all speak to the enigma of the ocean; an ever-changing scape, full of alien life. I hope you enjoy them, and also Girl. Boy. Sea.
This is a beautiful story, simple yet profound. It’s about young, innocent, and a wee bit naïve Jamie, led to adventure by troubled but brave Mara.
The adventure takes us to St. Kilda’s, the remotest inhabited Scottish island. The island, the sea, and the quest to explore are used as metaphors for mystery and the pull of the unknown.
A beautifully written tale of courage, friendship, and survival. Imagine a tiny island far out in the Atlantic Ocean off the west coast of Scotland. On some days, you can hardly see where the sea ends and the land begins, everything merged in a blue-grey mist of sea spray and wind-blown sand. There is nothing between here and America. I say nothing, but what I mean, of course, is nothing but ocean. And about sixty-five kilometres out to sea, one last remote outcrop of islands and sea stacks, with the highest sea cliffs anywhere in the UK-St Kilda. Distant, desolate,…
I love mystery novels that both entertain and inform the reader. These books usually conform to the expected tropes of the mystery genre, but have that extra something that makes the reader carry on thinking long after they have finished reading. In my own novels I enjoy including positive eco-friendly role-models, ideas, and solutions all embedded within a traditional mystery, that readers can think about, and then perhaps adopt, in their own lives. I am always delighted when readers tell me that my story has made them look at their own lives and businesses to see what they can do to make them more sustainable
In this excellently researched DI Ben Kitto series the author does not shy away from the fact that bad things happen in beautiful places.
I particularly love this first book because it sympathetically captures the essence of living in a small, remote island community, where drugs, violence, and alcohol are not far beneath the surface and the economic hardships these places endure are a daily concern.
The islands in this book are a far cry from the summer Isles of Scilly that many of us know and love and it is a realistic reminder that life anywhere is not always as idyllic and simple as it appears from the outside.
'Gripping, clever and impossible to put down' ERIN KELLY
DI Ben Kitto needs a second chance. After ten years working for the murder squad in London, a traumatic event has left him grief-stricken. He's tried to resign from his job, but his boss has persuaded him to take three months to reconsider.
Ben plans to work in his uncle's boatyard on the tiny Scilly island of Bryher where he was born, hoping to mend his shattered nerves. His plans go awry when the body of a sixteen-year-old girl is found on the beach…
I’m a historian, and while I have a great deal of experience producing straight ‘nonfiction’ work, the idea of reading something ‘non-fictional;’ within a fictional world has always excited me because it allows many opportunities to talk about us while framing it as them. They also play into what I call the ‘Rutger Hauer Effect,’ where his character in Blade Runner mentions the wonderous things he’s seen in passing. I want to see those things too! Fictional nonfiction books provide a fantastic opportunity to tease the readers with things that their author knows and has seen but exist just beyond the reach of our own imaginations.
Much of my background as a historian focuses on the First World War, and, as a result, I have a particular interest in the ‘invasion literature’ of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This is a particularly fun and interesting example in that it creates newspaper and press reports to help grant a level of tactile reality to the unfolding invasion of England.
Books like this had a significant impact on British popular culture and mindset before 1914, and Le Queux’s decision to make his fictional work appear to be nonfiction where possible works incredibly well and, as it was serialized in the Daily Mail newspaper, he adapted the text to include many locations readers either lived or would recognize!
...No fewer than two hundred thousand Germans were already upon English soil! The outlook grew blacker every hour.
Eight years before the outbreak of the First World War, when national hysteria over the supposed presence of German spies in England gripped the country, the journalist and novelist William Le Queux imagined a catastrophic scenario in which the German army invaded Britain in a shock attack on the east coast. His novel, first published as The Invasion of 1910 and serialised in the Daily Mail, was intended as a warning to military strategists and the government of the time that England…
I am an award-winning, national best-selling author who loves reading as much as I love writing. Combine that with a good, smooth bourbon and it’s a win-win. Like my literary journey, my love for bourbon has been filled with surprises and challenges. Romance writing found me. I didn’t go looking for it. The journey introduced me to great writers and amazing stories and taught me to write better. Distilleries could extol the health benefits of bourbon, but I discovered it can be subtle, soul-searing, and pairs beautifully with a good meal and an even better book. Like my writing, bourbon leaves you feeling like you’ve had a great meal and threw in dessert!
This book is the embodiment of great storytelling. Guy Johnson takes us on a journey that is profound and addicting.
The characters are beautifully constructed against a backdrop of historical fiction, adventure, and romance. They are flawed, and you find yourself rooting for them at every turn. This is the first book I read that taught me how to better push the constraints of my own writing and to simply write what might feel personal but is also necessary.
Johnson was also the first author I ever reached out to, to say how much the book meant to me and he responded with the most engaging words of encouragement and advice for my own stories.
I’d highly recommend this book for anyone looking to escape in the pages of an epic tale that reads as if it is on the big screen. It’s masterfully written and makes for a soul-searing…
Raised in the steamy bayous of New Orleans in the early 1900s, LeRoi "King" Tremain, caught up in his family's ongoing feud with the rival DuMont family, learns to fight. But when the teenage King mistakenly kills two white deputies during a botched raid on the DuMonts, the Tremains' fear of reprisal forces King to flee Louisiana.
King thus embarks on an adventure that first takes him to France, where he fights in World War I as a member of the segregated 369th Battalion—in the bigoted army he finds himself locked in combat with American soldiers as well as with…
My entire life has revolved around the military. At seven years old, I decided that I would serve my country as a Marine, so my formative years were spent reading as much as I could about the ideas of service, leadership, combat, and sacrifice. I joined the Corps at seventeen and spent the next twenty-one years trying to live up to those stories I read as a child. Now, I divide my time between training special operations Marines for combat, writing about my experiences, and encouraging veterans of all services to put their stories on paper as a senior editor for the Lethal Minds Journal. I share the lessons I’ve learned in my weekly substack, Walking Point.
This is a book I have read over and over. Jünger, a German infantryman, paints a picture of trench warfare that does nothing to glamorize combat, but I found the ideas of duty, bravery, leadership, and even ethics in its pages.
I appreciate that this memoir began as Jünger’s journal and was re-written and edited over a number of years, which allowed for the level of reflection that I feel is necessary for a memoir.
Originally published in 1920, The Storm of Steel is a first-hand account of World War I trench combat lifted from the diaries of Ernst Jünger, a German infantryman who would become one of Europe's most talented writers. The book was first translated into English in 1929 by Basil Creighton, the acclaimed translator of many other classic works of German literature, and was widely hailed as a masterpiece.
The Storm of Steel remains the definitive account of World War I, following Jünger through several major engagements as he develops from an eager young soldier into a battle-hardened officer. Subsequent revisions by…
I’m an experienced historian, biographer, and storyteller. I’ve written widely about Australian politics, social history, sport, and World War I. My biography of Australia’s most famous fighting general, Pompey Elliott, won multiple national awards, and I assembled his extraordinary letters and diaries in a separate book, Pompey Elliott at War: In His Own Words. Another biography, Will Dyson: Australia’s Radical Genius, about a remarkably versatile artist–writer who was Australia’s first official war artist, was shortlisted for the National Biography Award. My multi-biography Farewell, Dear People: Biographies of Australia’s Lost Generation won the Prime Minister’s Prize for Australian History, and I’ve written a sequel, Life So Full of Promise.
Charles Bean’s epic volumes were pioneering, illuminating, thorough, deeply researched and far superior to equivalent official histories produced by other nations involved in the conflict.
Although Bean’s books were written long ago — between 1921 and 1942 — they are still the starting point for any credible project concerning itself with what the AIF did in battle. And he edited various volumes in the Official History series compiled by other writers as well, including a book about the home front during the war.
Bean was remarkable. His Official History, and the records and research materials underpinning it, have been crucial in so much of my work—not only my lost generation multi-biographies, and also my books on Pompey Elliott and Will Dyson, but many other research projects as well.
As children, my brother and I were constant playmates. He was an early riser and often woke me up so our day of play could begin as soon as possible. I have sight, and my brother is blind. Play for us was an all-senses experience. We felt the rumble of our bikes on the street, listened to the screech of the metal swing set, and guessed spices by their smell. We also devoured stories. We listened to audiobooks, he read to me in Braille, and I read to him. All of these experiences, and more, prepared me to be an author of numerous children’s books with sensory details to make stories come alive.
Pat the Bunny is designed for the youngest children learning to read, yet I remember this book on our shelf throughout my whole childhood.
Each page is interactive as children are invited to pat the soft bunny, smell the flowers, touch Dad’s scratchy face, and more. Besides learning to read, children learn to notice sensory details in the world around them.
The timeless children's classic full of interactive fun—a perfect gift for new babies and first birthdays.
For generations, Pat the Bunny has been creating special first-time moments between parents and their children. One of the best-selling children’s books of all time, this classic touch-and-feel book offers babies a playful and engaging experience, all the while creating cherished memories that will last a lifetime.
