The most recommended books about brothers

In this historical fiction verse novel set in 1987, we meet Calvin Johnston and his brothers. The brothers all have hemophilia and have contracted HIV through blood transfusions.

Calvin and his family live in Ashland, the “Friendliest Little Town,” but many of the people in Ashland react out of fear rather than friendship when they learn of the Johnston brothers’ diagnosis. I grew up in a small, sheltered town like Ashland, and I have to wonder how our village (and young me) would’ve reacted to a similar situation.

One of the things I love most about books is that they give me a chance to try on someone else’s life for a bit. Blood Brothers turned me inside out, broke my heart, and allowed me a chance to reflect and grow.

Rob Sanders’ lyrical writing, coupled with supporting information at the back of the book, makes this an amazing option… show more.

The Sweetness of Water is historical fiction that captures the reality of the human issues – the opportunities, the hopes and fears, the dreams and taboos – of life in the American South in the years just after the Civil War.

The characters are complex, the history solid, the writing gorgeous. It is rare that one encounters historical fiction that is truly fictional and yet also “fictionally true” – that is, accurate to small historical details even though the story is made-up. But this book is that, and I’m glad to have it part of me not only as a historian of the nineteenth century, but also for what it brought me and taught me.

I must admit that I didn’t know who Nicholas Sparks was prior to reading this book. Had he stuck to romance novels, I would’ve never discovered his amazing life story. Three Weeks with My Brother is so unique that it’s almost unfitting to call it a travel memoir. Instead, it’s a heartfelt international journey down memory lane as Nicholas and his brother Micah take the reader through the ups and downs of their lives. Readers not only get to experience an adventure around the world, but they also encounter a story filled with love, tragedy, success, and everything that makes a person who they are. In this case, that person is Nicholas Spark, a best-selling author, and screenwriter. 

Dave Egger’s memoir is about his early years as the adult caretaker of his younger brother after the death of both their parents. This is an energetic and writerly work.

His writing screams “Look at me” with its sharp and distinctive style. He writes that he wants to be heard, that he wants to be understood, and his writing demands this of you. 

There are stories of him starting a magazine and him trying to get into MTV’s The Real World. My memory of the book is a scene of him and his brother playing frisbee. It is told in a dramatic and elevated manner, their throws monumentally heroic, the disc cutting the air between them, their catches amazingly acrobatic.

You sense this is how a young hero should see himself in his own story. Surely this is worth seeing, he asks, and I thought: absolutely!

I love smart characters, and I think too often we don’t get them, or their brains are almost seen as an undesirable trait. That was far from the case here.

Anna was allowed to be smart and capable throughout, and Marco was appreciative of all her quirks. I love how much chemistry (pun intended... sorry!) the author was able to pull out in this closed-door romance. It was sweet and fun and the perfect read for a self-care evening.

Two African American brothers spend their summer in rural Virginia while their parents navigate a rough patch in their marriage. Genie, 11, and Ernie, 13, get to know their blind grandfather who has a special room filled with plants and songbirds. I identified with Genie, a worrier who likes to pose questions in his notebook. As the two brothers respond differently to their grandfather’s announcement that a brave man learns to shoot a gun at 14, Reynolds is also asking readers to consider what it means to be brave and how we should define family. I loved the themes and vivid setting of the book. As someone who visited a grandparent in a small, rural town each summer, I identified with the boys’ sense that they have travelled not just a state but a whole world away from home.

Dewitt’s book is a rethinking of the classic Western. It is ugly, violent, romantic, and hilarious almost at the same time. I loved the interplay between Charlie and Eli Sisters, hired killers heading off on what may be “one last job.” 

I love books where you start on the surface of characters, but their true selves are revealed through dialogue and their actions. Like a good writer should, Dewitt flips things on their head—who are the good guys? Who are the bad guys? 

I strive for this in writing novels—flipping genre cliches on their heads and letting characters—flaws and all—come to life in a story that is both realistic and humorous. 

For decades, Holocaust denial was widespread in Arab countries. That’s beginning to change, and Sansal’s harrowing novel – inspired in part by a Nazi officer who escaped to Algeria and became a hero in the war for independence – aids in writing that history back into consciousness. We gain extraordinary intimacy with two brothers as they contend in different ways with the challenges of North African immigrant life in France, the massacre by the Algerian military that claims the lives of their parents, and the discovery of their father’s horrific past. Sansal was attacked for comparing Islamist fundamentalism to the Holocaust and for visiting Israel, but I think it’s clear his intent is to condemn any ideology based on an unyielding and violent intolerance of difference.   

I got this book in a subscription book box and was immediately intrigued by the premise. The town of Bone Gap is full of “gaps,” openings to other realities that someone can slip into and disappear. This story is not your usual read. The writer creatively mixes mystery, magic, love, loss, regret, forgiveness, and overcoming. 

The story follows Finn, a teenage boy, who tries to discover why his brother’s girlfriend disappeared, and the girlfriend, who is made a prisoner because she’s beautiful. 

The book made me think about a lot of things: that there is a difference between looking at and seeing someone else; that past trauma may not show on your face, but it’s part of you; that things seem more beautiful when you leave them behind; and that everyone has their reasons to see things differently. This book is character-focused, weird, entertaining, and very cathartic. 

I read the novel when I saw that Jane Campion had chosen to adapt the book for her latest film. I have nerves of cast iron. But I found this book truly terrifying. The subject is human evil – the sadistic, twisted cruelty of which men are capable, both to animals, and other human beings. The descriptive writing is extraordinary: the ranch, the mountains, and the wild lands of Montana appear before your eyes. The family is almost destroyed by the predatory, violent brother Phil. He is like a Shakespearean villain: magnetic, charismatic, spellbinding, brilliant, and vicious.

Campion softens the edges of the story at every step in her wonderful film. And I can understand why. Had she filmed the book the movie would be banned. Read the book.