The most recommended books about Siberia

Who picked these books? Meet our 50 experts.

50 authors created a book list connected to Siberia, and here are their favorite Siberia books.
Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission.

What type of Siberia book?

Loading...
Loading...

Book cover of Open Mic Night in Moscow: And Other Stories from My Search for Black Markets, Soviet Architecture, and Emotionally Unavailable Russian Men

Kristen Van Nest Author Of Where to Nest: A Global Search for Love, Cheap Wine and a Place to Belong

From my list on travel books that’ll make you laugh until your side hurts.

Why am I passionate about this?

With my debut comedic travel memoir having come out in April, I read every humorous travel book I could get my hands on both as part of my education for inspiration on how to write my book and before I even knew I was going to write a book because I simply love reading these types of stories. From my own experience, travel has made me grow so much as a person, and all of these authors beautifully capture their own journeys and how travel helped them find their way.

Kristen's book list on travel books that’ll make you laugh until your side hurts

Kristen Van Nest Why did Kristen love this book?

Coming from a standup comedy background, Murray captures her quest across Central Asia, inspired by her love of Russian men.

Through some scary moments, nearly getting kidnapped to more hilarious ones performing standup in front of a crowd that speaks a different language than her own, she is fun to travel with and always has a hilarious anecdote to share.

By Audrey Murray,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Open Mic Night in Moscow as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The raucous and surprisingly poignant story of a young, Russia-obsessed American writer and comedian who embarked on a solo tour of the former Soviet Republics, never imagining that it would involve kidnappers, garbage bags of money, and encounters with the weird and wonderful from Mongolia to Tajikistan.

Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Siberia are not the typical tourist destinations of a twenty-something, nor the places one usually goes to eat, pray, and/or love. But the mix of imperial Russian opulence and Soviet decay, and the allure of emotionally unavailable Russian men proved strangely irresistible to comedian Audrey Murray.

At age twenty-eight, while…


Book cover of The Consolations of the Forest: Alone in a Cabin on the Siberian Taiga

Bill Murray Author Of Out in the Cold: Travels North: Adventures in Svalbard, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland and Canada

From my list on to understand the high north.

Why am I passionate about this?

There’s nothing like personal experience. You have to read the literature, it’s true. That’s how we’ve all met here at Shepherd. But you have to roll up your sleeves and get down to visiting, too, if you want to write about travel. I first approached the Arctic in 1991 and I return above sixty degrees north every year, although I must confess to a secret advantage; I married a Finn. We spend summers at a little cabin north of Helsinki. I know the region personally, I keep coming back, and I invite you, whenever you can, to come up and join us!

Bill's book list on to understand the high north

Bill Murray Why did Bill love this book?

This is through and through simply a gorgeous little book.

I enjoyed rereading it for this article. The largest body of fresh water on earth is Lake Baikal, not far east of Irkutsk in Siberia.

(If you’ve never heard of Baikal, that’s a measure of the variety of wonders to be found in the high north. Baikal holds so much water because it’s so deep: the world’s deepest at more than 5300 feet). If you ever have the opportunity you must visit.

My wife and I have traveled together a good bit, and I don’t feel we’re cloistered in any way, but to turn up in the ramshackle town of Listvyanka, Russia, at the beginning of this century, and then to charter a small boat to cross Baikal made me feel, I don’t know, maybe like Dorothy in the Emerald City.

I was just a total alien in a place…

By Sylvain Tesson, Linda Coverdale (translator),

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Consolations of the Forest as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Sylvain Tesson, found a radical solution to his need for freedom, one as ancient as the experiences of the hermits of old Russia: he decided to lock himself alone in a cabin in the middle taiga, on the shores of Baikal, for six months. Noting carefully his impressions of the silence, Sylvain Tesson shares with us an extraordinary experience.


Book cover of Nights at the Circus

Katy Darby Author Of The Unpierced Heart

From my list on historical fiction with wanton & wilful women.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a historical fiction author (one novel published by Penguin, plus several Sherlock Holmes stories with Belanger Books) – and I read it avidly too, although many of the Victorian novels I love were considered frighteningly modern in their day. I’m fascinated by the 19th century as both reader and writer because of the incredible changes (social and technological) it saw, and the resulting dramas and tensions that emerged. Literacy and literary culture exploded during Victoria’s reign, but it was also a time of astonishing contrast: poverty versus huge wealth, outward virtue versus secret vice, prejudice and injustice (especially regarding women’s rights) versus struggles for social progress… sound familiar?

Katy's book list on historical fiction with wanton & wilful women

Katy Darby Why did Katy love this book?

Angela Carter is famous for her sumptuous language, structural playfulness, genre-bending, and seductive, logic-defying plots – and if you like gorgeous lyricism, unforgettable characters, and magical realism (emphasis on the magical), you’ll fall in love with Nights at the Circus. In 1899, journalist Jack Walser meets six-foot-two circus aerialist Fevvers, “the Cockney Venus”. Raised in a brothel and a graduate of freak shows, she’s now a star of the Victorian stage – but are her wings real, as she claims? Walser becomes part of the circus in body and spirit, as, disguised as a clown, he follows Fevvers to St Petersburg and into the wilds of Siberia, where Fevvers must draw on all her cunning and strength to survive – let alone save Walser, too. 

By Angela Carter,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Nights at the Circus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction

From the master of the literary supernatural and author of The Bloody Chamber, her acclaimed novel about the exploits of a circus performer who is part-woman, part-swan

Sophi Fevvers-the toast of Europe's capitals, courted by the Prince of Wales, painted by Toulouse-Lautrec-is an aerialiste extraordinaire, star of Colonel Kearney's circus. She is also part woman, part swan. Jack Walser, an American journalist, is on a quest to discover Fevvers's true identity: Is she part swan or all fake? Dazzled by his love for Fevvers, and desperate for the scoop of…


Book cover of Between Shades of Gray

Lyn Miller-Lachmann Author Of Torch

From my list on for tweens and teens on Russian/Soviet aggression.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m the author of multiple middle grade and YA historical novels, including Torch, which won the 2023 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Young Adult Literature. Torch takes place in the aftermath of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, and it is especially timely in the face of the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Bear (a popular symbol of the Russian Empire) has mauled many of its neighbors in the past century, not only Czechoslovakia and Ukraine but also the Baltic countries that, like Ukraine, were incorporated into the Soviet Union and the other Eastern European countries that were part of the Soviet bloc until the fall of Communism in 1989. 

Lyn's book list on for tweens and teens on Russian/Soviet aggression

Lyn Miller-Lachmann Why did Lyn love this book?

This bestselling novel depicts the little-known Soviet invasion of Lithuania in 1940 and the deportation of more than 100,000 ethnic Lithuanians to Siberia through the eyes of 15-year-old Lina and her family.

The Lithuanian-American author was inspired by her relatives’ experiences. Like Ukraine, Lithuania regained its independence after the end of Communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union, but Russia continues to threaten the small nation.

By Ruta Sepetys,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Between Shades of Gray as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 12, 13, 14, and 15.

What is this book about?

The haunting and powerful Second World War novel by Ruta Sepetys that inspired the feature film, ASHES IN THE SNOW, OUT NOW.

One night fifteen-year-old Lina, her mother and young brother are hauled from their home by Soviet guards, thrown into cattle cars and sent away. They are being deported to Siberia.

An unimaginable and harrowing journey has begun. Lina doesn't know if she'll ever see her father or her friends again. But she refuses to give up hope.

Lina hopes for her family.
For her country.
For her future.
For love - first love, with the boy she barely…


Book cover of Asian Odyssey

Nadine Willems Author Of Ishikawa Sanshiro's Geographical Imagination: Transnational Anarchism and the Reconfiguration of Everyday Life in Early Twentieth-Century Japan

From Nadine's 3 favorite reads in 2023.

Why am I passionate about this?

Author Historian Japanologist Walker Multitasker Down-to-earth dreamer

Nadine's 3 favorite reads in 2023

Nadine Willems Why did Nadine love this book?

Little is known about Dmitri Alioshin, the author of this breathtaking tale of survival in the vastness of Siberia and Mongolia during the 1917-1922 Russian Civil War.

Presented alternately as an autobiography and a novel inspired by real-life events, Asian Odyssey dragged me along into the recesses of the war, its cruelty and misery, and the sweeping tides of history it evokes. But the vivid depiction of the landscape and the people nurtured by the region’s plains and mountains also lifted my spirits to soothing heights.

Whoever Alioshin might be, and whether he did indeed fight on the side of both the White and Red Russians, he left a haunting story.

By Alioshin Dmitri,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The author, formerly an officer in the imperial Russian army, recounts the experiences of his hazardous flight through Mongolia to his father's home in Harbin after the fall of the Kerensky government.


Book cover of The Lost Pianos of Siberia

Kristyn Harman Author Of Cleansing the Colony: Transporting Convicts from New Zealand to Van Diemen's Land

From Kristyn's 3 favorite reads in 2023.

Why am I passionate about this?

Author History professor Kiwi living in Australia

Kristyn's 3 favorite reads in 2023

Kristyn Harman Why did Kristyn love this book?

A magical combination of travel, quest, encounters, landscape, and music woven together meant that I could hardly put this book down!

I journeyed with Sophy Roberts as she traversed Siberia in its breathtaking present while also recalling its complex and often difficult past. The harshness of exile tied up with its convict history was alleviated a little by the beauty and hope imbued in music.

Roberts provides plentiful insights into the history of pianos in Russia and, therefore, Siberia, while also meeting numerous fascinating people along the way as she determinedly pursues her quest. 

By Sophy Roberts,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

From acclaimed journalist Sophy Roberts, a journey through one of the harshest landscapes on earth―where music reveals the deep humanity and the rich history of Siberia


Siberia’s story is traditionally one of exiles, penal colonies and unmarked graves. Yet there is another tale to tell.

Dotted throughout this remote land are pianos―grand instruments created during the boom years of the nineteenth century, as well as humble, Soviet-made uprights that found their way into equally modest homes. They tell the story of how, ever since entering Russian culture under the westernizing influence of Catherine the Great, piano music has run through…


Book cover of Resurrection

Charlie Hertzog Young Author Of Spinning Out: Climate Change, Mental Health and Fighting for a Better Future

From my list on helping us make utopian dreams come true.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve spent my life obsessed with utopias, knowing from a young age that the human world is unnecessarily cruel. Utopias aren’t a delusion, nor a destination; they’re navigation tools. As an activist-researcher on climate, new economics, and mental health, I experiment with practical routes to radically better worlds. It’s a prefigurative stroke of luck that the pleasure and connection we long for are vital for creating radical change. I nearly died in 2019, after a suicide attempt tied to the dire state of the world. Rebuilding myself, including learning to walk after losing both of my legs, forced an epistemological and ontological reckoning. Now, I’m more realistically hopeful than ever.

Charlie's book list on helping us make utopian dreams come true

Charlie Hertzog Young Why did Charlie love this book?

I was recommended this book as a teenager by someone I deeply respect and admire. I’ve come back to it a lot, most recently from a hospital bed with an epidural in my spine. I think the book lifted more pain then than the drip.

Resurrection was the last novel Tolstoy wrote and it led to his excommunication from the Russian Orthodox Church. It’s a complex quasi-love story about a beautifully flawed protagonist’s struggle to give away all the land he owns out of a tangle of duty, guilt, and a wide-eyed love for his fellow human.

In 19thC Russia, that’s extremely complicated: economically, socially, ethically, spiritually. It’s about why anyone can claim to ‘own’ anything, what fairness looks like to different people, and whether it’s possible to enjoy life while rampantly battling to perfect yourself (short answer: no).

The novel plays out on vast tracts of peasant-farmed land, dank,…

By Leo Tolstoy, Louise Maude (translator), Keith Carabine (editor)

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

This powerful novel, Tolstoy's third major masterpiece, after War and Peace and Anna Karenina, begins with a courtroom drama (the finest in Russian literature) all the more stunning for being based on a real-life event. Dmitri Nekhlyudov, called to jury service, is astonished to see in the dock, charged with murder, a young woman whom he once seduced, propelling her into prostitution. She is found guilty on a technicality, and he determines to overturn the verdict. This pitches him into a hellish labyrinth of Russian courts, prisons and bureaucracy, in which the author loses no opportunity for satire and bitter…


Book cover of Red Winter

Sherry V. Ostroff Author Of Caledonia

From my list on historical novels to get lost in.

Why am I passionate about this?

My first love in reading and writing is historical fiction. But I’m pretty particular about how the stories are created. To me, historical novels should be as accurate as possible; the facts, rather than the fiction, should guide the story. With my writing, I follow the wise words of the author, Anya Seton: It has…been my anxious endeavor to use nothing but historical fact when these facts are known…. Since I have based my story on history, I have tried never to distort time, or place, or character to suit my convenience. I’m particularly pleased when readers tell me that my research is exemplary and they have learned something new. 

Sherry's book list on historical novels to get lost in

Sherry V. Ostroff Why did Sherry love this book?

I love books that include unusual locations and little-known events. Red Winter takes place in the 1920s in Siberia when the pogroms came and disrupted the peaceful existence of a small town in the frozen north. Like my book, which is about the creation of a Scottish colony in Central America, Red Winter offers the reader an opportunity to learn about a largely unknown history.  

By Kyra Kaptzan Robinov,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

When murderous Bolsheviks infiltrate the Siberian city of Nikolaevsk-on-Amur in 1920, Luba’s comfortable, upper class life is upended overnight. As her husband is imprisoned and their house overrun with unruly partisan soldiers, Luba finds herself on the run with four small children, her mother-in-law, and epileptic sister-in-law. Pigsties, abandoned warehouses, opium dens are just a few of the places the group seeks refuge as they try to elude capture and stay alive.

The little-known history of this exotic time and place is seen through the eyes of a reluctant heroine grappling with adversity and loss during the dangerous political chaos…


Book cover of The Cowboy and the Cossack

Gary Jonas Author Of Modern Sorcery

From my list on non-fantasy novels for fantasy readers.

Why am I passionate about this?

My mother instilled a love of reading in me, and from an early age, I read everything from Agatha Christie to Edgar Rice Burroughs to Louis L’Amour to Marvel Comics. Stories are stories no matter how they’re classified, and genre is primarily a marketing tool to help readers find things they like. When I started writing, I often blended genres because I liked so many things. As I type this, I have 29 novels published with #30 on the way. The novels include science fiction, fantasy, horror, and thriller under my name, westerns as Dan Winchester, and a cozy mystery as Angie Cabot. Go figure.

Gary's book list on non-fantasy novels for fantasy readers

Gary Jonas Why did Gary love this book?

This is one of my all-time favorite novels. A group of Montana cowboys must drive a herd of cattle across Russia in the early 1880s or a village will starve. You’re thinking, dude, this is Lonesome Dove set in Russia. Fair point, but this book came out a decade before the McMurtry novel. And in my humble opinion, it’s a better book. Yes, that’s a bold statement. The scenes are so beautifully written and executed, that you feel like you’re there. Fantasy readers will appreciate the clash of cultures as well as the coming-of-age story that gives the book its heart. I envy those of you who get to meet Levi, Shad, Rostov, and the rest for the first time. This is a book to be treasured and re-read.

By Clair Huffaker,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Fifteen Montana cowboys sail into Vladivostok with a herd of five hundred longhorns, ready to cross a thousand miles of Siberian wilderness. When a band of Cossacks, Russia's elite horsemen and warriors, shows up to escort these rough and ready Americans to their destination, the clash of cultures begins. The feud between American six shooter and Russian saber is embodied in two men: Shad, the leader of the Montana cowboys, and Rostov, the Cossack commander. Nature and man are enemies that will force them to work together-and a ruthless Tartar army that stands between them and their destination. The code…


Book cover of The Noise of Time

Caitlin Horrocks Author Of The Vexations

From my list on featuring classical music.

Why am I passionate about this?

I learned to read music at about the same time I learned to read words. I grew up taking piano lessons, studying almost entirely classical pieces that came weighted with history: everything I ever played had been played better by someone else. I still enjoyed my attempts, but realized that the relationship I had with those notes was not the one I wanted to have with words, which I felt drawn to assemble into my own arrangements, my own stories. So, as a weirdo who’s been thinking about interpretation and creation since childhood, I love books that delve into the challenges and emotional complexities of making music.

Caitlin's book list on featuring classical music

Caitlin Horrocks Why did Caitlin love this book?

In 1936, Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich is spending every night in a hallway by the elevator, ready for the secret police he’s sure are coming for him. By the end of the novel, he’s publicly celebrated, but the requirements of government approval weigh as heavily on him as government threats. What, both Barnes and Shostakovich himself ask, might his music have been like under different circumstances? “The last questions of a man’s life do not come with any answers; that is their nature. They merely wail in the head, factory sirens in F sharp.” Barnes’s slim, swift novel offers no easy answers as it examines how moral compromise corrodes a life and deforms that life’s work.

By Julian Barnes,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

** The Sunday Times Number One bestseller **

A Daily Telegraph / Financial Times / Guardian / Sunday Times / The Times / New Statesman / Observer Book of the Year

'BARNES'S MASTERPIECE.' - OBSERVER

In May 1937 a man in his early thirties waits by the lift of a Leningrad apartment block. He waits all through the night, expecting to be taken away to the Big House. Any celebrity he has known in the previous decade is no use to him now. And few who are taken to the Big House ever return.

So begins Julian Barnes's first novel…