Books like 'The Book of Air and Shadows'
Readers who enjoyed The Book of Air and Shadows by Michael Gruber also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical mystery action / adventure 20th century thriller historical-fiction suspense crime literary-fiction early-modern
-
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King
Rated: 4.48 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsAndy Dufresne, a banker, was convicted of killing his wife and her lover and sent to Shawshank Prison. He maintains his innocence over the decades he spends at Shawshank during which time he forms a friendship with "Red", a fellow inmate.Source: stephenking...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
The Godfather by Mario Puzo
Rated: 4.37 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsThe Godfather—the epic tale of crime and betrayal that became a global phenomenon.Almost fifty years ago, a classic was born. A searing portrayal of the Mafia underworld, The Godfather introduced readers to the first family of American crime fiction, the Corleones, and their powerful legacy of tradition, blood, and honor...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction organized-crime suspense urban thriller -
The Godfather by Mario Puzo, Peter Bart
Rated: 4.37 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsThe Godfather—the epic tale of crime and betrayal that became a global phenomenon.Almost fifty years ago, a classic was born. A searing portrayal of the Mafia underworld, The Godfather introduced readers to the first family of American crime fiction, the Corleones, and their powerful legacy of tradition, blood, and honor...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction organized-crime suspense urban thriller -
The Return of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle, Angus Wilson
Rated: 4.24 of 5 stars · 35 ratings'Holmes,' I cried. 'Is it really you? Can it indeed be that you are alive? Is it possible that you succeeded in climbing out of that awful abyss?'Missing, presumed dead, for three years, Sherlock Holmes returns triumphantly to his dear companion Dr Watson. And not before time! London has never been in more need of his extraordinary services: a murderous individual with an air gun stalks the city...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
-
In Danger's Path by W.E.B. Griffin
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsDesperate to find someone to unite the warring interests of General MacArthur, Admiral Nimitz, and OSS chief Donovan, FDR puts Fleming Pickering in charge of the OSS's Pacific operations...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
Charm School by Nelson DeMille
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsRead by James NaughtonSomething very strange -- and sinister -- is going on in the Russian woods at Borodino. In a place called Mrs. Ivanova's Charm School, young KGB agents are being taught by American POW's how to be model citizens of the USA. The Soviet goal -- to infiltrate the United States undetected...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Retreat, Hell! by W.E.B. Griffin
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIt is the fall of 1950. The Marines have made a pivotal breakthrough at Inchon, but a roller coaster awaits them. While Douglas MacArthur chomps at the bit, intent on surging across the 38th parallel, Brigadier General Fleming Pickering works desperately to mediate the escalating battle between MacArthur and President Harry Truman...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
Dragonfly by Leila Meacham
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFrom the New York Times bestselling author of Roses comes a gripping new novel about five young spies embedded among the highest Nazi ranks in occupied Paris At the height of World War II, a handful of idealistic young Americans receive a mysterious letter from the government, asking them if they are willing to fight for their country...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense urban thriller -
Nothing More Dangerous by Allen Eskens, Kevin Stillwell
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe summer of 1976 is a turning point for 15-year-old Boady Sanden. He's managed to outrun and outwit the bullying seniors throughout his freshman year at St. Ignatius High; he's working multiple jobs for Wally Schenicker's construction company; and he finally makes a friend his own age--Thomas Elgin, son of the only black family on Boady's side of town...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Black Cross by Greg Iles
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsIt is January 1944 — and as Allied troops prepare for D-day, Nazi scientists develop a toxic nerve gas that will repel and wipe out any invasion force. To salvage the planned assault, two vastly different but equally determined men are sent to infiltrate the secret concentration camp where the poison gas is being perfected on human subjects...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
The Unlikely Spy by Daniel Silva
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 26 ratings"In wartime," Winston Churchill wrote, "truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies."For Britain's counterintelligence operations, this meant finding the unlikeliest agent imaginable-a history professor named Alfred Vicary, handpicked by Churchill himself to expose a highly dangerous, but unknown, traitor... -
Snow Wolf by Glenn Meade
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIn the heart of the Cold War, they sent him to plot the ultimate assassination. Now they want him dead...It is 1953. Joseph Stalin, the world's most tyrannical dictator, is teetering on the edge of insanity, and about to plunge the world into nuclear chaos. Only one man and one woman can penetrate the Iron Curtain and stop this madman, before it's too late.But someone inside the Kremlin knows...Categorized as:
historical-fiction crime thriller suspense political-intrigue fiction espionage mystery -
Cometh the Hour by Jeffrey Archer
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 28 ratings"Cometh the Hour" opens with the reading of a suicide note, which has devastating consequences for Harry and Emma Clifton, Giles Barrington and Lady Virginia.Giles must decide if he should withdraw from politics and try to rescue Karin, the woman he loves, from behind the Iron Curtain...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 58 ratings"Allah!"With that shrill cry, three Muslim terrorists blow up a key Soviet oil complex, creating a critical oil shortage that threatens the stability of the USSR...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century -
-
The Company by Robert Littell
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe Barnes & Noble ReviewSince the publication of his 1973 debut thriller, The Defection of A. J. Lewinter, Robert Littell has evolved into one of the most credible, consistently interesting espionage novelists of the modern era... -
Word of Honor by Nelson DeMille, Brian Murray
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsHe is a good man, a brilliant corporate executive, an honest, handsome family man admired by men and desired by women. But a lifetime ago Ben Tyson was a lieutenant in Vietnam. There the men under his command committed a murderous atrocity--and together swore never to tell the world what they had done. Now the press, army justice, and the events he tried to forget have caught up with Ben Tyson...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
The Great Swindle by Pierre Lemaitre
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsOctober 1918: the war on the Western Front is all but over. Desperate for one last chance of promotion, the ambitious Lieutenant Henri d'Aulnay Pradelle sends two scouts over the top, and secretly shoots them in the back to incite his men to heroic action once more...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century 21st-century action-adventure adult -
Shibumi by Trevanian, Gisela Stege
Rated: 4.23 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsNicholai Hel is the world’s most wanted man. Born in Shanghai during the chaos of World War I, he is the son of an aristocratic Russian mother and a mysterious German father and is the protégé of a Japanese Go master. Hel survived the destruction of Hiroshima to emerge as the world’s most artful lover and its most accomplished—and well-paid—assassin... -
Mightier Than the Sword by Jeffrey Archer
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsA bomb goes off, but how many passengers on the MV Buckingham have lost their lives? You will find out only if you read the opening chapter of Mightier than the Sword...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
The Odessa File by Frederick Forsyth
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsThe suicide of an elderly German Jew explodes into revelation after revelation: a Mafia-like organization called Odessa, a real-life fugitive known at the "Butcher of Riga", a young German journalist turned obsessed avenger...and ultimately, of a brilliant, ruthless plot to reestablish the worldwide power of SS mass murders and to carry out Hitler's chilling "Final Solution...Categorized as:
conspiracies crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century -
Master of the Game by Sidney Sheldon
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsOne of Sidney Sheldon's most popular and bestselling titles, repackaged and reissued for a new generation of fans. Kate Blackwell is one of the richest and most powerful women in the world. She is an enigma, a woman surrounded by a thousand unanswered questions. Her father was a diamond prospector who struck it rich beyond his wildest dreams...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Blood and Honor by W.E.B. Griffin
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIf you enjoyed W. E. B. Griffin's Honor Bound, you should segue with pleasure into this involving sequel. Set in Buenos Aires in 1943, it follows the adventures of three American soldiers as they think and fight their way through a complex story about Nazi sympathizers, dedicated supporters of the Allied cause, and other people just trying to stay alive...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
A Quiet Flame by Philip Kerr
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsPhilip Kerr returns with his best-loved character, Bernie Gunther, in the fifth novel in what is now a series: a tight, twisting, compelling thriller that is firmly rooted in history.A Quiet Flame opens in 1950... -
Field Gray by Philip Kerr
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsPhilip Kerr delivers a novel with the noir sensibility of Raymond Chandler, the realpolitik of vintage John le Carré, and the dark moral vision of Graham Greene... -
-
Riiginõunik by Boris Akunin
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsSince the publication of The Winter Queen, a New York Times Notable Book and the first mystery featuring Erast Fandorin, Boris Akunin’s historical mystery series has become a worldwide sensation, selling millions of copies and propelling Akunin into the ranks of Russia’s most widely read contemporary novelists...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction literary-fiction thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook -
The Black Swan of Paris by Karen Robards
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsA captivating story of estranged sisters reunited by a devastating war and the race to save their mother’s lifeParis, 1944Celebrated singer Genevieve Dumont is both a star and a smoke screen. An unwilling darling to the Nazis, the chanteuse’s position of privilege also has its advantages—such as going undetected as an ally to undercover British officer Captain Max Ryan as part of the resistance...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense urban 20th-century -
The Kaiser's Web by Steve Berry
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsTwo candidates are vying to become Chancellor of Germany. One is a patriot having served for the past sixteen years, the other a usurper, stoking the flames of nationalistic hate. Both harbor secrets, but only one knows the truth about the other... -
The Guns of Navarone by Alistair MacLean
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsAn entire navy had tried to silence the guns of Navarone and failed. Full-scale attacks had been driven back. Now they were sending in just five men, each one a specialist in dealing death...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century -
Only Time Will Tell by Jeffrey Archer
Rated: 4.09 of 5 stars · 39 ratingsFrom the internationally bestselling author of Kane and Abel and A Prisoner of Birth comes Only Time Will Tell, the first in an ambitious new series that tells the story of one family across generations, across oceans, from heartbreak to triumph. The epic tale of Harry Clifton’s life begins in 1920, with the words “I was told that my father was killed in the war...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Qb VII by Leon Uris
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsIn Queen’s Bench Courtroom Number Seven, famous author Abraham Cady stands trial. In his book The Holocaust—born of the terrible revelation that the Jadwiga Concentration Camp was the site of his family’s extermination—Cady shook the consciousness of the human race. He also named eminent surgeon Sir Adam Kelno as one of Jadwiga’s most sadistic inmate/doctors...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century -
The Last Days of Night by Graham Moore
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsNew York, 1888. Gas lamps still flicker in the city streets, but the miracle of electric light is in its infancy. The person who controls the means to turn night into day will make history--and a vast fortune. A young untested lawyer named Paul Cravath, fresh out of Columbia Law School, takes a case that seems impossible to win...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense urban thriller 20th-century 21st-century -
Be Careful What You Wish For by Jeffrey Archer, Otakar Brousek ml.
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsBestselling author Jeffrey Archer's Be Careful What You Wish For opens with Harry Clifton and his wife Emma rushing to hospital to learn the fate of their son Sebastian, who has been involved in a fatal car accident. But who died, Sebastian or his best friend Bruno? When Ross Buchanan is forced to resign as chairman of the Barrington Shipping Company, Emma Clifton wants to replace him...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense urban thriller 20th-century -
Spoils of Victory: A Mason Collins Novel by John A. Connell
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsFrom the author of Ruins of War comes an electrifying novel featuring U.S. Army criminal investigator Mason Collins, set in the chaos of post-World War II Germany. When the Third Reich collapsed, the small town Garmisch-Partenkirchen became the home of fleeing war criminals, making it the final depository for the Nazis’ stolen riches. There are fortunes to be made on the black market... -
Black Order by James Rollins
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsLibrarian's note: This is an Alternate Cover Edition for ISBN10: 0752876457 ISBN13: 9780752876450.A sinister fire in a Copenhagen bookstore ignites a relentless hunt across four continents. Arson and murder reveal an insidious plot to steal a Bible that once belonged to Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary theory...Categorized as:
conspiracies crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century -
-
Where Eagles Dare by Alistair MacLean
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 45 ratingsForbidding peaks, resourceful commandos, beautiful spies, nonstop action, and neck-snapping plot twists make this the classic adventure thriller—the kind of page-turner that readers actually will find impossible to put down...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Todo lo peor by César Pérez Gellida
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsSigue la Guerra fría, sigue en pie el muro que divide Alemania en dos partes. Todo lo peor sucederá en estas circunstancias.Un asesino comienza a matar. Sus víctimas son homosexuales y sus crímenes parecen tener un componente religioso... -
The Sins of the Father by Jeffrey Archer
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsOn the heels of the international bestseller Only Time Will Tell, Jeffrey Archer picks up the sweeping story of the Clifton Chronicles.Only days before Britain declares war on Germany, Harry Clifton, hoping to escape the consequences of long-buried family secrets, and forced to accept that his desire to marry Emma Barrington will never be fulfilled, has joined the Merchant Navy...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel, Charles W. Bailey II
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratings"Gentleman Jim" Scott was a brilliant magnetic general. Like a lot of people, he believed the President was ruining the country. Unlike anyone else, he had the power to do something about it, something unprecedented and terrifying. Colonel "Jiggs" Casey was the Marine who accidentally stumbled onto the plot...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
The Assassination Option by W.E.B. Griffin, William E. Butterworth IV
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsJames Cronley’s first successful mission for the new Central Intelligence Directorate has drawn all kinds of attention, some welcome, some not, including from the Soviets, his own Pentagon, and a seething J. Edgar Hoover...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
A Dangerous Fortune by Ken Follett
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 44 ratingsAn alternate cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.By the 1860s, the Pilasters are one of the world's greatest banking families, with connections that reach from the City of London to far-afield colonies...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense urban thriller -
Stettin Station by David Downing
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn the fall of 1941, Anglo-American journalist John Russell is still living in Berlin, tied to the increasingly alien city by his love for two Berliners: his fourteen-year-old son, Paul, and his longtime girlfriend, Effi. Forced to work for both German and American Intelligence, he's searching for a way out of Germany... -
Potsdam Station by David Downing
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsApril, 1945. The Third Reich is on the verge of extinction, and its enemies are already plotting against each other. For John Russell, this has personal importance: his son and girlfriend are trapped in Berlin and only the Soviets can get him in there. But the price of their help will threaten both his and the world's postwar future...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense urban thriller 20th-century -
Dark Star by Alan Furst
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe acclaimed author of Night Soldiers offers a dramatic and exciting spy thriller of Eastern Europe on the brink of World War II. In the back alleys and glittering salons of Europe, there is a thin line between survival and betrayal, as Soviet NKVD agents and the Nazi Gestapo confront each other in a brilliant duel of espionage. Like watching Casablanca for the first time.--Time... -
Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 35 ratingsA triple murder in a Moscow amusement center: three corpses found frozen in the snow, faces and fingers missing. Chief homicide investigator Arkady Renko is brilliant, sensitive, honest, and cynical about everything except his profession. To identify the victims and uncover the truth, he must battle the KGB, FBI, and New York police as he performs the impossible--and tries to stay alive doing it...Categorized as:
conspiracies crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction political-intrigue suspense thriller -
-
Queen of Clubs by Beezy Marsh
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsLondon, 1957: After rising up against gangland’s queen, Alice Diamond, formerly downtrodden Nell is living the perfect life of crime. Far from the East End slums where she was raised, she’s now an accomplished professional thief by day—lifting luxury goods from high-end department stores—and a glamorous nightclub owner after dark... -
Daddy by Loup Durand
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWho has the key to a $350 million fortune the Nazis have sent their most brilliant operative to find? Thomas, an 11-year old boy with the mind of a genius, the cunning of a fox, and the chance of a snowball in Hell to escape...unless he is helped by one man. An American who doesn't even know he exists. A man he calls Daddy...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction political-intrigue suspense 20th-century action-adventure adult -
The Spy by Andrew Gross
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFebruary, 1943. Both the Allies and the Nazis are closing in on attempts to construct the decisive weapon of the war. Kurt Nordstrum, an engineer in Oslo, puts his life aside to take up arms against the Germans as part of the Norwegian resistance... -
If The Dead Rise Not by Philip Kerr
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAn instant classic in the Bernie Gunther series, with storytelling that is fresher and more vivid than ever. Berlin, 1934: The Nazis have secured the 1936 Olympiad for the city but are facing foreign resistance. Hitler and Avery Brundage, the head of the U.S. Olympic Committee, have connived to soft-pedal Nazi anti- Semitism and convince America to participate... -
Wayfaring Stranger by James Lee Burke
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA sprawling thriller drenched with atmosphere and intrigue that takes a young boy from a chance encounter with Bonnie and Clyde to the trenches of World War II and the oil fields along the Texas-Louisiana coast...Categorized as:
crime drama historical-fiction literary-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century 21st-century -
A Falcon Flies by Wilbur Smith
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA Falcon Flies by Wilbur SmithIn 1860, a man and woman approach the coast of Africa aboard a swift clipper--in the command of an American who knows no law. Robyn Ballantyne and her brother Morris have waited years for this moment: to return to Africa, to search for their missionary father who had disappeared somewhere in the wilderness...Categorized as:
drama historical-fiction suspense thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook
Or - use our amazing romance book finder to get recommendations based on your favorite content tropes and themes. Mix and match at will.