Books like 'Smonk: A Novel'
Readers who enjoyed Smonk: A Novel by Tom Franklin also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical mystery psychological western gothic southern-gothic historical-fiction crime literary-fiction noir
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The Complete Stories and Poems by Edgar Allan Poe
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 44 ratingsThis single volume brings together all of Poe's stories and poems, and illuminates the diverse and multifaceted genius of one of the greatest and most influential figures in American literary history...Categorized as:
crime dark gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction anthologies audiobook -
![The Edgar Allan Poe Audio Collection by Edgar Allan Poe]()
The Edgar Allan Poe Audio Collection by Edgar Allan Poe
Rated: 4.46 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsUniversally acclaimed as the maestro of horror and the morbid, Edgar Allan Poe's dark gift has for more than a century and a half set the standard for the genre.Now, Caedmon Audio presents a classic collection of Poe's most terrifying tales performed by two of the most brilliant interpreters of his work ever to be recorded: Vincent Price and Basil Rathbone...Categorized as:
crime dark gothic historical-fiction humor industrial-era literary-fiction action-adventure -
![Mississippi Blood by Greg Iles]()
Mississippi Blood by Greg Iles
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsLibrarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found hereThe endgame is at hand for Penn Cage, his family, and the enemies bent on destroying them in this revelatory volume in the epic trilogy set in modern-day Natchez, Mississippi—Greg Iles’s epic tale of love and honor, hatred and revenge that explores how the sins of the past continue to haunt the present...Categorized as:
crime family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction southern-gothic action-adventure adult -
![It Happened in Silence by Karla M. Jay]()
It Happened in Silence by Karla M. Jay
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsHonorable Mention in the 2022 Eric Hoffer Book Award Historical Fiction Category2021 Benjamin Franklin Silver Award 2021 Finalist Wishing Shelf Book AwardRiveting Southern Fiction by the award-winning author of When We Were Brave. ~Set in a world where women of the KKK betray their neighbors, horrors of unscrupulous foundling homes come to light, and buried mysteries are not all that hidden... -
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![Never Kiss Goodbye by Laura Haley-McNeil]()
Never Kiss Goodbye by Laura Haley-McNeil
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA cowboy haunted by his past. A woman stalked by a deadly secret.Pregnant and on the run, Lily Harkin will do anything to protect her unborn child, but no one can know her secret – a secret so horrific it could destroy her and anyone she meets.Bronc rider Josh Merrick can’t forget the mistake that cost a woman her life...Categorized as:
western literary-fiction industrial-era romance mystery fiction historical action-adventure -
![A Season for Scandal by Laura Wood]()
A Season for Scandal by Laura Wood
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsAn all-female detective agency righting wrongs at the end of the nineteenth century; infiltrating a scandalous upper class world straight out of Bridgerton and using their wit and bravery to unmask a villain... -
![The Key by Kathryn Hughes]()
The Key by Kathryn Hughes
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFrom the #1 bestselling author of The Letter Kathryn Hughes comes The Key, an unforgettable story of a heartbreaking secret that will stay with you for ever. 'Riveting' Lesley Pearse on The Letter. 'Gripping' Good Housekeeping on The Secret. 1956 It's Ellen Crosby's first day at work as a student nurse at Ambergate County Lunatic Asylum... -
![The Tell-Tale Heart, Plus 3 other Tales of Mystery, Suspense by Edgar Allan Poe]()
The Tell-Tale Heart, Plus 3 other Tales of Mystery, Suspense by Edgar Allan Poe
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 71 ratingsThe Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan PoeAdventures of the Noble Bachelorby Sir Arthur Conan DoyleThe Kitchen Table by Alan KingSight Unseen by Dorothy DavisIn the first volume of Mystery Theatre we present the "Tell Tale-Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe. It is a frightening story of a troubled man's conscience driving him insane...Categorized as:
crime dark gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction anthologies audiobook -
![Absolute Truths by Susan Howatch]()
Absolute Truths by Susan Howatch
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIt is 1965, and Charles Ashworth has attained the plum position of bishop of Starbridge, an honor that keeps him in a heady whirl of activity that would exhaust the most seasoned corporate executive. With the invaluable support of his minions and his attractive, unsinkable wife, Ashworth stands against the amorality and decadence of the age—"Anti-Sex Ashworth... -
![The God of the Woods by Liz Moore]()
The God of the Woods by Liz Moore
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsFrom the New York Times bestselling author of Long Bright River, an immersive, propulsive novel about a missing child whose disappearance sends equal shockwaves through three very different worlds—an opulent Adirondack summer estate, the rustic teen summer camp that operates in its shadow, and the blue-collar community that serves them both... -
![The Pit and the Pendulum - an Edgar Allan Poe Short Story by Edgar Allan Poe]()
The Pit and the Pendulum - an Edgar Allan Poe Short Story by Edgar Allan Poe
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 48 ratingsGet set for true terror in one of Edgar Allan Poe's most famous short stories.We enter the mind of a prisoner of the Spanish Inquisition. The dank prison room is without light and he begins to feel his way around the walls...Categorized as:
crime dark gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction anthologies audiobook classics -
![Venom by Colin Falconer]()
Venom by Colin Falconer
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsFrom Saigon to Paris, from Bangkok to the Ganges, this thriller is the story of Michel Christian. Abandoned on the streets of Saigon when he is only a child, he grows up with a fatal attraction for women and an insatiable desire for revenge... -
![Natchez Burning by Greg Iles]()
Natchez Burning by Greg Iles
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 28 ratings#1 New York Times bestselling novelist Greg Iles returns with his most eagerly anticipated book yet, and his first in five years – Natchez Burning, the first installment in an epic trilogy that weaves crimes, lies, and secret past and present into a mesmerizing thriller featuring Southern mayor and former prosecutor Penn Cage... -
![Mystical Paths by Susan Howatch]()
Mystical Paths by Susan Howatch
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhen Nicholas Darrow follows his father into the Anglican priesthood in 1968 at the age of twenty-five, he is fleeing a troubled past. But when his fascination with his own psychic powers results in a near-tragedy, Nicholas must face the truth about his relationship with his father before he can find his way out of the seemingly impenetrable darkness that engulfs him... -
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![The Caretakers by Eliza Maxwell]()
The Caretakers by Eliza Maxwell
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn the isolated estate she’s found the perfect getaway. But there’s no escaping the past in this chilling novel from the bestselling author of The Unremembered Girl. Filmmaker Tessa Shepherd helped free a man she believed was wrongly imprisoned for murder. When he kills again, Tessa’s life is upended.She’s reeling with guilt, her reputation destroyed... -
![Only Time Will Tell by Jeffrey Archer]()
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 dark epic family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure -
![The Cherry Robbers by Sarai Walker]()
The Cherry Robbers by Sarai Walker
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 7 ratingsSarai Walker has done it again. With The Cherry Robbers she upends the Gothic ghost story with a fiery feminist zeal. --Maria SempleThe highly anticipated second novel from Sarai Walker, following her "slyly subversive" (EW) cult-hit Dietland--a feminist gothic about the lone survivor of a cursed family of sisters, whose time may finally be up... -
![A Season in Purgatory by Dominick Dunne]()
A Season in Purgatory by Dominick Dunne
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThey were the family with everything. Money. Influence. Glamour. Power. The power to halt a police investigation in its tracks. The power to spin a story, concoct a lie, and believe it was the truth. The power to murder without guilt, without shame, and without ever paying the price. America's royalty, they called the Bradleys. But an outsider refuses to play his part... -
![The Tie That Binds by Kent Haruf]()
The Tie That Binds by Kent Haruf
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsFrom the bestselling author of , is a powerfully eloquent tribute to the arduous demands of rural America, and of the tenacity of the human spirit.Colorado, January 1977. Eighty-year-old Edith Goodnough lies in a hospital bed, IV taped to the back of her hand, police officer at her door. She is charged with murder...Categorized as:
epic family historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction rural western 20th-century -
![Veil of Doubt by Sharon Virts]()
Veil of Doubt by Sharon Virts
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsWhen a mother is charged with murder in a town already convinced of her guilt, can defense attorney Powell Harrison find truth and justice in a legal system where innocence is not presumed? Emily Lloyd, a young widow in Reconstruction-era Virginia, is accused of poisoning her three-year-old daughter, Maud... -
![Now, Voyager (The Vale Novels) by Olive Higgins Prouty]()
Now, Voyager (The Vale Novels) by Olive Higgins Prouty
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratings"Don't let's ask for the moon! We have the stars!" The film that concludes with Bette Davis's famous words, reaffirmed Davis's own stardom and changed the way Americans smoked cigarettes. But few contemporary fans of this story of a woman's self-realization know its source... -
![The Mansion by William Faulkner]()
The Mansion by William Faulkner
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe Mansion completes Faulkner’s great trilogy of the Snopes family in the mythical county of Yoknapatawpha, Mississippi, which also includes The Hamlet and The Town. Beginning with the murder of Jack Houston, and ending with the murder of Flem Snopes, it traces the downfall of this indomitable post-bellum family, who managed to seize control of the town of Jefferson within a generation...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction southern-gothic 20th-century adult book classics -
![The Hound of the Baskervilles, with "the Adventure of the Speckled Band" by Arthur Conan Doyle]()
The Hound of the Baskervilles, with "the Adventure of the Speckled Band" by Arthur Conan Doyle
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe Hound of the Baskervilles (1901–02) is Arthur Conan Doyle’s most celebrated Sherlock Holmes adventure. At the end of the yew tree path of his ancestral home, Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead. Close by are the footprints of a gigantic hound. Called to investigate, Holmes seems to face a supernatural foe...Categorized as:
crime industrial-era historical-fiction literary-fiction classics mystery fiction victorian -
![The Emerald Comb by Kathleen McGurl]()
The Emerald Comb by Kathleen McGurl
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratings'If you want a book that is exciting, fast-paced and impossible to put down, with plenty of twists and turns, then you need to buy this book! I can't wait to read more of Kathleen's novels.' – Emma's Book ReviewsSome secrets are best left buried… Researching her family tree had been little more than a hobby – until Katie stepped onto Kingsley House’s sprawling, ivy-strewn drive... -
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![The Edge of Lost by Kristina McMorris]()
The Edge of Lost by Kristina McMorris
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 25 ratingsNEW YORK TIMES & USA TODAY BESTSELLEROn a cold night in October 1937, searchlights cut through the darkness around Alcatraz. A prison guard’s only daughter—one of the youngest civilians who lives on the island—has gone missing. Tending the warden’s greenhouse, convicted bank robber Tommy Capello waits anxiously... -
![The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Other Stories by Robert Louis Stevenson]()
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Other Stories by Robert Louis Stevenson
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 28 ratings&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LI&&RThe Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr...Categorized as:
crime dark gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction adult anthologies -
![The Scapegoat by Daphne du Maurier]()
The Scapegoat by Daphne du Maurier
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsBy chance, John and Jean--one English, the other French--meet in a provincial railway station. Their resemblance to each other is uncanny, and they spend the next few hours talking and drinking - until at last John falls into a drunken stupor. It's to be his last carefree moment, for when he wakes, Jean has stolen his identity and disappeared...Categorized as:
crime dark family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure -
![Folly by Laurie R. King]()
Folly by Laurie R. King
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsAn acclaimed master of suspense creates a heroine you will never forget in this superbly chilling novel of a woman who begins a desperate undertaking that may transform her life--or end it.WHAT HAPPENS IF YOUR WORST FEARS AREN’T ALL IN YOUR MIND?Rae Newborn is a woman on the edge: on the edge of sanity, on the edge of tragedy, and now on the edge of the world...Categorized as:
crime dark family historical-fiction literary-fiction action-adventure adult audiobook -
![The Summer of Katya by Trevanian]()
The Summer of Katya by Trevanian
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn the golden summer of 1914, Jean-Marc Montjean, recently graduated from medical school, comes to the small French village of Salies to assist the village physician. His first assignment is to treat the brother of a beautiful woman named Katya Treville. As he and her family become friendly, he realizes they are haunted by an old, dark secret . . -
![Sweeping Up Glass by Carolyn Wall]()
Sweeping Up Glass by Carolyn Wall
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsDestined to be a classic, Sweeping Up Glass is a tough and tender novel of love, race, and justice, and a ferocious, unflinching look at the power of family. Olivia Harker Cross owns a strip of mountain in Pope County, Kentucky, a land where whites and blacks eke out a living in separate, tattered kingdoms and where silver-faced wolves howl in the night... -
![In Milady's Chamber by Sheri Cobb South]()
In Milady's Chamber by Sheri Cobb South
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsEstranged from her husband through her failure to produce an heir, Lady Fieldhurst resolves to repay his neglect by taking a lover. Fate takes a hand when she and her paramour enter her bedroom and find Lord Fieldhurst lying on the floor--with her nail scissors protruding from his neck.Idealistic young Bow Street Runner John Pickett has spent most of his brief career chasing petty pickpockets... -
![A Million Drops by Víctor del Árbol]()
A Million Drops by Víctor del Árbol
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAn intense literary thriller that tears through the interlocked histories of fascism and communism in Europe without pausing for breath. Gonzalo Gil is a disaffected lawyer stuck in a failed career and a strained marriage, dodging the never-ending manipulation of his powerful father-in-law... -
![In My Father's House by Ernest J. Gaines]()
In My Father's House by Ernest J. Gaines
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA compelling novel of a man brought to reckon with his buried past...In St. Adrienne, a small black community in Louisiana, Reverend Phillip Martin—a respected minister and civil rights leader—comes face to face with the sins of his youth in the person of Robert X, a young, unkempt stranger who arrives in town for a mysterious "meeting" with the Reverend...Categorized as:
crime epic family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction southern-gothic 20th-century -
![Leave Her to Heaven by Ben Ames Williams]()
Leave Her to Heaven by Ben Ames Williams
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThis classic bestselling novel about a man who encounters a woman whose power to destroy is as strong as her power to love evokes Hemingway in its naturalistic portrayal of elemental forces in both nature and humanity. Ellen’s beauty was radiant, and Harland had been so struck with her personality and the strength of her character that he knew he could never leave her... -
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![Angel Street: A Victorian Thriller in Three Acts by Patrick Hamilton]()
Angel Street: A Victorian Thriller in Three Acts by Patrick Hamilton
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA Broadway hit first produced on the West End under the title Gaslight and filmed twice, Angel Street tells the story of the Manninghams who live on Angel Street in 19th Century London. As the curtain rises, all appears the essence of Victorian tranquility. It is soon apparent however, that Mr... -
![A Whispered Name by William Brodrick]()
A Whispered Name by William Brodrick
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA hugely moving and intelligent novel from the bestselling author of The Sixth Lamentation and The Gardens of the Dead, A Whispered Name reaches into the mysteries of one man's past and casts light on the long shadows war leaves... -
![Orpheus Builds a Girl by Heather Parry]()
Orpheus Builds a Girl by Heather Parry
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsBased on a true story, Orpheus Builds a Girl is a novel of sisterly love, sinister obsession, and the battle for control of the story. A dark, chilling debut novel from award-winning writer Heather Parry.German doctor Wilhelm Von Tore shares with the reader the story of his one true ove; a love written in the stars, decades in the making, a love so strong it transcended death itself...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction dark horror fiction retellings historical -
![The Vanishing of Audrey Wilde by Eve Chase]()
The Vanishing of Audrey Wilde by Eve Chase
Rated: 3.95 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsFour sisters. One summer. A lifetime of secrets. When fifteen-year-old Margot and her three sisters arrive at Applecote Manor in June 1959, they expect a quiet English country summer. Instead, they find their aunt and uncle still reeling from the disappearance of their daughter, Audrey, five years before...Categorized as:
crime family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction audiobook book coming-of-age -
![The Manticore by Robertson Davies]()
The Manticore by Robertson Davies
Rated: 4.01 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsAround a mysterious death is woven a glittering, fantastical, cunningly contrived trilogy of novels. Luring the reader down labyrinthine tunnels of myth, history and magic, The Deptford Trilogy provides an exhilarating antidote to a world from where 'the fear and dread and splendour of wonder have been banished'... -
![The Eustace Diamonds by Anthony Trollope]()
The Eustace Diamonds by Anthony Trollope
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsLizzie Greystock, a fortune-hunter who ensnares the sickly, dissipated Sir Florian Eustace and is soon left a very wealthy widow and mother. While clever and beautiful, Lizzie has several character flaws; the greatest of these is an almost pathological delight in lying, even when it cannot benefit her... -
![Crazy in Alabama by Mark Childress]()
Crazy in Alabama by Mark Childress
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFamily tumult and nationwide social unrest converge to shake the world of 12-year-old orphan Peejoe Bullis in the summer of 1965, "when everybody went crazy in Alabama...Categorized as:
family historical-fiction humor literary-fiction action-adventure audiobook book comedy -
![Le Quinconce by Charles Palliser]()
Le Quinconce by Charles Palliser
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsThe protagonist, a young man naive enough to be blind to all clues about his own hidden history (and to the fact that his very existence is troubling to all manner of evildoers) narrates a story of uncommon beauty which not only brings readers face-to-face with dozens of piquantly drawn characters at all levels of 19th-century English society but re-creates with precision the tempestuous weather...Categorized as:
crime epic gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure -
![The Clearing by Tim Gautreaux]()
The Clearing by Tim Gautreaux
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe story of a murderous battle for control, and a wise, compassionate investigation into the bonds of love and family and of what sustains people through loss...Categorized as:
crime epic family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction southern-gothic 20th-century -
![My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier]()
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier
Rated: 3.98 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsPhilip Ashley's older cousin Ambrose, who raised the orphaned Philip as his own son, has died in Rome. Philip, the heir to Ambrose's beautiful English estate, is crushed that the man he loved died far from home. He is also suspicious. While in Italy, Ambrose fell in love with Rachel, a beautiful English and Italian woman...Categorized as:
crime dark family gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction 20th-century -
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![The Open Curtain by Brian Evenson]()
The Open Curtain by Brian Evenson
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhen Rudd, a troubled teenager, embarks on a school project, he runs across a series of articles from the 1902 New York Times chronicling a vicious murder committed by the grandson of Brigham Young... -
![The Beloved Girls by Harriet Evans]()
The Beloved Girls by Harriet Evans
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratings"It's a funny old house. They have this ceremony every summer . . . There's an old chapel, in the grounds of the house. It's half-derelict. The Hunters keep bees in there. Every year, on the same day, the family processes to the chapel. They open the combs, taste the honey. Take it back to the house. Half for them -" my father winced, as though he had bitten down on a sore tooth... -
![1922 by Stephen King]()
1922 by Stephen King
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 25 ratings1922 is a novella by Stephen King, published in his collection Full Dark, No Stars (2010).The story opens with the confession of Wilfred James to the murder of his wife, Arlette, following their move to Hemingford, Nebraska onto land willed to Arlette by her father...Categorized as:
crime dark family gothic historical-fiction literary-fiction southern-gothic 21st-century -
![The Savage Instinct by Marjorie DeLuca, M.M. DeLuca]()
The Savage Instinct by Marjorie DeLuca, M.M. DeLuca
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsEngland, 1873. Clara Blackstone has just been released after one year in a private asylum for the insane. Clara has two goals: to reunite with her husband, Henry, and to never—ever—return to the asylum...Categorized as:
crime gothic historical-fiction industrial-era literary-fiction adult audiobook book -
![Nettleblack by Nat Reeve]()
Nettleblack by Nat Reeve
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 7 ratingsSubversive and playful, Nettleblack is a neo-Victorian queer farce that follows a runaway heir/ess and an organisation of crime-fighting misfits as they struggle with the misdeeds besieging a rural English town. The year is 1893...Categorized as:
historical-fiction gothic industrial-era literary-fiction humor lgbtq fiction historical -
![Carolina Skeletons by David Stout]()
Carolina Skeletons by David Stout
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsIn 1944, Linus Bragg, a 14-year-old black student, is accused of killing two white girls and condemned to the electric chair. Forty-four years later, Bragg's nephew travels to South Carolina to discover the truth--and finds himself on the Wanted List and fighting for his own freedom! HC: Mysterious Press...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult amateur-sleuth book fiction
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