Books like 'Storming Heaven'
Readers who enjoyed Storming Heaven by Denise Giardina also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
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Death and the Dervish by Meša Selimović
Rated: 4.55 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsDeath and the Dervish is an acclaimed novel by Bosnian writer Mesa Selimovic. It recounts the story of Sheikh Nuruddin, a dervish residing in an Islamic monastery in Sarajevo in the eighteenth century during the Ottoman Turk hegemony over the Balkans. When his brother is arrested, he must descend into the Kafkaesque world of the Ottoman authorities in his search to discover what happened to him...Categorized as:
classics high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult book -
![Stoner by John Williams]()
Stoner by John Williams
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsWilliam Stoner is born at the end of the nineteenth century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar’s life, so different from the hardscrabble existence he has known...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university north-america usa 20th-century -
![Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg]()
Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsWoman or man? This internationally acclaimed novel looks at the world through the eyes of Jess Goldberg, a masculine girl growing up in the "Ozzie and Harriet" McCarthy era and coming out as a young butch lesbian in the pre-Stonewall gay drag bars of a blue-collar town...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics university 20th-century adult book -
![Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust, D.J. Enright]()
Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust, D.J. Enright
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFirst published in 1919, Within a Budding Grove was awarded the Prix Goncourt, bringing the author immediate fame. In this second volume of In Search of Lost Time, the narrator turns from the childhood reminiscences of Swann’s Way to memories of his adolescence...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult audiobook -
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![Animal Farm / 1984 by George Orwell]()
Animal Farm / 1984 by George Orwell
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 72 ratingsThis edition features George Orwell’s best-known novels—1984 and Animal Farm—with an introduction by Christopher Hitchens.In 1984, London is a grim city where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind. Winston Smith joins a secret revolutionary organisation called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party... -
![Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry]()
Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 24 ratings"This is a book about Heaven," says Jayber Crow, "but I must say too that . . . I have wondered sometimes if it would not finally turn out to be a book about Hell." It is 1932 and he has returned to his native Port William to become the town's barber...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction rural 20th-century adult audiobook -
![Body and Soul by Frank Conroy]()
Body and Soul by Frank Conroy
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn the dim light of a basement apartment, six-year-old Claude Rawlings sits at an old white piano, picking out the sounds he has heard on the radio and shutting out the reality of his lonely world.The setting is 1940s New York, a city that is "long gone, replaced by another city of the same name...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century book coming-of-age drama -
![Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada, Geoff Wilkes]()
Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada, Geoff Wilkes
Rated: 4.23 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsInspired by a true story, Hans Fallada's Alone in Berlin is the gripping tale of an ordinary man's determination to defy the tyranny of Nazi rule. This Penguin Classics edition contains an afterword by Geoff Wilkes, as well as facsimiles of the original Gestapo file which inspired the novel. Berlin, 1940, and the city is filled with fear...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction politics thriller 20th-century action-adventure -
![A Daughter's Sorrow by Cathy Sharp]()
A Daughter's Sorrow by Cathy Sharp
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsHeartache and hardship in London’s East End, from the bestselling author of The Orphans of Halfpenny StreetBridget has always been the one to take on the responsibility for looking after her family... -
![Extinction by Thomas Bernhard]()
Extinction by Thomas Bernhard
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe last work of fiction by one of the twentieth century’s greatest artists, Extinction is widely considered Thomas Bernhard’s magnum opus. Franz-Josef Murau—the intellectual black sheep of a powerful Austrian land-owning family—lives in Rome in self-imposed exile, surrounded by a coterie of artistic and intellectual friends...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult anthologies -
![Remembrance of Things Past: Volume III - The Captive, The Fugitive, & Time Regained by Marcel Proust]()
Remembrance of Things Past: Volume III - The Captive, The Fugitive, & Time Regained by Marcel Proust
Rated: 4.55 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe third and final volume includes THE CAPTIVE, THE FUGITIVE, and TIME REGAINED...Categorized as:
classics family literary-fiction 20th-century anthologies fiction historical literary -
![HIDDEN by Linda Gillard]()
HIDDEN by Linda Gillard
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA birth. A death. Hidden for a hundred years. The new novel from the author of Kindle bestseller THE MEMORY TREE “Lady, fiancé killed, will gladly marry officer totally blinded or otherwise incapacitated by the war...Categorized as:
historical-fiction family literary-fiction historical 20th-century suspense war fiction -
![A Daughter’s Dream by Cathy Sharp]()
A Daughter’s Dream by Cathy Sharp
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHeartache and hardship in London’s East End, from the bestselling author of The Orphans of Halfpenny StreetAmy Robinson and her fiance Matthew are struggling to resist the temptations faced by a soon-to-be-wed couple. To avoid these, Matthew throws himself into a new job and she goes to work in an exclusive new dress shop, where she meets Mary Maitland...Categorized as:
historical-fiction family literary-fiction female-mc psychological romance 20th-century holidays -
![The Power of the Dog by Thomas Savage]()
The Power of the Dog by Thomas Savage
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFirst published in 1967, Thomas Savage's western novel about two brothers now includes an afterword by Annie Proulx.Phil and George are brothers, more than partners, joint owners of the biggest ranch in their Montana valley. Phil is the bright one, George the plodder. Phil is tall and angular; George is stocky and silent...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction north-america usa 20th-century adult -
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![Taking Care by Joy Williams]()
Taking Care by Joy Williams
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsStories deal with a young divorcee, a shared summer home, a troubled family, a wedding, childhood fears, the death of a pet, a lying child, and enlightenment...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies female-author fiction historical -
![Swann's Way by Marcel Proust]()
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsMarcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is one of the most entertaining reading experiences in any language and arguably the finest novel of the twentieth century. But since its original prewar translation there has been no completely new version in English...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult audiobook -
![Swann's Way by Marcel Proust]()
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsMarcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is one of the most entertaining reading experiences in any language and arguably the finest novel of the twentieth century. But since its original prewar translation there has been no completely new version in English...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult audiobook -
![The Complete Short Prose, 1929-1989 by Samuel Beckett]()
The Complete Short Prose, 1929-1989 by Samuel Beckett
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsNobel prize winner Samuel Beckett is one of the most profoundly original writers of our century. He gives expression to the anguish and isolation of the individual consciousness with a purity and minimalism that have altered the shape of world literature...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies fiction historical -
![A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean]()
A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsFrom its first magnificent sentence, "In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing," to the last, "I am haunted by waters," "A River Runs Through It" is an American classic...Categorized as:
classics family high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult -
![The Promise by Chaim Potok]()
The Promise by Chaim Potok
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratings“A superb mirror of a place, a time, and a group of people who capture our immediate interest and hold it tightly.” — The Philadelphia InquirerYoung Reuven Malter is unsure of himself and his place in life. An unconventional scholar, he struggles for recognition from his teachers...Categorized as:
classics family high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century book coming-of-age -
![The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham]()
The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsBased on the life of Paul Gauguin, The Moon and Sixpence is W. Somerset Maugham's ode to the powerful forces behind creative genius. Charles Strickland is a staid banker, a man of wealth and privilege. He is also a man possessed of an unquenchable desire to create art... -
![The Cremator by Ladislav Fuks, Rajendra A. Chitnis]()
The Cremator by Ladislav Fuks, Rajendra A. Chitnis
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratings“The devil’s neatest trick is to persuade us that he doesn’t exist.”—Giovanni Papini It is a maxim that both rings true in our contemporary world and pervades this tragicomic novel of anxiety and evil set amid the horrors of World War II...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics 20th-century adult audiobook book -
![Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson]()
Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsAs two pals wander the streets of Belfast in search of something better--a better pint, a better job, a better woman, a better now--readers are treated to their hilarious misadventures, political intrigues, and outlandish schemes...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century action-adventure adult book -
![All the Little Live Things by Wallace Stegner]()
All the Little Live Things by Wallace Stegner
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsScarred by the senseless death of their son and baffled by the engulfing chaos of the 1960s, Allston and his wife, Ruth, have left the coast for a California retreat...Categorized as:
classics family high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies -
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![Going to the Dogs: The Story of a Moralist by Erich Kästner]()
Going to the Dogs: The Story of a Moralist by Erich Kästner
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsGoing to the Dogs is set in Berlin after the crash of 1929 and before the Nazi takeover, years of rising unemployment and financial collapse. The moralist in question is Jakob Fabian, “aged thirty-two, profession variable, at present advertising copywriter . .Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics 20th-century adult book comedy -
![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:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction north-america rural usa 20th-century -
![Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose]()
Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsA landmark American drama that inspired a classic film and a Broadway revival—featuring an introduction by David MametA blistering character study and an examination of the American melting pot and the judicial system that keeps it in check, Twelve Angry Men holds at its core a deeply patriotic faith in the U.S. legal system...Categorized as:
classics high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction politics university 20th-century audiobook -
![A Book of Memories by Péter Nádas, Imre Goldstein]()
A Book of Memories by Péter Nádas, Imre Goldstein
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThis extraordinary magnum opus seems at first to be a confessional autobiographical novel in the grand manner, claiming and extending the legacy of Proust and Mann. But it is more: Peter Nadas has given us a superb contemporary psychological novel that comes to terms with the ghosts, corpses, and repressed nightmares of Europe's recent past...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult book fiction -
![Selected Short Stories by William Faulkner]()
Selected Short Stories by William Faulkner
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFrom the Modern Library’s new set of beautifully repackaged hardcover classics by William Faulkner—also available are Snopes, As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, Light in August, and Absalom, Absalom!William Faulkner was a master of the short story...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies fiction gothic -
![The Ogre by Michel Tournier]()
The Ogre by Michel Tournier
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAn international bestseller and winner of the Prix Goncourt, France's most prestigious literary award, The Ogre is a masterful tale of innocence, perversion, and obsession. It follows the passage of strange, gentle Abel Tiffauges from submissive schoolboy to "ogre" of the Nazi school at the castle of Kaltenborn, taking us deeper into the dark heart of fascism than any novel since The Tin Drum... -
![Roman Fever (and Other Stories) by Edith Wharton]()
Roman Fever (and Other Stories) by Edith Wharton
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA Virago Modern Classic These stories - all powerful moral analyses - demonstrate the true professionalism of Edith Wharton... -
![Whose Names Are Unknown by Sanora Babb]()
Whose Names Are Unknown by Sanora Babb
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsOriginally written and slated for publication in 1939, this long-forgotten masterpiece was shelved by Random House when The Grapes of Wrath met with wide acclaim...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction politics rural 20th-century adult -
![The Seven That Were Hanged by Leonid Andreyev]()
The Seven That Were Hanged by Leonid Andreyev
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsSergey did not know that the colonel, having locked himself all the previous night in his little study, had deliberated upon this ritual with all his power. "We must not aggravate, but ease the last moments of our son," resolved the colonel firmly, and he carefully weighed every possible phase of the conversation, every act and movement that might take place on the following day... -
![U.S.A.: The 42nd Parallel / 1919 / The Big Money by John Dos Passos]()
U.S.A.: The 42nd Parallel / 1919 / The Big Money by John Dos Passos
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn the novels that make up the U.S.A.trilogy—The 42nd Parallel, 1919, and The Big Money—Dos Passos creates an unforgettable collective portrait of America, shot through with sardonic comedy and brilliant social observation. He interweaves the careers of his characters and the events of their time with a narrative verve and breathtaking technical skill that make U.S.A...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction politics 20th-century adult anthologies -
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![Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell]()
Mrs. Bridge by Evan S. Connell
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAlternate-cover edition for ISBN 0865470561 / 9780865470569 can be found here The wife of a successful lawyer in 1930s Kansas City, India Bridge, tries to cope with her dissatisfaction with an easy, though empty, life.Before Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique there was Mrs...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult audiobook -
![Possessing the Secret of Joy by Alice Walker]()
Possessing the Secret of Joy by Alice Walker
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsPossessing the Secret of Joy is the story of Tashi, a tribal African woman who lives much of her adult life in North America. As a young woman, a misguided loyalty to the customs of her people led her to voluntarily submit to the tsunga's knife and be genitally mutilated (pharoanoically circumcised)...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction politics university 20th-century abuse -
![Vladimir Nabokov: Novels 1955–1962 by Vladimir Nabokov]()
Vladimir Nabokov: Novels 1955–1962 by Vladimir Nabokov
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThis Library of America volume is the second of three volumes that contain the most authoritative versions of the English works of the brilliant Russian émigré, Vladimir Nabokov.Lolita (1955), Nabokov’s single most famous work, is one of the most controversial and widely read books of its time...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction politics fiction humor 20th-century psychological historical -
![Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman]()
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsA modern classic, Einstein’s Dreams is a fictional collage of stories dreamed by Albert Einstein in 1905, when he worked in a patent office in Switzerland. As the defiant but sensitive young genius is creating his theory of relativity, a new conception of time, he imagines many possible worlds. In one, time is circular, so that people are fated to repeat triumphs and failures over and over... -
![Regeneration by Pat Barker]()
Regeneration by Pat Barker
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsRegeneration, one in Pat Barker's series of novels confronting the psychological effects of World War I, focuses on treatment methods during the war and the story of a decorated English officer sent to a military hospital after publicly declaring he will no longer fight. Yet the novel is much more...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics university 20th-century adult audiobook -
![The Dead by James Joyce]()
The Dead by James Joyce
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsOften cited as the best work of short fiction ever written, "The Dead" is the final short story in the 1914 collection Dubliners by James Joyce...Categorized as:
classics family high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult -
![So Big by Edna Ferber]()
So Big by Edna Ferber
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsAuthor Edna Ferber described the story of So Big as being about a "material man, son of his earth-grubbing, idealistic mother". Left an orphan at 19 years old in the late 1880s, Selina Peake needs to support herself. She leaves the city life she has known to become a teacher in the farming community of High Prairie, IL...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction rural 20th-century adult audiobook -
![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:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction thriller 20th-century action-adventure adult -
![The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter]()
The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsDespite the enormous success--both critical and popular--of her novel Ship of Fools, Katherine Anne Porter's reputation as one of America's most distinguished writers rest chiefly on her superb short stories. This volume brings together the collections Flowering Judas; Pale Horse, Pale Rider; and The Leaning Tower as well as four stories not available elsewhere in book form.Go little book.. -
![In Search of April Raintree by Beatrice Mosionier, Michaela Washburn]()
In Search of April Raintree by Beatrice Mosionier, Michaela Washburn
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsTwo young sisters are taken from their home and family. Powerless to change their fortunes, they are separated, and each put into different foster homes. Yet over the years, the bond between them grows. As they each make their way in a society that is, at times, indifferent, hostile, and violent, one embraces her Métis identity, while the other tries to leave it behind...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century audiobook book -
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![The Third Lie by Ágota Kristóf]()
The Third Lie by Ágota Kristóf
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn the third volume in a critically acclaimed trilogy that also includes The Proof and The Notebook, Claus lies dying in a prison in the town of his birth, reminiscing about the past and his missing twin and haunted by three lies that have profoundly affected his life...Categorized as:
family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies audiobook female-author -
![On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin]()
On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsLewis and Benjamin Jones, identical twins, were born with the century on a farm on the English-Welsh border. For eighty years they live on the farm--sharing the same clothes, tilling the same soil, sleeping in the same bed. Their lives and the lives of their neighbors--farmers, drovers, clergymen, traders, coffin-makers--are only obliquely touched by the chaos of twentieth-century progress... -
![Famous Last Words by Timothy Findley]()
Famous Last Words by Timothy Findley
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIn the final days of the Second World War, Hugh Selwyn Mauberley scrawls his desperate account on the walls and ceilings of his ice-cold prison high in the Austrian Alps. Officers of the liberating army discover his frozen, disfigured corpse and his astonishing testament - the sordid truth that he alone possessed...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics thriller 20th-century adult alternate-history -
![The Spider's House by Paul Bowles, Francine Prose]()
The Spider's House by Paul Bowles, Francine Prose
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsSet in Fez, Morocco, during that country's 1954 nationalist uprising, The Spider's House is perhaps Paul Bowles's most beautifully subtle novel, richly descriptive of its setting, and uncompromising in its characterizations...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure adult black-mc -
![Mr. Bridge by Evan S. Connell]()
Mr. Bridge by Evan S. Connell
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWalter Bridge is an ambitious lawyer who redoubles his efforts and time at the office whenever he senses that his family needs something, even when what they need is more of him and less of his money. Affluence, material assets, and comforts create a cocoon of community respectability that cloaks the void within - not the skeleton in the closet but a black hole swallowing the whole household...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies audiobook -
![A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams]()
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
Rated: 3.98 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsThe Pulitzer Prize and Drama Critics Circle Award winning play—reissued with an introduction by Arthur Miller (Death of a Salesman and The Crucible), and Williams’ essay “The World I Live In...Categorized as:
classics family high-school historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century abuse
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