Books like 'Lost Empires'
Readers who enjoyed Lost Empires by J.B. Priestley also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction classics
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Bad Habit by Alana S. Portero
Rated: 4.56 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsCombining the raw realism and vulnerability of Shuggie Bain and Detransition, Baby with the poignant sensibility of Pedro Almodóvar, a staggering coming-of-age novel deeply rooted in the class struggles of a trans woman growing up in Madrid in the last decades of the twentieth century."I saw a whole generation of boys fall like irredeemable angels...Categorized as:
coming-of-age literary-fiction historical-fiction lgbtq fiction feminism contemporary drama -
![The Compleat Works of Wllm Shkspr (abridged) by Adam Long, Daniel Singer]()
The Compleat Works of Wllm Shkspr (abridged) by Adam Long, Daniel Singer
Rated: 4.45 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsRevised from the rather long original complete works of Shakespeare, this abridged version is written by three Americans, with no qualifications worth speaking of. The playtext is reproduced here with footnotes which will be of no help to anyone and a letter from the authors to the Queen... -
![The Keeper of Stars by Buck Turner]()
The Keeper of Stars by Buck Turner
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsNOW A #1 BESTSELLERWho says you can’t rewrite the stars?1962—Twelve years removed from the summer when she first gave her heart away, Dr. Elizabeth (Ellie) Spencer, Professor of Astronomy at Indiana University, receives a mysterious package that has her asking that very question.Inside the unmarked box is a novel written by Ellie’s first love, Jack Bennett...Categorized as:
historical-fiction classics coming-of-age romance fiction mystery contemporary audiobook -
![Captains of the Sands by Jorge Amado]()
Captains of the Sands by Jorge Amado
Rated: 4.35 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsLiving by their wits in the steamy slums of Bahia, a gang of orphans and runaways, led by fifteen-year-old "Bullet," spend their time stealing from Brazil's rich and privileged until public outcry demands their capture... -
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![The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever]()
The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsHere are sixty-one stories that chronicle the lives of what has been called "the greatest generation." From the early wonder and disillusionment of city life in "The Enormous Radio" to the surprising discoveries and common mysteries of suburbia in "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill" and "The Swimmer," Cheever tells us everything we need to know about "the pain and sweetness of life...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary fiction -
![A Treatise on Shelling Beans by Wiesław Myśliwski]()
A Treatise on Shelling Beans by Wiesław Myśliwski
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOur narrator, a retired musician, receives a visit from an enigmatic stranger who inspires him to share the story of his long and stormy life...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 21st-century adult audiobook book contemporary -
![All My Mothers by Joanna Glen]()
All My Mothers by Joanna Glen
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFrom the author of the Costa shortlisted debut, The Other Half of Augusta Hope, comes the story of one girl’s journey to find her birth mother, and her realisation that mothers – and family – can be discovered in the most unexpected of places…London, 1980s. Though she has a comfortable, privileged life, Eva Martínez-Green is deeply unhappy...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction coming-of-age fiction contemporary audiobook family parenthood -
![The Stories of Raymond Carver by Raymond Carver]()
The Stories of Raymond Carver by Raymond Carver
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsWill You Please Be Quiet, Please? What We Talk About When We Talk About Love... -
![Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? by Raymond Carver]()
Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? by Raymond Carver
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsWith this, his first collection, Carver breathed new life into the short story. In the pared-down style that has since become his hallmark, Carver showed us how humour and tragedy dwelt in the hearts of ordinary people, and won a readership that grew with every subsequent brilliant collection of stories, poems and essays that appeared in the last eleven years of his life...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary fiction -
![What Work Is by Philip Levine]()
What Work Is by Philip Levine
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWinner of the National Book Award in 1991 “This collection amounts to a hymn of praise for all the workers of America. These proletarian heroes, with names like Lonnie, Loo, Sweet Pea, and Packy, work the furnaces, forges, slag heaps, assembly lines, and loading docks at places with unglamorous names like Brass Craft or Feinberg and Breslin’s First-Rate Plumbing and Plating...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary fiction literary -
![Calling for a Blanket Dance by Oscar Hokeah]()
Calling for a Blanket Dance by Oscar Hokeah
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA moving and deeply engaging debut novel about a young Native American man struggling to find strength in his familial identity, from a stellar new voice in literary fiction... -
![Before My Actual Heart Breaks by Tish Delaney]()
Before My Actual Heart Breaks by Tish Delaney
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsI’m not yours and you’re not mine. That’s what I say to his dreaming face as I watch the shadows of his dark eyelashes dance by the light of a Tilley lamp.It’s not the first lie I’ve told myself. When I was sixteen, I wanted to fly...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction coming-of-age romance fiction contemporary mental-illness sad -
![Beatles by Lars Saabye Christensen]()
Beatles by Lars Saabye Christensen
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsBeatles is the story of Kim Karlsen and his three buddies, Gunnar, Ola and Seb - and, yes, they occasionally like to think of themselves as the Fab Four. They were born in 1951, and the story starts with the first wave of Beatlemania in Norway, in the spring of 1965... -
![Rost by Jakub Małecki]()
Rost by Jakub Małecki
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratings2002 sterben die Eltern des siebenjährigen Szymek auf ihrem Rückweg in das kleine Dorf Cholny bei einem Autounfall. Sein Leben vor diesem Ereignis kippt in eine ihm scheinbar unerreichbare Vergangenheit...Categorized as:
coming-of-age literary-fiction 21st-century adult audiobook book contemporary fiction -
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![天橋上的魔術師 by Wu Ming-Yi, 吳明益]()
天橋上的魔術師 by Wu Ming-Yi, 吳明益
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 7 ratings...Categorized as:
coming-of-age literary-fiction historical-fiction fiction young-adult magic family contemporary -
![My Struggle: Book Three by Karl Ove Knausgård]()
My Struggle: Book Three by Karl Ove Knausgård
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA family of four--mother, father and two boys--move to the South Coast of Norway to a new house on a newly developed site. It is the early 1970s and the family's trajectory, upwardly mobile: the future seems limitless...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction 21st-century adult anthologies audiobook -
![Los nombres propios by Marta Jiménez Serrano]()
Los nombres propios by Marta Jiménez Serrano
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 24 ratings¿Quién es Belaundia Fu? Es la mejor amiga de Marta a los siete años: la amiga invisible que, en esos momentos en que las cosas no salen como había planeado y ni siquiera la abuela es capaz de consolarla, se sienta con ella y espera hasta que se le pase... -
![Interpreter of Maladies / The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri]()
Interpreter of Maladies / The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsJhumpa Lahiri took the literary world by storm when her debut collection, Interpreter of Maladies, won the Pulitzer Prize in 2000. The collection was followed by her best-selling and critically acclaimed novel The Namesake—a finely wrought, deeply moving family drama. Presenting these works together here, this edition displays Lahiri’s enormous talent as a storyteller...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction adult anthologies contemporary fiction literary poc-author -
![The Dishwasher by Stéphane Larue]()
The Dishwasher by Stéphane Larue
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIt’s winter in Montreal, 2002, when a graphic design student’s gambling addiction starts to drag him under... -
![Island: The Complete Stories by Alistair MacLeod]()
Island: The Complete Stories by Alistair MacLeod
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe sixteen exquisitely crafted stories in Island prove Alistair MacLeod to be a master. Quietly, precisely, he has created a body of work that is among the greatest to appear in English in the last fifty years.A book-besotted patriarch releases his only son from the obligations of the sea. A father provokes his young son to violence when he reluctantly sells the family horse...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary family -
![Los ojos del perro siberiano by Antonio Santa Ana]()
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![Endpapers by Jennifer Savran Kelly]()
Endpapers by Jennifer Savran Kelly
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 5 ratingsAn accessible, character-driven story set in 2003 New York City about a genderqueer book conservator who feels trapped by her gender presentation, her ill-fitting relationship, and her artistic block, as she discovers a decades-old hidden queer love letter and becomes obsessed with tracking down its author. It’s 2003, and artist Dawn Levit is stuck...Categorized as:
coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction adult audiobook book contemporary fiction -
![In Youth Is Pleasure: & I Left My Grandfather's House by Denton Welch, William S. Burroughs]()
In Youth Is Pleasure: & I Left My Grandfather's House by Denton Welch, William S. Burroughs
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsKeenly observed autobiographical fiction and journal entries from acclaimed writer Denton Welch, featuring an introduction by William S. Burroughs “In Youth Is Pleasure” recounts the summer vacation of Orvil Pym—a sensitive, withdrawn, and deeply unhappy boy of fifteen. Following a trying year at public school, Orvil spends the summer with his father and two older brothers...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age literary-fiction anthologies contemporary fiction lgbtq literary -
![The Rachel Incident by Caroline O'Donoghue]()
The Rachel Incident by Caroline O'Donoghue
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsWhere would I start, and how would it even make sense? How could you understand the year in Shandon Street unless you were there, with us, living it?Rachel Murray is twenty-one years old, platonically infatuated with her housemate James, and less-than-platonically infatuated with her enigmatic, married English professor Dr Byrne... -
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![They Knew Mr. Knight by Dorothy Whipple]()
They Knew Mr. Knight by Dorothy Whipple
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe Blakes are an ordinary family: Celia looks after the house and Thomas works at the family engineering business in Leicester. The book begins when he meets Mr Knight, a financier as crooked as any on the front pages of our newspapers nowadays; and tracks his and his family's swift climb and fall.Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction historical-fiction fiction female-author season-winter contemporary book -
![High Lonesome: Selected Stories, 1966-2006 by Joyce Carol Oates]()
High Lonesome: Selected Stories, 1966-2006 by Joyce Carol Oates
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAn unprecedented collection of the best of Joyce Carol Oates's short stories combined with eleven new storiesNo other writer can match the impressive oeuvre of Joyce Carol Oates, and High Lonesome: Selected Stories, 1966-2006 gathers stories from Oates's seminal collections, including The Wheel of Love (1970), Marriages and Infidelities (1972), and Heat (1991), arranged by decade...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction adult anthologies contemporary female-author fiction -
![Teresa Batista, Cansada de Guerra by Jorge Amado]()
Teresa Batista, Cansada de Guerra by Jorge Amado
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAt thirteen Tereza is sold by her aunt to a ranch owner who treats her like a piece of property, and sexually abuses her. When caught in bed with her lover she defends herself against the ranch owner’s violence with a knife and ends up in jail. Freed by a long-time admirer, she eventually ends up in a brothel...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book contemporary drama -
![Cómplices by Taibo]()
Cómplices by Taibo
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsJulián ha luchado contra el aburrimiento de todas las maneras posibles. Desde que le diagnosticaron hepatitis, ha recreado en su cabeza conversaciones imaginarias entre ostras que no tienen nada que hacer, ha buscado formas fantasiosas en las manchas de la pared, ha lanzado mocos al aire. Pero es feliz porque no tiene que ir a la escuela... -
![Padma River Boatman by Manik Bandopadhyay]()
Padma River Boatman by Manik Bandopadhyay
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFishing life along the coastline of the Padma and its bitsy melancholic account of intense physical, helpless yet illusory tale. Kuber's struggles, Kapila's voluptuous youth like the rainfilled Padma and the presence of a mysterious man, Hasan Mia, make and break the narrative with tweaks that are deep, covert and sudden like hidden currents... -
![Shadowed Paths by Ivan Bunin]()
Shadowed Paths by Ivan Bunin
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe collection consists of the best of his early works - Sukhodol, The Last Rendezvous, Apple Fragrance, The Gentleman from San Francisco - and stories written in his last years - Leka, Sunstroke, Shadowed Paths, and others. They may be called stories about love and about the unforgettable Russian landscape. For here, Bunin writes about himself, in the hushed stillness of the fields..Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary fiction -
![Pioneer Summer: A Novel by Elena Malisova, Katerina Silvanova]()
Pioneer Summer: A Novel by Elena Malisova, Katerina Silvanova
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThis star-crossed gay romance is a #1 bestselling TikTok sensation that took listeners by storm, made international news, and catalyzed one of Russia’s largest-ever crackdowns on LGBTQ representation The year is 1986, and Yurka Konev, 16, has been sent off for another summer at Pioneer Camp...Categorized as:
historical-fiction coming-of-age literary-fiction romance lgbtq fiction young-adult contemporary -
![Dear Marley by Danielle Keil]()
Dear Marley by Danielle Keil
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsEveryone at Ryder High knows what it means to have a teal envelope taped to their locker on the first day of the month.For Marley “Sunny” Sorenshine, a Secret Admirer might be just what she needs to put her recent, very public, break up behind her.Her optimism is dimmed when she reads the first note—her admirer was tricked into participating. He didn’t choose Marley, a dart did...Categorized as:
literary-fiction coming-of-age romance contemporary young-adult loner-mc fiction book -
![The Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories by Theodore W. Goossen]()
The Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories by Theodore W. Goossen
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThis collection of short stories, including many new translations, is the first to span the whole of Japan's modern era from the end of the nineteenth century to the present day...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction adult anthologies contemporary female-author fiction -
![Greh njene majke by Milica Jakovljević Mir-Jam]()
Greh njene majke by Milica Jakovljević Mir-Jam
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsPosle smrti svoga oca, bogatog bankara i majke, domacice, Neda je ostala potpuno sama. Bila je primorana da napusti roditaljsku kucu gde je bila ususkana ljubavlju i bogatstvom svojih roditelja i suoci se sa stvarnim svetom u kome su vladala pravila muskarca. Posle niza dogadjaja, vesta igra sudbine i zavet njene majke dovesce je pravo u ruke muskarca koji je bio njena sudbina... -
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![Honeybees and Distant Thunder by Riku Onda]()
Honeybees and Distant Thunder by Riku Onda
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsTender and intense, Honeybees and Distant Thunder is the unflinching story of love, courage and rivalry as three young people come to understand what it means to truly be a friend.In a small coastal town just a stone's throw from Tokyo, a prestigious piano competition is underway...Categorized as:
literary-fiction coming-of-age fiction contemporary 21st-century realistic book adult -
![The Orchard by Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry]()
The Orchard by Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsFour teenagers grow inseparable in the last days of the Soviet Union—but not all of them will live to see the new world arrive in this powerful debut novel, loosely based on Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard.Coming of age in the USSR in the 1980s, best friends Anya and Milka try to envision a free and joyful future for themselves... -
![The Foreign Legion by Clarice Lispector]()
The Foreign Legion by Clarice Lispector
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThe Foreign Legion is a collection in two parts, gathering both stories and chronicles, and it offers wonderful evidence of Clarice Lispector's unique sensibility and range as an exponent of experimental prose. It opens with thirteen stories and the second part of the book presents newspaper crônicas, which Lispector said she retrieved from a bottom drawer... -
![The Weight of a Moment by Michael Bowe]()
The Weight of a Moment by Michael Bowe
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWinner for Literary Fiction at the American Fiction Awards 2020. On list of “10 Best Indie Books of 2019” at Shelf Unbound Magazine. Finalist for Best Novel at the Next Generation Book Awards 2020, (often referred to as the "Sundance of Books" in the media). Winner of a Bronze Medal at the Readers' Favorite Awards 2020... -
![Reader’s Block by David Markson]()
Reader’s Block by David Markson
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIn this spellbinding, utterly unconventional fiction, an aging author who is identified only as Reader contemplates the writing of a novel. As he does, other matters insistently crowd his mind - literary and cultural anecdotes, endless quotations attributed and not, scholarly curiosities - the residue of a lifetime's reading which is apparently all he has to show for his decades on earth...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book contemporary fiction philosophy -
![The Poor Mouth: A Bad Story about the Hard Life by Flann O'Brien]()
The Poor Mouth: A Bad Story about the Hard Life by Flann O'Brien
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe Poor Mouth relates the story of one Bonaparte O'Coonassa, born in a cabin in a fictitious village called Corkadoragha in western Ireland equally renowned for its beauty and the abject poverty of its residents. Potatoes constitute the basis of his family's daily fare, and they share both bed and board with the sheep and pigs...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book comedy contemporary -
![Kokoschka's Doll by Afonso Cruz]()
Kokoschka's Doll by Afonso Cruz
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAt the age of forty-two, Bonifaz Vogel begins to hear a voice.But it doesn't belong to the mice or the woodworm, as he first imagines. Nor is it the voice of God, as he comes to believe. It belongs to young Isaac Dresner, who takes refuge in the cellar of Vogel's bird shop on the run from the soldier who shot his best friend... -
![The People Look Like Flowers at Last by Charles Bukowski]()
The People Look Like Flowers at Last by Charles Bukowski
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe People Look like Flowers at Last is the last of five collections of never-before published poetry from the late great Dirty Old Man, Charles Bukowski.In it, he speaks on topics ranging from horse racing to military elephants, lost love to the fear of death. He writes extensively about writing, and about talking to people about writers such as Camus, Hemingway, and Stein... -
![Her Lover by Albert Cohen]()
Her Lover by Albert Cohen
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHandsome, worldly, and intelligent, Solal holds a position of enviable power in 1930s Geneva. But as Under-Secretary-General of the League of Nations, he has become bitterly disillusioned by international affairs and the self-serving people who surround him...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book contemporary dark-academia -
![The Half Brother by Lars Saabye Christensen]()
The Half Brother by Lars Saabye Christensen
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThis Nordic Prize-winning novel, a truly gripping epic, relates the lives of four generations of a unique and strange family with touching intimacy and surreal comedy.Traces four generations of a family marked by the untimely birth of Fred, a misfit and boxer conceived during a devastating rape who forges an unusual friendship with his younger half-brother, Barnum...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction 21st-century adult book contemporary -
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![The Orange Grove by Larry Tremblay]()
The Orange Grove by Larry Tremblay
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratings“A finely sculpted gem . . . Possibly the best novel to come from Quebec in 2013.”—Elle“A fluid and disturbing fable . . . Subtle and extraordinary.”—La Presse“An essential book.”—ChatelaineIn an unnamed and war-torn country, twin brothers Amed and Aziz live in the sanctuary of the family’s orange grove...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction 21st-century book contemporary family -
![Lessons by Ian McEwan]()
Lessons by Ian McEwan
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsWhen the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, eleven-year-old Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. Two thousand miles from his mother's protective love, stranded at an unusual boarding school, his vulnerability attracts piano teacher Miss Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction coming-of-age fiction audiobook contemporary family book -
![Misophonia by Dana Vowinckel]()
Misophonia by Dana Vowinckel
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsPart coming-of-age tale, part family saga, an extraordinary debut novel set between Berlin, Chicago, and Jerusalem “about being Jewish and German, and all the awkwardness that entails” (The Guardian).It’s the hottest of summers in Chicago, and fifteen-year-old Margarita is spending her vacation as usual, under the not-so-watchful eyes of her aging maternal grandparents... -
![El Camino by Miguel Delibes]()
El Camino by Miguel Delibes
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsUpon entering the Royal Spanish Academy in 1975, Miguel Delibes delivered an address which reclaimed El Camino (1950) for the emerging Green movement...Categorized as:
classics coming-of-age historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century audiobook book contemporary -
![The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber & Other Stories by Ernest Hemingway]()
The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber & Other Stories by Ernest Hemingway
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratings"The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber" is a short story set in Africa. It was published in the September 1936 issue of Cosmopolitan magazine concurrently with "The Snows of Kilimanjaro... -
![Gravel Heart by Abdulrazak Gurnah]()
Gravel Heart by Abdulrazak Gurnah
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFrom the winner of the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature, a powerful story of exile, migration, and betrayal.Salim has always known that his father does not want him. Living with his parents and his adored Uncle Amir in a house full of secrets, he is a bookish child, a dreamer haunted by night terrors. It is the 1970s and Zanzibar is changing...
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