18 books like Don't Cry for Me

What to read after Don't Cry for Me — books similar to it, matched on shared themes.

The fool of quality Henry Brooke · 1906 · 302p · ≈ 10h · Challenging First published in 1906, The Fool of Quality; a picaresque and sentimental novel by the Irish writer Henry Brooke, is the only one of his works which has enjoyed any great reputation. The somewhat shapeless plot is an account of the doings of young Harry Clinton, who, rejected by his decadent and aristocratic father, is educated on enlightened principles by his philanthropic uncle. Thus equipped… Shares: Pères et fils, Fathers and sons

Memorial Bryan Washington · 2020 · ★ 3.9 · 336p · ≈ 11h · Moderate Benson and Mike are two young guys who live together in Houston. Mike is a Japanese American chef at a Mexican restaurant and Benson's a Black day care teacher, and they've been together for a few years—good years—but now they're not sure why they're still a couple. There's the sex, sure, and the meals Mike cooks for Benson, and, well, they love each other. But when Mike finds out his estranged… Shares: Pères et fils, Fathers and sons

Soul kiss Shay Youngblood · 1997 · ★ 4.0 · 207p · ≈ 6h · Moderate Left by her mother in the care of her aunts at the age of seven, Mariah dreams of her mother's return and of the father she has never met, eventually beginning a correspondence with him that leads to a tumultuous visit when she turns fourteen. A first novel. Shares: Familles noires américaines, African American families

Dirty Jersey Phillip Thomas Duck · 2008 · 253p · ≈ 8h · Moderate A chance encounter with Fiasco, one of the hottest rappers around, gives Eric Posey entry into a world where he is suddenly cool and has access to anything he's ever wanted, for the price of his sister, Kenya. Shares: African American families, African American fiction

The emperor of Ocean Park Stephen L. Carter · 2002 · ★ 4.0 · 657p · ≈ 21h · Moderate n his triumphant fictional debut, Stephen Carter combines a large-scale, riveting novel of suspense with the saga of a unique family. The Emperor of Ocean Park is set in two privileged worlds: the upper crust African American society of the Eastern seabord--families who summer at Martha's Vineyard--and the inner circle of an Ivy League law school. Talcott Garland is a successful law professor,… Shares: African American families, Fathers and sons

The Between Tananarive Due · 1995 · ★ 4.0 · 288p · ≈ 9h · Moderate The Between is a 1995 horror novel by Tananarive Due and her debut novel. It follows a middle-class African-American husband and father who has lived with the belief that he cheated death as a child. When his family becomes the target of racist threats, he suffers a psychological breakdown intertwined with supernatural elements that blur the boundary between reality and death. It was nominated… Shares: Familles noires américaines, African American families

Love Story Erich Segal · 1970 · ★ 3.7 · 131p · ≈ 4h · Moderate Oliver Barrett IV, a wealthy jock from a stuffy WASP family on his way to a Harvard degree and a career in law . . . Jenny Cavilleri, a sharp-tongued, working-class beauty studying music at Radcliffe . . . Opposites in nearly every way, Oliver and Jenny are kindred spirits from vastly different worlds. Falling deeply and powerfully, their attraction to one another defies everything they have ever… Shares: Terminally ill, Fathers and sons

The Reformatory Tananarive Due · 2023 · ★ 4.4 · 576p · ≈ 19h · Moderate Gracetown, Florida - June 1950 Twelve-year-old Robbie Stephens, Jr., is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, a reformatory, for kicking the son of the largest landowner in town in defense of his older sister, Gloria. So begins Robbie’s journey further into the terrors of the Jim Crow South and the very real horror of the school they call The Reformatory. Robbie has a talent… Shares: African American fiction, Historical Fiction

The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison · 1970 · ★ 4.1 · 195p · ≈ 6h · Moderate Each night Pecola prayed for blue eyes. In her eleven years, no one had ever noticed Pecola. But with blue eyes, she thought, everything would be different. She would be so pretty that her parents would stop fighting. Her father would stop drinking. Her brother would stop running away. If only she could be beautiful. If only people would look at her. When someone finally did, it was her father,… Shares: African American fiction, Historical Fiction

Roots Alex Haley · 1861 · ★ 4.4 · 476p · ≈ 15h · Challenging Roots is a novel written by Alex Haley and published in 1976. It portrays the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery in the United States, and follows his life and the lives of his alleged descendants in the U.S. down to Haley. The release of the novel, combined with its hugely popular television adaptation, Roots (1977), led to a cultural… Shares: African American families, Historical Fiction

Home as found James Fenimore Cooper · 1800 · ★ 5.0 · 432p · ≈ 14h · Challenging "No society, dear!--Why you were at the Henderson's, and the Morgan's, and the Drewett's; three of the greatest _réunions_ that we have had in two winters!"' "I did not know that you meant those unpleasant crowds, by society". "Unpleasant crowds! Why, child, that is society, is it not?' "Not what I have been taught to consider such; I rather think it would be better to call it company". "And is… Shares: Historical Fiction

The Border Empire Ralph Compton · 1997 · ★ 4.0 · 352p · ≈ 11h · Moderate Wes Stone was a lawman—until the Sandlin gang gunned down his legendary father. Now, he's giving up his badge for vengeance... Shares: Historical Fiction

Yellow Wife Sadeqa Johnson · 2021 · ★ 4.4 · 288p · ≈ 9h · Moderate Born on a plantation in Charles City, Virginia, Pheby Delores Brown has lived a relatively sheltered life. Shielded by her mother’s position as the estate’s medicine woman and cherished by the Master’s sister, she is set apart from the others on the plantation, belonging to neither world. She’d been promised freedom on her eighteenth birthday, but instead of the idyllic life she imagined with… Shares: African American fiction, Historical Fiction

The Wings of the Dove Henry James · 1902 · ★ 3.8 · 457p · ≈ 15h · Challenging Beautiful Kate Croy may have been left penniless by her relatives, but her bold, ambitious nature ensures she will not succumb meekly to a life of poverty. If the financial circumstances of Merton Densher, the man she is passionately in love with, are not sufficient to secure her future, perhaps her cunning will. So when Milly Theale arrives in Europe from America, laden with wealth but also… Shares: Terminally ill, Historical Fiction

Pan Michael An historical novel Henryk Sienkiewicz · 1893 · ★ 4.2 · 542p · ≈ 18h · Challenging The third and final book of Henryk Sienkiewicz’s Trilogy takes a closer and more intimate look at one of the series’ protagonists: Pan Michael Volodyovski. The Polish Commonwealth has been through intense periods of war, and the peace that follows leaves one of its greatest heroes, Pan Michael, finally free to marry his beloved Panna Anusia. But in a twist of fate, she falls ill and dies, leaving… Shares: Historical Fiction

St. George and St. Michael George MacDonald · 1876 · 450p · ≈ 15h · Challenging It was the middle of autumn, and had rained all day. Through the lozenge-panes of the wide oriel window the world appeared in the slowly gathering dusk not a little dismal. The drops that clung trickling to the dim glass added rain and gloom to the landscape beyond, whither the eye passed, as if vaguely seeking that help in the distance, which the dripping hollyhocks and sodden sunflowers… Shares: Historical Fiction

A Bitter Cut Anna Lee Huber · 2026 Lady Kiera Darby plans to spend the summer reconnecting with friends and family in anticipation of the betrothal of her beloved brother. But when a future in-law is implicated in a murder, the party takes a deadly turn. . . .July 1833. Lady Darby and her dashing husband, Sebastian Gage, are settling into their newly renovated home at Bevington Park in Warkwickshire with their young daughter. With… Shares: Historical Fiction

Only Time Will Tell Jeffrey Archer · 2011 · ★ 4.5 · 400p · ≈ 13h · Moderate "From the popular author of Kane and Abel and A Prisoner of Birth comes 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." A dock worker in Bristol, Harry never knew his father, but he learns about life on the docks from his uncle who expects… Shares: Fathers and sons, Historical Fiction

About the book Don't Cry for Me →