18 books like The American
The Four Winds
Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the future seems bleak. Until the night she meets Rafe Martinelli and decides to change the direction of her life. With her reputation in ruin, there is…
Shares: History
War and remembrance
From the Middle East, to Moscow, to Hitler's death camps, the members of the Henry family face grave danger as they fight in the Second World War.
Shares: Community pick
The Winds of War
Follows the various members of the Henry family as they become involved in the events preceeding America's involvement in World War II.
Like no other masterpiece of historical fiction, Herman Wouk's sweeping epic of World War II is the great novel of America's Greatest Generation.
Wouk's spellbinding narrative captures the tide of global events, as well as all the drama, romance, heroism, and…
Shares: Community pick
The Sound and the Fury
In many ways this was an experimental novel, using several differing narrative styles. Divided into four parts, the author relates the same episodes from four different viewpoints, using a different style for each. The story concerns various members of a Southern family, once wealthy landowners but now struggling to maintain their reputation.
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles, Aristocracy
Daisy Miller
A beautiful American girl, Daisy Miller, is pursued by the sophisticated Winterbourne, who moves in fairly conservative circles. Their courtship is frowned upon by the other Americans they meet in Switzerland and Italy because Daisy is too vivacious and flirtatious and neither belongs to, nor follows the rules of, their society. The novella is a comment on American and European attitudes towards…
Shares: Americans in fiction, Americans, Travel, History
Wicked Widow
Madeline Deveridge is all too aware of the whispers behind her back, the rumors that she dispatched her husband to the next world and concealed her crime. But Madeline has a far more pressing problem than being called the Wicked Widow. She fears that she and her beloved aunt are being haunted!
Shares: Widows in fiction, Widows
Five Days in Paris
Peter Haskell has everything.. power, position, a career and a family that mean everything to him and for which he has sacrificed a great deal. Compromise has been key, and integrity is the base on which he lives. Olivia Thatcher, the wife of a famous senator, is trapped in a web of duty and obligation, married to a man she once loved and no longer even knows. Peter and Olivia meet in Paris,…
Shares: Americans in fiction, Americans, Travel
Lisey's Story
Two years after her husband's death, Lisey Landon decides it's time to go through his office to clear out his papers. Scott Landon was a bestselling novelist and Lisey has been besieged by people wanting to buy any of his unpublished work but she is determined not to let that happen. As she begins the process of cleaning, she is contacted by an unsavory character who claims that if she does not…
Shares: Widows in fiction, Widows
A Widow for One Year
“One night when she was four and sleeping in the bottom bunk of her bunk bed, Ruth Cole woke to the sound of lovemaking—it was coming from her parents’ bedroom.”
This sentence opens John Irving’s ninth novel, A Widow for One Year, a story of a family marked by tragedy. Ruth Cole is a complex, often self-contradictory character—a “difficult” woman. By no means is she conventionally “nice,” but…
Shares: Widows in fiction, Widows
Red Lily
Three women meet at a crossroads in their lives, each searching for new ways to grow - and find in each other the courage to take chances and embrace the future.
With the undying support of her friends, Hayley and her new daughter have laid down roots in a new town. But when one of those friendships blossoms into something more, Hayley must choose between two different kinds of love...
Shares: Widows in fiction, Widows
Tender Is the Night
A psychiatrist, Dick Diver, treats and eventually marries a wealthy patient, Nicole. Eventually, this marriage destroys him.
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles
The Red Badge of Courage
The Red Badge of Courage is a war novel by American author Stephen Crane (1871–1900). Taking place during the American Civil War, the story is about a young private of the Union Army, Henry Fleming, who flees from the field of battle. Overcome with shame, he longs for a wound, a "red badge of courage," to counteract his cowardice. When his regiment once again faces the enemy, Henry acts as…
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles, History
A Passage to India
When Adela Quested and her elderly companion Mrs Moore arrive in the Indian town of Chandrapore, they quickly feel trapped by its insular and prejudiced 'Anglo-Indian' community. Determined to escape the parochial English enclave and explore the 'real India', they seek the guidance of the charming and mercurial Dr Aziz, a cultivated Indian Muslim. But a mysterious incident occurs while they are…
Shares: Culture conflict, History
The Town
Flem Snopes goes on to higher things in Jefferson, Yoknapatawpha's county seat.
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles
Intruder in the Dust
Using his preferred stream-of-consciousness style the author tells a story of a black farmer in Mississippi accused of murdering a white man.
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles
Absalom, Absalom!
The story of Thomas Sutpen, an enigmatic stranger who came to Jefferson in the early 1830s to wrest his mansion out of the muddy bottoms of the north Mississippi wilderness. He was a man, Faulkner said, "who wanted sons and the sons destroyed him."
Shares: American Manuscripts, Facsimiles
A Tramp Abroad
Twain's account of traveling in Europe. A Tramp Abroad sparkles with the author's shrewd observations and highly opinionated comments on Old World culture. A Tramp Abroad includes among its adventures a voyage by raft down the Neckar and an ascent of Mont Blanc by telescope, as well as the author's attempts to study art.
Shares: Americans in fiction, Americans, Travel, History
The judgment of Paris
In post-war Europe, fresh-out-of-law-school Philip Warren takes a year to discover his future. In this classic coming-of-age story, Philip journeys through various affairs, misadventures, and cities full of unforgettable characters that prompt his self-discovery and lessons on taking pleasure in both love and life.
Shares: Americans in fiction, Americans