18 books like The Brooklyn Follies

What to read after The Brooklyn Follies — books similar to it, matched on shared themes.

Autobiography of a Face Lucy Grealy · 1994 · ★ 4.0 · 230p · ≈ 7h · Moderate Lucy Grealy's ruthless self-examination, rich fantasy life, and great derring-do inform this powerful memoir about the premium we put on beauty and on a woman's face in particular. It took Lucy twenty years of living with a distorted self-image and more than thirty reconstructive procedures before she could come to terms with her appearance after childhood surgery left her jaw disfigured. As a… Shares: Cancer, Patients, Popular works, Biography & Memoir

Spirited Women Petrea King · 1995 · 328p · ≈ 10h · Moderate The acclaimed author of The Secret Women and Things Past Telling returns with an engrossing historical novel about a little known aspect of World War II—the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, the only Black WACs to serve overseas during the conflict. In the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Dorothy Thom, Spelman graduate, librarian and Francophile, joins the Women’s… Shares: Cancer, Popular works

Telling Tales Kylie Cardell · 2015 · 156p · ≈ 5h · Moderate Young writers have historically played a pivotal role in shaping autobiographical genres and this continues into the graphic and digital texts which characterise contemporary life writing. This volume offers a selection of pertinent case studies which illuminate some of the core themes which have come to characterise autobiographical writings of childhood, including: cultural and identity… Shares: Authorship, Biography & Memoir

The Magnolia Palace Fiona Davis · 2022 · ★ 4.0 · 368p · ≈ 12h · Moderate INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Lions of Fifth Avenue, returns with a tantalizing novel about the secrets, betrayal, and murder within one of New York City's most impressive Gilded Age mansions.Eight months since losing her mother in the Spanish flu outbreak of 1919, twenty-one-year-old Lillian Carter's life has completely fallen apart. For… Shares: New york, American literature

Terms of Endearment Larry McMurtry · 1975 · ★ 4.4 · 410p · ≈ 13h · Moderate Aurora is the kind of woman who makes the whole world orbit around her, including a string of devoted suitors. Widowed and overprotective of her daughter, Aurora adapts at her own pace until life sends two enormous challenges her way: Emma’s hasty marriage and subsequent battle with cancer. Shares: Cancer, Patients, American literature

Relampago Danielle Steel · 1995 · ★ 2.5 · 389p · ≈ 12h · Moderate A woman's idyllic life--child, career, successful husband--ends with breast cancer. The protagonist is Alexandra Parker, a New York lawyer who suddenly finds her husband doesn't want a woman who is sick. Fortunately others do, even if she has gone bald from treatment. Shares: Cancer, Patients

Bluebeard Kurt Vonnegut · 1987 · ★ 4.2 · 293p · ≈ 9h · Moderate Broad humor and bitter irony collide in this fictional autobiography of Rabo Karabekian, who, at age seventy-one, wants to be left alone on his Long Island estate with the secret he has locked inside his potato barn. But then a voluptuous young widow badgers Rabo into telling his life story—and Vonnegut in turn tells us the plain, heart-hammering truth about man’s careless fancy to create or… Shares: Authorship, American literature, Biography & Memoir

Living in the Labyrinth/a Personal Journey Through the Maze of Alzheimers Diana Friel McGowin · 1992 · 147p · ≈ 4h · Moderate Living In The Labyrinth is the story of how one woman found the strength and the courage to cope with a devastating disease that has afflicted five million Americans. Far from being an exercise in self-pity or a standard autobiography, this is an unflinching and ultimately uplifting look at a debilitating illness from the inside out. -- From publisher description. Shares: Patients, Biography & Memoir

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Rebecca Skloot · 2009 · ★ 4.1 · 381p · ≈ 12h · Moderate Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor black tobacco farmer whose cells—taken without her knowledge in 1951—became one of the most important tools in medicine, vital for developing the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, in vitro fertilization, and more. Henrietta’s cells have been bought and sold by the billions, yet she remains virtually unknown, and her… Shares: Cancer, Patients, Biography & Memoir

Back on Blossom Street Debbie Macomber · 2007 · ★ 4.3 · 408p · ≈ 13h · Moderate There's a new shop on Seattle's Blossom Street--a flower store called Susannah's Garden, right next door to A Good Yarn. Susannah Nelson, the owner, has just hired an assistant named Colette Blake, a young widow who's obviously hiding a secret--or two.When Susannah and Colette both join Lydia Goetz's new knitting class, they discover that Lydia and her sister, Margaret, have worries of their own.… Shares: Cancer, Patients

No such thing as a bad day Hamilton Jordan · 2000 · 260p · ≈ 8h · Moderate Former White House chief of staff recounts his bouts with non-Hodgkins lymphoma, melanoma, and prostate cancer. Shares: Cancer, Patients, Biography & Memoir

Halfway to forever Karen Kingsbury · 2002 · 430p · ≈ 14h · Moderate You wept with them as they were Waiting for MorningYou shared their Moment of WeaknessNow they face the greatest struggles of their lives.Matt and Hannah Bronzan have found a new life in the face of devastating loss.  Together with Hannah’s daughter, Jenny, they are finally moving forward—toward the adoption of a little girl. A younger sister for Jenny, a daughter for them to love and raise… Shares: Cancer, Patients

Auto/Biography in the Americas Ricia A. Chansky · 2016 · 198p · ≈ 6h · Moderate Auto/Biography in the Americas: Relational Lives brings together scholars from disparate geographic regions, cultural perspectives, linguistic frameworks, and disciplinary backgrounds to explore what connects narrated lives in the Americas. By interweaving scholarship on Afro-diasporic subjectivities, gendered narratives, lives in translation, celebrity auto/biographies, and pedagogical… Shares: American literature, Biography & Memoir

Stick Figure Lori Gottlieb · 2000 · ★ 3.7 · 230p · ≈ 7h · Moderate After happening upon the diary she kept when she was 11 years old, Gottlieb was moved to publish this chronicle of her struggle with anorexia nearly 20 years after she wrote it. In the late 1970s, she lived with her parents and brother in Beverly Hills, where Gottlieb's loneliness and concern about looking attractive to boys swiftly transformed into an obsession with dieting, although she had… Shares: Patients, Biography & Memoir

Ida B. ...and Her Plans to Maximize Fun, Avoid Disaster, and (Possibly) Save the World Katherine Hannigan · 2004 · 256p · ≈ 8h · Moderate In Wisconsin, fourth-grader Ida B spends happy hours being home-schooled and playing in her family's apple orchard, until her mother begins treatment for breast cancer and her parents must sell part of the orchard and send her to public school. Shares: Cancer, Patients

Seize the Day Saul Bellow · 1956 · ★ 3.5 · 118p · ≈ 3h · Moderate is a man in his mid-forties, temporarily living in the Hotel Gloriana on the Upper West Side of New York City, the same hotel in which his father has taken residence for a number of years. He is out of place from the beginning, living in a hotel filled with elderly retirees and continuing throughout the novel to be a figure of isolation amidst crowds. The novella traverses one very important day… Shares: Middle-aged men, New york

Mediating Memory Bunty Avieson · 2017 · 344p · ≈ 11h · Moderate The argument has been made that memoir reflects and augments the narcissistic tendencies of our neo-liberal age. Mediating Memory: Tracing the Limits of Memoir challenges and dismantles that assumption. Focusing on the history, theory and practice of memoir writing, editors Bunty Avieson, Fiona Giles and Sue Joseph provide a thorough and cutting-edge examination of memoir through the lenses of… Shares: Authorship, Biography & Memoir

How to write your own life story Lois Daniel · 1980 · 221p · ≈ 7h · Moderate Writing the story of one's life sounds like a daunting task, but it doesn't have to be. This warmhearted, encouraging guide helps readers record the events of their lives for family and friends. Excerpts from other writers' work are included to exemplify and inspire. Provided are tips on intriguing topics to write about, foolproof tricks to jog your memory, ways to capture stories on paper… Shares: Authorship, Biography & Memoir

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