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Recommendations based on Paint it Blackby Janet Fitch
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White Oleander
by Janet Fitch
A young girl's struggles to survive in a series of foster homes, finding strength in her resilience.
Astrid Magnussen is a 12-year-old girl living in Los Angeles , California with her mother, Ingrid Magnussen, a self-centered and eccentric poet. Astrid's father, Klaus Anders, left before Astrid was ... (Wikipedia)
The Hour I First Believed
by Wally Lamb
A teacher's life is shattered by the Columbine shooting, leading to a journey of self-discovery and healing.
When high school teacher Caelum Quirk and his wife, Maureen, move to Littleton, Colorado, they both get jobs at Columbine High School. In April 1999, while Caelum is away, Maureen finds herself in ... (Barnes & Noble)
The Perfect Son
by Barbara Claypole White
A mother struggles to understand and help her son with OCD while dealing with her own past.
From a distance, Felix Fitzwilliam, the son of an old English family, is a good husband and father. But, obsessed with order and routine, he’s a prisoner to perfection. Disengaged from the emotional ... (Barnes & Noble)
A Complicated Kindness
by Miriam Toews
A teenage girl navigates life in a strict Mennonite community while dealing with family dysfunction and questioning her faith.
The novel is set in a small religious Mennonite town called East Village, generally considered to be a fictionalized version of Toews' hometown of Steinbach , Manitoba . The narrator is Nomi Nickel, ... (Wikipedia)
Geek Love
by Katherine Dunn
A family of self-made circus freaks navigates love, loyalty, and morality in a world that shuns them for their differences.
The novel takes place in two interwoven , time periods: the first deals with the Binewski children's constant struggle against each other through life. They especially have to deal with the ... (Wikipedia)
Back Roads
by Tawni O'Dell
After his mother's imprisonment, a young man struggles to care for his three younger sisters in a small Pennsylvania town.
Harley Altmyer should be in college drinking beer and chasing girls. He should be freed from his stifling coal town with its lack of jobs and no sense of humor. Instead he's marooned in the ... (Wikipedia)
The Story Sisters
by Alice Hoffman
Three sisters navigate the complexities of life, love, and loss through their shared passion for storytelling and magical realism.
The Story Sisters charts the lives of three sisters–Elv, Claire, and Meg. Each has a fate she must meet alone: one on a country road, one in the streets of Paris, and one in the corridors of her own ... (Goodreads)
A Home at the End of the World
by Michael Cunningham
Childhood friends Jonathan and Bobby navigate love, loss, and self-discovery in New York City and rural Woodstock.
Bobby had grown up in a home in suburban Cleveland, Ohio during the 1960s and 1970s where partying and drugs were a recurring theme. He has already witnessed the death of his mother and beloved older ... (Wikipedia)
The White Tiger
by Aravind Adiga
An exploration of the Indian class system, told from the perspective of a lower-caste man.
The entire novel is narrated through letters by Balram Halwai to the Premier of China, who will soon be visiting India. Balram is an Indian man from an impoverished background, born in the village of ... (Wikipedia)
Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere
by Mike Carey
A journey of magical realism through the hidden world of London Below.
Graphic adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere collects all nine issues of the Vertigo maxiseries. An ordinary Londoner stops to help an enigmatic girl and joins a battle to save the strange ... (Goodreads)
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
by Gregory Maguire
A retelling of the classic Cinderella story from the perspective of one of the stepsisters, exploring themes of beauty, identity, and societal expectations.
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister tells the story of Iris, the plain younger daughter of Margarethe Fisher, as she takes care of her mentally challenged older sister Ruth and her beautiful stepsister ... (Wikipedia)
Son of a Witch
by Gregory Maguire
A story of redemption set in a fantastical world, as a young man searches for his true identity.
Liir hid in the shadows of the castle after Dorothy did in the Witch. Left for dead in a gully, the teen is shattered in spirit and body. But silent novice Candle tends him at the Cloister of Saint ... (Goodreads)
Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk
by David Sedaris
Collection of humorous animal-based stories filled with wit and insight.
Featuring, David Sedaris's, unique blend of hilarity and heart, this new collection of keen-eyed animal-themed tales is an utter delight. Though the characters may not be human, the situations in ... (Goodreads)
Jemima J
by Jane Green
A woman's journey to find self-acceptance and fulfillment in a world of expectations.
Jemima Jones is overweight. About one hundred pounds overweight. Treated like a maid by her thin and social-climbing roommates, and lorded over by the beautiful Geraldine (less talented but better ... (Goodreads)
Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging
by Louise Rennison
A comedic coming-of-age story of a teenage girl, navigating the ups and downs of teenage life.
Georgia, a teenager, lives with her mother, father, 3-year-old sister Libby, and her wild cat, Angus, whom the family found on a holiday to Scotland. Georgia bumps into the popular and attractive ... (Wikipedia)
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
by Michael Chabon
Two cousins create a comic book superhero and find success and adventure in 1940s New York.
The novel begins in 1939 with the arrival of 19-year-old Josef "Joe" Kavalier as a refugee in New York City , where he comes to live with his 17-year-old cousin, Sammy Klayman. With the help of his ... (Wikipedia)
Valley of the Dolls
by Jacqueline Susann
Three women's pursuit of fame and fortune, their struggles with addiction and ambition.
In 1945, beautiful ingenue Anne Welles moves to New York to start a new life, seeking to escape the ennui of her hometown of Lawrenceville, Massachusetts . She quickly finds employment as a secretary ... (Wikipedia)
The Night Watch
by Sarah Waters
A suspenseful story of ordinary people living through the turmoil of World War II.
Kay The novel begins with Kay Langrish-a woman broken by the war. She spends her days locked in her room in London, watching her landlord's patients arrive and leave at precisely the same hours every ... (Wikipedia)
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
by Fannie Flagg
A nostalgic tale of friendship, courage and resilience set in the American South.
Throughout the novel the narrator and time period change, and the reader relies on the chapters' headings to establish the date and the source of the chapter. Some of the narration comes in the form ... (Wikipedia)
Super Sad True Love Story
by Gary Shteyngart
A darkly comic exploration of love in a technologically-driven world.
The son of a Russian immigrant , protagonist Leonard (Lenny) Abramov, a middle-aged, middle class, otherwise unremarkable man whose mentality is still in the past century, falls madly in love with ... (Wikipedia)
In a Dark, Dark Wood
by Ruth Ware
A woman discovers the secrets of her past while attending a weekend getaway with old friends.
In a dark, dark wood Nora hasn't seen Clare for ten years. Not since Nora walked out of school one day and never went back. There was a dark, dark house Until, out of the blue, an invitation to ... (Goodreads)
Worlds' End
by Neil Gaiman
A mythical road trip through a surreal landscape of forgotten stories and folk tales.
A "reality storm" draws an unusual cast of characters together. They take shelter in a tavern, where they amuse each other with their life stories. Although Morpheus is never a focus in these ... (Goodreads)
Plain Truth
by Jodi Picoult
A young Amish woman faces the consequences of a difficult decision, navigating the boundaries of faith, justice, and freedom.
The novel recounts the story of how a dead infant found on an Amish farm rocks the entire community. As the police investigate the death, they discover that the baby was not stillborn , but instead ... (Wikipedia)
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle
by David Wroblewski
An epic tale of family and loyalty set in a rural Wisconsin landscape.
Forte's Children Edgar comes from a line of dog breeders. After buying a farm, his grandfather, John Sawtelle, rents out the farmland and starts dog breeding . He and his wife have two sons, Edgar's ... (Wikipedia)
Everything for Us
by Michelle Leighton
A steamy romance between a wealthy bad boy and a girl from the wrong side of the tracks. Secrets and danger threaten their love.
When it comes to passion this hot, it’s all or nothing. Olivia Townsend’s wealthy cousin Marissa had everything a girl could ask for—a great job, a privileged life, and all the friends she wanted. ... (Goodreads)
The Likeness
by Tana French
A murder investigation reveals secrets of a young woman's past, threatening her present.
The story follows the efforts of detective Cassie Maddox to determine the circumstances surrounding the death of Lexie Madison, a young woman who is her doppelgänger . , The dead woman not only ... (Wikipedia)
A Dirty Job
by Christopher Moore
A comedic journey of a man's life as he is forced to confront death and the underworld.
The story centers on Charlie Asher, a "beta-male" (as opposed to " alpha-male ") who leads a satisfying life as the owner and proprietor of a second-hand store in San Francisco. At the moment when ... (Wikipedia)
The Marriage Plot
by Jeffrey Eugenides
A young woman's exploration of love, life, and her place in the world.
It's the early 1980s - the country is in a deep recession, and life after college is harder than ever. In the cafés on College Hill, the wised-up kids are inhaling Derrida and listening to the ... (Goodreads)
Breaking Nova
by Jessica Sorensen
A story of two broken souls, Nova and Quinton, who find solace in each other but struggle to overcome their past traumas.
From the #1, New York Times, bestselling author of the Ella and Micha series comes a powerful story of love, healing, and impossible choices . . . BREAKING NOVA Nova Reed used to have dreams-of ... (Barnes & Noble)
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
by Alvin Schwartz
Collection of tales of horror and the supernatural, to be shared with friends around a campfire.
This spooky addition to Alvin Schwartz's popular books on American folklore is filled with tales of eerie horror and dark revenge that will make you jump with fright. There is a story here for ... (Goodreads)
