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Recommendations based on The Accidental Touristby Anne Tyler
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Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant
by Anne Tyler
A family grapple with their disappointments, as they come to terms with the past.
Pearl Tull is a rigid perfectionist. She has three children with her husband, traveling salesman Beck, who abandons the family. After Beck leaves, Pearl struggles to maintain a front as if nothing is ... (Wikipedia)
A Patchwork Planet
by Anne Tyler
A young man's journey of self-discovery and finding his place in the world.
The novel is narrated by 30-year-old Barnaby, whose life has gone off the rails since he was caught robbing neighborhood homes as an adolescent. To the despair of his distant father, his social ... (Wikipedia)
Saint Maybe
by Anne Tyler
A man's journey of atonement, struggling to make amends for his past mistakes.
Tyler's plot explores the ways ordinary people react to disastrous events with quietly heroic behavior. When seventeen-year-old Ian Bedloe confronts his older brother Danny with his belief that the ... (Wikipedia)
A Prayer for Owen Meany
by John Irving
A boy's search for faith, set against a backdrop of unlikely events.
The story is narrated by John Wheelwright, a former citizen of New Hampshire who has become a voluntary expatriate from the United States, having settled in Toronto , Ontario , Canada and taken on ... (Wikipedia)
The Prince of Tides
by Pat Conroy
A man's search for solace and understanding in his troubled family's past.
Tom Wingo is a middle-aged man with a wife and three young daughters who has recently lost his job as a high school English teacher and football coach. He learns that his twin sister, Savannah, has ... (Wikipedia)
The World According to Garp
by John Irving
A humorous and heart-wrenching journey of life, love and literature.
This is the life and times of T. S. Garp, the bastard son of Jenny Fields—a feminist leader ahead of her times. This is the life and death of a famous mother and her almost-famous son; theirs is a ... (Goodreads)
The Thorn Birds
by Colleen McCullough
A powerful tale of forbidden love, set in rural Australia in the early 20th century.
The story begins in New Zealand on 8 December 1915, the fourth birthday of Meghann "Meggie" Cleary who is the only daughter of Padriac ("Paddy"), an Irish farm labourer, and Fiona ("Fee"), his wife. ... (Wikipedia)
Stones from the River
by Ursula Hegi
A dwarf girl navigates life in a small German town during WWII, facing discrimination and secrets.
Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780684844770 From the highly acclaimed, award-winning author of Floating in My Mother's Palm comes a stunning novel about ordinary people living in extraordinary ... (Goodreads)
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)
Like Water for Chocolate
by Laura Esquivel
Magical tale of forbidden love, crossed by cultural and family traditions.
The book is divided into 12 sections named after the months of the year, starting in January and ending in December. Each section begins with a Mexican recipe . The chapters connect each dish to an ... (Wikipedia)
Sophie's Choice
by William Styron
A survivor of the Holocaust is confronted with a devastating moral dilemma.
Stingo, a novelist who is recalling the summer when he began his first novel, has been fired from his low-level reader's job at the publisher McGraw-Hill and has moved into a cheap boarding house in ... (Wikipedia)
Empire Falls
by Richard Russo
A small town's citizens struggle to find meaning and find their place in a rapidly changing world.
Set in the decaying, nearly bankrupt, small town of Empire Falls, Maine, this is the story of the unassuming manager of the Empire Grill, Miles Roby, who has spent his life in the town. The town, and ... (Wikipedia)
Exodus
by Leon Uris
The story of the birth of Israel, following the lives of Jewish refugees from WWII to the establishment of the state.
In 1946 American foreign correspondent Mark Parker and American nurse Kitty Fremont reunite as old friends. Kitty is an American volunteer at the Karaolos internment camp on Cyprus , where thousands ... (Wikipedia)
The Shipping News
by Annie Proulx
A man's attempt to rebuild his life in a small Newfoundland town, discovering compassion and joy.
The story centers around Quoyle, a newspaper reporter from upstate New York , whose father had emigrated from Newfoundland . Shortly after his parents' joint suicide, Quoyle's unfaithful and abusive ... (Wikipedia)
Pigs in Heaven
by Barbara Kingsolver
A young girl and her adoptive mother fight for their family's rights and the power of love.
Mother and adopted daughter, Taylor and Turtle Greer, are back in this spellbinding sequel about family, heartbreak and love. Six-year-old Turtle Greer witnesses a freak accident at the Hoover Dam ... (Goodreads)
Howards End
by E.M. Forster
Exploration of the societal divides in early 20th century England, and the consequences of class prejudice.
Howards End is a novel by E. M. Forster about social conventions, codes of conduct and relationships in turn-of-the-century England. A strong-willed and intelligent woman refuses to allow the ... (Goodreads)
Bel Canto
by Ann Patchett
A story of redemption and transformation amidst a hostage crisis.
Set in an unspecified South American country, , the story begins at a birthday party thrown at the country's vice presidential home in honor of Katsumi Hosokawa, the visiting chairman of a large ... (Wikipedia)
Angle of Repose
by Wallace Stegner
A man's search for his ancestors and their stories, leading to a journey of self-discovery.
Lyman Ward narrates a century after the fact. Lyman interprets the story at times and leaves gaps that he points out at other times. Some of the disappointments of his life, including his divorce, ... (Wikipedia)
Cutting for Stone
by Abraham Verghese
A sweeping journey of two twin brothers and their search for identity, belonging and family.
The story is told by the protagonist, Marion Stone. He and his conjoined twin Shiva are born at Mission Hospital (called "Missing" in accordance with the local pronunciation), Addis Ababa , in ... (Wikipedia)
Cat's Eye
by Margaret Atwood
A woman reflects on her childhood and her complex relationships with her peers.
After being lured back to her childhood home of Toronto for a retrospective show of her art, Elaine reminisces about her childhood. At the age of eight she becomes friends with Carol and Grace, and, ... (Wikipedia)
A Thousand Acres
by Jane Smiley
A family's story of death and inheritance, exposing secrets of their past.
Larry Cook is an aging farmer who decides to incorporate his farm, handing complete and joint ownership to his three daughters, Ginny, Rose, and Caroline. When the youngest daughter objects, she is ... (Wikipedia)
A Fine Balance
by Rohinton Mistry
A gripping story of four unlikely lives intertwined in the tumult of India's caste system.
The book exposes the changes in Indian society from independence in 1947 to the Emergency called by Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi . Mistry was generally critical of Indira Gandhi in the book. ... (Wikipedia)
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
by Betty Smith
A coming of age story set in Brooklyn, depicting a young girl's struggles and growth.
The novel is split into five "books", each covering a different period in the characters' lives. Book One opens in 1912 and introduces 11-year-old Francie Nolan, who lives in the Williamsburg ... (Wikipedia)
The Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen
A family drama exploring the complexities of relationships, aging and life’s choices.
The novel shifts back and forth through the late 20th century, intermittently following spouses Alfred and Enid Lambert as they raise their children Gary, Chip, and Denise in the traditional ... (Wikipedia)
She's Come Undone
by Wally Lamb
A young woman's trial-filled journey to self-acceptance and self-preservation.
Dolores Price is heartbroken when her handsome, but irresponsible father, Tony, leaves their suburban home for another woman. She and her mother, Bernice, move into her uptight Catholic grandmother's ... (Wikipedia)
A Map of the World
by Jane Hamilton
A story of tragedy, resilience and redemption, revealing the fragility of life.
One unremarkable June morning, Alice Goodwin is, as usual, trying to keep in check both her temper and her tendency to blame herself for her family's shortcomings. When the Goodwins took over the ... (Goodreads)
Song of Solomon
by Toni Morrison
A tale of family, heritage, and identity, exploring the power of memory and its impact on the present.
Song of Solomon opens with the death of Robert Smith, an insurance agent and member of The Seven Days, an organization that kills white people in retaliation for the racial killing of black people. ... (Wikipedia)
The God of Small Things
by Arundhati Roy
A moving story of two siblings growing up in India, exploring love, politics, and class.
The year is 1969. In the state of Kerala, on the southernmost tip of India, a skyblue Plymouth with chrome tailfins is stranded on the highway amid a Marxist workers' demonstration. Inside the car ... (Goodreads)
The Winds of War
by Herman Wouk
The story of a family caught in the middle of World War II and their struggles to survive.
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 ... (Barnes & Noble)
Ethan Frome
by Edith Wharton
Tale of doomed romance set against a harsh New England winter.
The novel is a framed narrative . The framing story concerns an unnamed male narrator spending a winter in Starkfield while in the area on business. He spots a limping, quiet man around the village, ... (Wikipedia)
