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Recommendations based on Fair and Tender Ladiesby Lee Smith
* statistically, based on millions of data-points provided by fellow humans
The Shoemaker's Wife
by Adriana Trigiani
Two Italian immigrants forge a love story amongst the struggles of making a life in America.
The majestic and haunting beauty of the Italian Alps is the setting of the first meeting of Enza, a practical beauty, and Ciro, a strapping mountain boy, who meet as teenagers, despite growing up in ... (Goodreads)
Cold Mountain
by Charles Frazier
A Confederate soldier's homecoming journey, filled with danger and adventure.
The novel opens in a Confederate military hospital near Raleigh, North Carolina , where Inman is recovering from battle wounds during the American Civil War . The soldier is tired of fighting for a ... (Wikipedia)
The Mammoth Hunters
by Jean M. Auel
A young woman's adventure, struggling to survive and forge her path in a prehistoric world.
This book picks up where, The Valley of Horses, ends; Ayla and Jondalar meet a group known as the Mamutoi, or Mammoth Hunters, with whom they live for a period of time. As the group's name suggests, ... (Wikipedia)
Flight of the Sparrow
by Amy Belding Brown
Mary Rowlandson, a Puritan woman, is captured by Native Americans and must navigate a new way of life.
She suspects that she has changed too much to ever fit easily into English society again. The wilderness has now become her home. She can interpret the cries of birds. She has seen vistas that have ... (Goodreads)
Their Eyes Were Watching God
by Zora Neale Hurston
A woman's journey of self-discovery, liberation and empowerment.
Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person – no mean feat for a black woman in the '30s. Janie's quest for identity takes her through three ... (Goodreads)
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)
Charms for the Easy Life
by Kaye Gibbons
Three generations of women in the South navigate love, family, and independence in the early 20th century.
A family without men, the Birches live gloriously offbeat lives in the lush, green backwoods of North Carolina. Radiant, headstrong Sophia and her shy, brilliant daughter, Margaret, possess powerful ... (Goodreads)
Ellen Foster
by Kaye Gibbons
A young girl's struggle to find a permanent home and family in the face of abuse and neglect.
Ellen is an only child who does not have a real home, even at the time when both her parents are still alive. Her father is " trash " and has a drinking problem , and the whole atmosphere is one of ... (Wikipedia)
The Valley of Horses
by Jean M. Auel
Prehistoric adventure of a young woman navigating a dangerous, but beautiful landscape.
The book starts off from the events at the end of, The Clan of the Cave Bear, detailing the life of a young Cro-Magnon woman named Ayla who has just been exiled from the Clan, the band of ... (Wikipedia)
The Widow of the South
by Robert Hicks
Based on a true story, a woman struggles to cope with the aftermath of the Civil War and the Battle of Franklin.
Tennessee, 1864. On a late autumn day, near a little town called Franklin, 10,000 men will soon lie dead or dying in a battle that will change many lives for ever. None will be more changed than ... (Goodreads)
The Pecan Man
by Cassie Dandridge Selleck
A woman's journey of self-discovery, as she uncovers the truth about her family's past.
The Pecan Man is a work of Southern fiction whose first chapter was the First Place winner of the 2006 CNW/FFWA Florida State Writing Competition in the Unpublished Novel category. In the summer of ... (Goodreads)
The Age of Innocence
by Edith Wharton
A romantic drama set in the high society of 19th century New York, exploring the limits of love and longing.
Newland Archer, gentleman lawyer and heir to one of New York City's most illustrious families, happily anticipates his highly desirable marriage to the sheltered and beautiful May Welland. Yet he ... (Wikipedia)
Cannery Row
by John Steinbeck
An exploration of the lives of the inhabitants of a small town in California.
Cannery Row has a simple premise: Mack and his friends are trying to do something nice for their friend Doc, who has been good to them without asking for reward. Mack hits on the idea that they ... (Wikipedia)
A River Runs Through it and Other Stories
by Norman Maclean
A series of stories about the life of a family and the relationship between two brothers.
Just as Norman Maclean writes at the end of "A River Runs through It" that he is "haunted by waters," so have readers been haunted by his novella. A retired English professor who began writing ... (Goodreads)
The Lake House
by Kate Morton
A woman's search for answers to the mystery of her mother's disappearance, uncovering secrets of a long-lost family.
An abandoned house... June 1933, and sixteen-year-old Alice Edevane is preparing for her family's Midsummer Eve party at their country home, Loeanneth. But by the time midnight strikes and fireworks ... (Goodreads)
The Kitchen God's Wife
by Amy Tan
A Chinese-American woman's story of family, culture, and personal growth.
The novel opens with the narrative voice of Pearl Louie Brandt, the American-born daughter of a Chinese mother and a Chinese-American father, living in San Jose, California . Pearl's mother, Winnie ... (Wikipedia)
Our Souls at Night
by Kent Haruf
An elderly couple's exploration of love, loneliness, and companionship.
A spare yet eloquent, bittersweet yet inspiring story of a man and a woman who, in advanced age, come together to wrestle with the events of their lives and their hopes for the imminent future. In ... (Goodreads)
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)
Year of Wonders
by Geraldine Brooks
A small English village grapples with the effects of the bubonic plague.
When an infected bolt of cloth carries plague from London to an isolated village, a housemaid named Anna Frith emerges as an unlikely heroine and healer. Through Anna's eyes we follow the story of ... (Goodreads)
These Is My Words: The Diary of Sarah Agnes Prine, 1881-1901
by Nancy E. Turner
A young woman's struggle for independence, chronicles her journey through the American Southwest.
“Belongs on your must-read list. This novel is a gem.” — Omaha World-Herald Nancy E. Turner's unforgettable, These Is My Words, melds the sweeping adventures and dramatic landscapes of, Lonesome ... (Barnes & Noble)
Child of God
by Cormac McCarthy
A violent and disturbing story of a man's descent into depravity.
Set in mountainous Sevier County, Tennessee , in the 1960s, Child of God tells the story of Lester Ballard, a dispossessed, violent man whom the narrator describes as "a child of God much like ... (Wikipedia)
The History of Love
by Nicole Krauss
A journey through a web of intertwining stories, searching for the meaning of love.
Approximately 70 years before the present, the 10-year-old Polish-Jewish Leopold (Leo) Gursky falls in love with his neighbor Alma Mereminski. The two begin a relationship that develops over the ... (Wikipedia)
The Supreme Macaroni Company
by Adriana Trigiani
A young woman navigates the challenges of balancing her Italian-American heritage and modern life while running a family business.
New York Times bestselling author Adriana Trigiani takes us from the cobblestone streets of Greenwich Village to lush New Orleans to Italy and back again, from the tricky dynamics between Old World ... (Barnes & Noble)
Prodigal Summer
by Barbara Kingsolver
Three interconnected stories of nature, romance, and family in the Appalachian Mountains.
Prodigal Summer tells the story of a small town in Appalachia during a single, humid summer, when three interweaving stories of love, loss and family unfold against the backdrop of the lush wildness ... (Wikipedia)
The Queen of the Big Time
by Adriana Trigiani
A coming-of-age story of a young Italian-American girl in the early 20th century, navigating love, family, and tradition.
Known and loved around the world for her sweeping Big Stone Gap trilogy and the instant New York Times bestseller Lucia, Lucia, Adriana Trigiani returns to the charm and drama of small-town life with ... (Goodreads)
Don't Let Me Go
by Catherine Ryan Hyde
A heartwarming story of a young boy and his mother's friend who form an unbreakable bond.
Former Broadway dancer and current agoraphobic Billy Shine has not set foot outside his apartment in almost a decade. He has glimpsed his neighbors—beautiful manicurist Rayleen, lonely old Ms. ... (Goodreads)
Neverwhere
by Neil Gaiman
A mysterious journey through a hidden realm of London, filled with danger and unexpected allies.
Neverwhere is the story of Richard Mayhew and his trials and tribulations in London. At the start of the story, he is a young businessman, recently moved from Scotland and with a normal life ahead. ... (Wikipedia)
Isle of Palms
by Dorothea Benton Frank
A woman escapes to her family's beach house on the Isle of Palms after a devastating divorce, finding healing and love in unexpected places.
Anna Lutz Abbot considers herself independent and happy, until one steamy summer when she must find a way to deal with the secrets of her unpredictable family-and her past. ... (Goodreads)
I'll Be Your Blue Sky
by Marisa de los Santos
A woman inherits a house from a stranger and discovers secrets that lead her on a journey of self-discovery and healing.
The New York Times bestselling author revisits the characters from her beloved novels Love Walked In and Belong to Me in this captivating, beautifully written drama involving family, friendship, ... (Barnes & Noble)
Go Set a Watchman
by Harper Lee
Confronting the past and present, a woman struggles to reconcile her beliefs with those of her hometown.
Jean Louise "Scout" Finch, a single 26-year-old, returns from New York to her hometown, Maycomb, Alabama, for her annual fortnight-long visit to her father Atticus, a lawyer and former state ... (Wikipedia)
