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Recommendation RequestRecommend me the most gripping page-turners you know!
Dear women, I know few things in this life that are more delectable than the pleasure of a thrilling book, the sort that makes you itch to come home and continue reading, the sort that fills you with the all-encompassing joy of turning page after page.
However, these books are rare treasures indeed.
If you have encountered such a book, or perhaps several of them, I'd be very happy to hear your recommendations! The genre doesn't matter, but please, if you can, only recommend books that were written by women. I'm also very open to non-fiction books. All I ask is that they really, truly sucked you in at the time of reading, that it was almost painful to put them down, or that they occupied your thoughts all day at work and made you more than happy to return home to read in the evening. They needn't even necessarily be books you loved - but books you loved reading, yes please! Thank you so much! In the meantime, I'll sit down and have a bit of a meditation on which books I'd like to recommend to you, in turn.
If anyone is into crime novels, oh man, i am obssessed by the Strike series by Robert Galbraith aka J.K. Rowling. I started with the last one (cause the premisse sounded so juicy) The Ink Black Heart, and was hooked. I can't stop thinking about the books and even marked in my calendar the release date for the next one.
The Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop
The Ephemera series by Anne Bishop
The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley (beautiful retelling of the King Arthur legend; was made into a miniseries with Anjelica Huston and Julianna Margulies; there are more Avalon books but this can be read as a one off also)
The Wayfarer Redemption series by Sara Douglass (6 books, also known as the Axis trilogy and the Wayfarer Redemption trilogy)
The Elenium series by David Eddings
The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy by Mercedes Lackey
The All Souls Trilogy by Deborah Harkness
Let me know if you do want a recommendation from a male author; I've got one great one.
The Starless Sea has been, other than Harry Potter, one of the only books I repeatedly return to and wish to live in that universe
Fever Series by Karen Marie Moning. I usually hate urban fantasy. I usually hate paranormal romance, especially heterosexual paranormal romance. The Fae Fever series has a lot of tropes I usually hate to my core. But we all have those exceptions. And fucking hell do I love this series, it is my big exception lmao! I loved these books and I loved reading them. They are fast-paced, but it's a good fast; an edge of my seat "I need to know what happens!!!" fast.
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn. Super fun, super spooky thriller with a female cast. Bonus points is that it has LOVELY prose.
Magister Trilogy by C.S. Friedman. Dark fantasy, super interesting intrigue, frightening sex-based magic system used to highlight the oppression women face, lovely main heroine.
Silver Foxes series by M.R. Anglin. Very unique indie science fiction series by a Jamacian-American author about talking animals on a distant planet. Stars a young fox girl and her adopted family as they run from a sinister government intent on their inhalation. Surprisingly deep and nuanced despite its cartoony covers.
The Sevenwaters Series by Juliet Marillier. Historical fantasy loosely based on Irish folklore. I would call it evenly paced, but I just adore her prose, it really carried the book for me. It's beautiful, and I loved listening to (reading lol?) it.
All of the above thriller, sci-fi & fantasy authors are women. :)
Please avoid recommending Marion Zimmer Bradley. She apparently abused her daughter and helped her pedophile husband gain access to children that were later sexually abused by him.
I haven't read Sevenwaters but I LOVED Wildwood Dancing and its sequel.
You might also enjoy Sarah Singleton, I have found some of her books fascinating, particularly Century, Heretic and Sacrifice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Singleton
Heretic is based on/inspired by a real life folk legend in England of the "green children".
The twist/revelation in Sacrifice is just one of those things that stays with you forever.