18 Best historical books like The Slowworm's Song by Andrew Miller

Cover of The Slowworm's Song by Andrew  Miller

The Slowworm's Song

By: Andrew Miller

4.07

Format: None pages, Hardcover

An innocent-looking letter drops on to the doormat in Stephen Rose's Somerset home like an unexplod…

If you liked the historical plot in The Slowworm's Song by Andrew Miller , here is a list of 18 books like this:

Cover of A Natural by Ross Raisin

1. A Natural

By: Ross Raisin

3.71

Format: 352 pages, Hardcover

Tom has always known exactly the person he is going to be. A successful footballer. A man others lo… read more

Similar categories in Ross Raisin's A Natural book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • contemporary
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • british literature
Cover of So Many Ways to Begin by Jon McGregor

2. So Many Ways to Begin

By: Jon McGregor

4.15

Format: 384 pages, Hardcover

In this potent examination of family and memory, Jon McGregor charts one man's voyage of self-disco… read more

Similar categories in Jon McGregor's So Many Ways to Begin book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels

3. This Isn't the Sort of Thing That Happens to Someone Like You

By: Jon McGregor

4.36

Format: 512 pages, Hardcover

A man builds a tree house by a river, in anticipation of the coming flood. A sugar-beet crashes thr… read more

Similar categories in Jon McGregor's This Isn't the Sort of Thing That Happens to Someone Like You book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

Cover of Prophet Song by Paul    Lynch

4. Prophet Song

By: Paul Lynch

4.10

Format: 259 pages, Kindle Edition

A fearless portrait of a society on the brink as a mother faces a terrible choice, from an internat… read more

Similar categories in Paul Lynch's Prophet Song book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"people are entitled to some small moment of peace."

-Paul Lynch, Prophet Song

"the child absorbing the mother’s trauma and storing it in his body for later use,"

-Paul Lynch, Prophet Song

"... time is at once addition and subtraction, time adds one day to the next and always takes away from what's left..."

-Paul Lynch, Prophet Song

"...knowing how it is so that all boys grow up and pull away from home to unmake the world in the guise of making it, nature decrees it so."

-Paul Lynch, Prophet Song

Cover of Caledonian Road by Andrew O'Hagan

5. Caledonian Road

By: Andrew O'Hagan

3.96

Format: 608 pages, Hardcover

A biting portrait of British class, politics, and money told through five interconnected families a… read more

Similar categories in Andrew O'Hagan's Caledonian Road book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
Cover of Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry

6. Old God's Time

By: Sebastian Barry

3.85

Format: 261 pages, Hardcover

From the two-time Booker Prize finalist author, a dazzlingly written novel exploring love, memory, … read more

Similar categories in Sebastian Barry's Old God's Time book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"Per ell aquest era el sentit de la jubilació, de l'existència: estar-de immòbil, feliç i inútil"

-Sebastian Barry, Old God's Time

"Per ell aquest era el sentit de la jubilació, de l'existència: estar-se immòbil, feliç i inútil"

-Sebastian Barry, Old God's Time

"No one minds life as long as they are not trying to leave it. Nor death, as long as they are not dying."

-Sebastian Barry, Old God's Time

Cover of Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnet

7. Case Study

By: Graeme Macrae Burnet

3.60

Format: 278 pages, Hardcover

“I have decided to write down everything that happens, because I feel, I suppose, I may be putting … read more

Similar categories in Graeme Macrae Burnet's Case Study book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
"Forget about meaning’, he said. ‘Life’s not about meaning, it’s about experience."

-Graeme Macrae Burnet, Case Study

"It is impossible to walk behind someone on a narrow cliff path without the idea of shoving them over the edge crossing one’s mind."

-Graeme Macrae Burnet, Case Study

"To be in another country, speaking another language, was to be another person, and in being another person I felt for the first time that I was myself."

-Graeme Macrae Burnet, Case Study

"Her handbag, he said, was found on the scene. I made a mental note to carry out a thorough spring clean of contents of my own bag before throwing myself in front of any trains."

-Graeme Macrae Burnet, Case Study

Cover of The Wren, the Wren by Anne Enright

8. The Wren, the Wren

By: Anne Enright

3.55

Format: 278 pages, Hardcover

An incandescent novel about the inheritance of trauma, wonder, and love across three generations of… read more

Similar categories in Anne Enright's The Wren, the Wren book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"It's not that I think about him constantly, he is my way of thinking. His mind is my compass, his eyes my only mirror."

-Anne Enright, The Wren, the Wren

"We don’t walk down the same street as the person walking beside us. All we can do is tell the other person what we see. We can point at things and try to name them. If we do this well, our friend can…"

-Anne Enright, The Wren, the Wren

"We don't walk down the same street as the person walking beside us. All we can do is tell the other person what we see. We can point at things and try to name them. If we do this well, our friend can…"

-Anne Enright, The Wren, the Wren

Cover of The New Life by Tom  Crewe

9. The New Life

By: Tom Crewe

3.77

Format: 392 pages, Hardcover

Two Victorian marriages, two dangerous love affairs, one extraordinary partnership . . .London, 189… read more

Similar categories in Tom Crewe's The New Life book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • historical
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
"Science requires a rational audience."

-Tom Crewe, The New Life

"True development does not respect comfort."

-Tom Crewe, The New Life

"We British are used to being ruthless, of course, but only the men. The women aren't. We don't grab. We shouldn't . But we have to, to make some room for ourselves."

-Tom Crewe, The New Life

"...John wondered if she would ever be so unthinkingly imperious again; whether her childish powers of command would survive the dislocation from home, the knowledge of her smallness in the greater wo…"

-Tom Crewe, The New Life

Cover of The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

10. The House of Doors

By: Tan Twan Eng

4.14

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

A spellbinding novel about love and betrayal, colonialism and revolution, storytelling and redempti… read more

Similar categories in Tan Twan Eng's The House of Doors book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
"Money's the sixth sense. If you don't have it, you can't make … the most of the other five."

-Tan Twan Eng, The House of Doors

"I feel that when I travel I can change myself a little, and I return from a journey not quite the same self I was."

-Tan Twan Eng, The House of Doors

"That night, side by side, we drifted among the galaxies of sea-stars, while far, far above us the asterisks of light marked out the footnotes on the page of eternity."

-Tan Twan Eng, The House of Doors

"All of us will be forgotten eventually. Like a wave on the ocean, leaving no trace that it had once existed.' He shook his head. 'We will be remembered through our stories."

-Tan Twan Eng, The House of Doors

Cover of Lessons by Ian McEwan

11. Lessons

By: Ian McEwan

4.00

Format: 448 pages, Hardcover

When the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, … read more

Similar categories in Ian McEwan's Lessons book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
"Books are difficult to tidy. Hard to chuck out. They resist."

-Ian McEwan, Lessons

"Only the backward look, the well-researched history could tell peaks and troughs from portals."

-Ian McEwan, Lessons

"What must it be, to burst out of deep infant sleep into the shocking singular fact of existence."

-Ian McEwan, Lessons

"The years slid over old deaths like a heavy lid. Nearly everything that happens to you in life you forget. Should have kept a journal."

-Ian McEwan, Lessons

Cover of North Woods by Daniel       Mason

12. North Woods

By: Daniel Mason

4.15

Format: 372 pages, Hardcover

A sweeping novel about a single house in the woods of New England, told through the lives of those … read more

Similar categories in Daniel Mason's North Woods book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of This Other Eden by Paul Harding

13. This Other Eden

By: Paul Harding

3.78

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

Set at the beginning of the twentieth century and inspired by historical events, This Other Eden te… read more

Similar categories in Paul Harding's This Other Eden book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of The Bee Sting by Paul Murray

14. The Bee Sting

By: Paul Murray

3.96

Format: 656 pages, Hardcover

From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray's The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and … read more

Similar categories in Paul Murray's The Bee Sting book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"It is for love. You are doing this for love."

-Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

"We all have problems. But often instead of accepting the truth about ourselves, we cover it up. We try to make ourselves the way we think we’re expected to be."

-Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

"Maybe every era has an atrocity woven into its fabric. Maybe every society is complicit in terrible things and only afterwards gets around to pretending they didn’t know. When the kids ask, tell them…"

-Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

"Maybe that’s how it will go – instead of one definitive cataclysm, a series of ‘anomalies’, each time lasting longer, with the stretches of what you call normal life becoming further and further apar…"

-Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

Cover of Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson

15. Shrines of Gaiety

By: Kate Atkinson

3.85

Format: 439 pages, Hardcover

London 1926. Roaring Twenties. Corruption. Seduction. Debts due. In a country still recovering … read more

Similar categories in Kate Atkinson's Shrines of Gaiety book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
"The library had not been a career choice. After all, who would choose to be a librarian?"

-Kate Atkinson, Shrines of Gaiety

"His head was always in the clouds. 'I'm writing a novel,' he told her. As if that was something to crow about. As if there weren't enough novels in the world already."

-Kate Atkinson, Shrines of Gaiety

Cover of Cuddy by Benjamin Myers

16. Cuddy

By: Benjamin Myers

4.33

Format: 447 pages, Hardcover

Cuddy is a bold and experimental retelling of the story of the hermit St. Cuthbert, unofficial patr… read more

Similar categories in Benjamin Myers's Cuddy book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
"Some say owls carry within them the souls of those who in life never had a name, a place or a purpose, and were cast out to wander alone. Some say their stained-glass eyes are windows into other worl…"

-Benjamin Myers, Cuddy

Cover of Wild Houses by Colin  Barrett

17. Wild Houses

By: Colin Barrett

3.78

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

A darkly funny and deeply moving debut novel about crimes of desperation, dreams abandoned, and sma… read more

Similar categories in Colin Barrett's Wild Houses book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"What you are in, Dev, is a holding pattern, only you're not holding out for anything."

-Colin Barrett, Wild Houses

"All boys, all children, are capable of cruelty at the right juncture of opportunity and circumstance, but only a few become committed prodigies of sadism..."

-Colin Barrett, Wild Houses

"In the dream, exactly as he had in real life, he sensed the slow, inexorable approach of the shapeless, prospectless days to come, days when there would be no need to get out of bed or brush his teet…"

-Colin Barrett, Wild Houses

"He looked around the empty kitchen. A part of him wanted this of course. A part of him had always wanted this, to be alone, away from even the prospect of any demand upon him to talk, to interact, to…"

-Colin Barrett, Wild Houses

Cover of Ordinary Human Failings by Megan Nolan

18. Ordinary Human Failings

By: Megan Nolan

3.78

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

When a 10-year-old child is suspected of a violent crime, her family must face the truth about thei… read more

Similar categories in Megan Nolan's Ordinary Human Failings book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"She loved the feeling of doing something on her own, and doing it in a routine. It felt thrillingly adult and affirmed her most cherished hope, the hope that she might have an actual inner life of su…"

-Megan Nolan, Ordinary Human Failings

"He had the sort of bland, agreeable, rosy face which could disappear into whatever context he wished it to. He was blond but not provocatively so. The naturally dull Kent accent could be clipped and …"

-Megan Nolan, Ordinary Human Failings

Cover of Trespasses by Louise Kennedy

19. Trespasses

By: Louise Kennedy

4.00

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

Set in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, a shattering novel about a young woman caught between … read more

Similar categories in Louise Kennedy's Trespasses book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • ireland
  • irish literature
Cover of The Seventh Son by Sebastian Faulks

20. The Seventh Son

By: Sebastian Faulks

3.60

Format: 353 pages, Kindle Edition

A CHILD WILL BE BORN WHO WILL CHANGE EVERYTHING When a young woman named Talissa answers an adve… read more

Similar categories in Sebastian Faulks's The Seventh Son book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
Cover of The Queen of Dirt Island by Donal Ryan

21. The Queen of Dirt Island

By: Donal Ryan

4.09

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

From the multi-award-winning and internationally bestselling author Donal Ryan, a searing, jubilant… read more

Similar categories in Donal Ryan's The Queen of Dirt Island book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"Time will wind its own sweet way. We have no choice but to keep up."

-Donal Ryan, The Queen of Dirt Island

"Happiness was a strange notion, something that was wrapped neatly, and packed into the closing scenes of television shows and daytime films, sharply relieved on the screen, but blurry in real life, a…"

-Donal Ryan, The Queen of Dirt Island

"her mother and grandmother and great-grandmother had walked her to the classroom door and Mammy had cried a bit and Granny had told her to cop on and Nana then had told Granny to cop on herself and t…"

-Donal Ryan, The Queen of Dirt Island

"She felt sad in that moment for anyone in the world who didn’t have a mother like hers. A mother who was standing now above her quarry like a prizefighter in a swell of victory, looking slowly left a…"

-Donal Ryan, The Queen of Dirt Island

Cover of My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1) by Joseph O'Connor

22. My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1)

By: Joseph O'Connor

4.05

Format: 276 pages, Kindle Edition

From the best-selling author of Star of the Sea, a WWII-era “great escape” novel set in the Vatican… read more

Similar categories in Joseph O'Connor's My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1) book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • historical
  • ireland
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
"Life schools you the way no catechism will."

-Joseph O'Connor, My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1)

"There are times when we must permit one another to lie."

-Joseph O'Connor, My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1)

"I was singing in Belfast the night the Luftwaffe firebombed the theatre. That's what you call a mixed review."

-Joseph O'Connor, My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1)

"A religiously minded kid will often be good at lying awake all night because you need an imagination if you're going to believe."

-Joseph O'Connor, My Father's House (Rome Escape Line Trilogy, #1)

Cover of The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry

23. The Heart in Winter

By: Kevin Barry

4.02

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

Award-winning writer Kevin Barry’s first novel set in America, a savagely funny and achingly romant… read more

Similar categories in Kevin Barry's The Heart in Winter book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"... the morning was starkly lit under a migraine - white and vast opening sky."

-Kevin Barry, The Heart in Winter

Cover of Clear by Carys Davies

24. Clear

By: Carys Davies

3.92

Format: 196 pages, Hardcover

A stunning, exquisite novel from an award-winning writer about a minister dispatched to a remote is… read more

Similar categories in Carys Davies's Clear book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
Cover of The Coast Road by Alan Murrin

25. The Coast Road

By: Alan Murrin

3.99

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

A poignant and heartbreaking debut novel set in the 1990s in a claustrophobic coast town. With divo… read more

Similar categories in Alan Murrin's The Coast Road book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • ireland
  • irish literature
Cover of Enlightenment by Sarah Perry

26. Enlightenment

By: Sarah Perry

3.70

Format: 384 pages, Hardcover

A dazzling new work of literary fiction from the author of The Essex Serpent, a story of love and a… read more

Similar categories in Sarah Perry's Enlightenment book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
"Thomas [Hart] lived where he'd been born, and where (so he often thought without rancor) he'd very likely die; and if he lived alone he was not lonely, that being a condition not of solitude but of l…"

-Sarah Perry, Enlightenment

"So I told her this: that it's true I've only rarely been happy, and perhaps more often been sad. But I have been content. I have lived. I have felt everything available to me: I've been faithless, de…"

-Sarah Perry, Enlightenment

"I wish I could say, James, that we forgave each other in the end. I wish I could say: she put her head on my shoulder and I welcomed it and we laughed and said all was well. But in fact we were quiet…"

-Sarah Perry, Enlightenment

"...in the ordinary way we love because we're loved, and give more or less what we're given. But to love without return is more strange and more wonderful, and not the humiliating thing I'd once taken…"

-Sarah Perry, Enlightenment

Cover of The Perfect Golden Circle by Benjamin Myers

27. The Perfect Golden Circle

By: Benjamin Myers

3.92

Format: 211 pages, Hardcover

From a British literary sensation, the story of two rural outcasts and the crop circles they create… read more

Similar categories in Benjamin Myers's The Perfect Golden Circle book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of My Friends by Hisham Matar

28. My Friends

By: Hisham Matar

4.34

Format: 399 pages, Hardcover

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Return , a luminous novel of friendship, family, and … read more

Similar categories in Hisham Matar's My Friends book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
"A vast distance exists between a protester and his slogan; the entire history of politics exists in that gap."

-Hisham Matar, My Friends

"For a writer, exile is prison, a severing from the source, and so, courageous or not, he dies in front of our eyes."

-Hisham Matar, My Friends

"She was older and all the more beautiful, had the weary tiredness of one who, in surrendering to her life, was ennobled by it."

-Hisham Matar, My Friends

"I walked off feeling an emptiness well up inside me. It seemed, for all the emptiness that it was, a presence. It made me want to run away, dive deeper into myself, into that cold desolation, to the …"

-Hisham Matar, My Friends

Cover of The Slowworm's Song by Andrew  Miller

29. The Slowworm's Song

By: Andrew Miller

4.07

Format: None pages, Hardcover

An innocent-looking letter drops on to the doormat in Stephen Rose's Somerset home like an unexplod… read more

Similar categories in Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • british literature
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
Cover of Seven Steeples by Sara Baume

30. Seven Steeples

By: Sara Baume

3.53

Format: 181 pages, Hardcover

Bell en Sigh verhuizen vanuit de drukte van de stad naar een huis aan de Atlantische Oceaan in het … read more

Similar categories in Sara Baume's Seven Steeples book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • ireland
  • irish literature
"October mornings peeled the night cloud back to its subcutaneous lilac tissue. The leaves earned their name by leaving the trees. Browned and blistered foliage cascaded from the sycamore, swilling in…"

-Sara Baume, Seven Steeples

Cover of The Laughter by Sonora Jha

31. The Laughter

By: Sonora Jha

3.89

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

An aging white male college professor develops a dangerous obsession with his new Pakistani colleag… read more

Similar categories in Sonora Jha's The Laughter book and Andrew Miller's The Slowworm's Song

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary

30 Top fiction books like The Slowworm's Song by Andrew Miller

Transform Your Habits

A Natural

Ross Raisin

3.71

Transform Your Habits

So Many Ways to Begin

Jon McGregor

4.15

Transform Your Habits

Prophet Song

Paul Lynch

4.10

Transform Your Habits

Caledonian Road

Andrew O'Hagan

3.96

View all the books

20 Best fiction books like Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson

Transform Your Habits

Trust

Hernan Diaz

3.83

Transform Your Habits

Old God's Time

Sebastian Barry

3.85

Transform Your Habits

Homecoming

Kate Morton

4.07

Transform Your Habits

Tom Lake

Ann Patchett

3.99

View all the books

Never miss a story from us, get weekly updates in your inbox.