11 must-read historical fiction books like The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

Cover of The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

The Luminaries

By: Eleanor Catton

3.67

Format: None pages, Hardcover

It is 1866, and young Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On…

If you liked the historical fiction plot in The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton , here is a list of 11 books like this:

Cover of The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson

1. The Finkler Question

By: Howard Jacobson

2.83

Format: 307 pages, Hardcover

Julian Treslove, a professionally unspectacular and disappointed BBC worker, and Sam Finkler, a pop… read more

Similar categories in Howard Jacobson's The Finkler Question book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literature
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"It's never over till it's over with a friend."

-Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question

"So many unhappy women out there. Such a sea of female misery."

-Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question

"At a certain age men began to shrink, and yet it was precisely at that age that their trousers became too short for them."

-Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question

"At any age there is future one doesn't have. Never enough life when you are happy, that was the thing. Never so much bliss that you can't take a little more."

-Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question

Cover of Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2) by Hilary Mantel

2. Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2)

By: Hilary Mantel

3.98

Format: 392 pages, Hardcover

Though he battled for seven years to marry her, Henry is disenchanted with Anne Boleyn. She has fai… read more

Similar categories in Hilary Mantel's Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2) book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
Cover of Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1) by Hilary Mantel

3. Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1)

By: Hilary Mantel

4.00

Format: None pages, Paperback

England in the 1520s is a heartbeat from disaster. If the king dies without a male heir, the countr… read more

Similar categories in Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1) book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

4. The Luminaries

By: Eleanor Catton

3.67

Format: None pages, Hardcover

It is 1866, and young Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On… read more

Similar categories in Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • mystery
  • novels

5. The Bone People

By: Keri Hulme

3.51

Format: None pages,

In a tower on the New Zealand sea lives Kerewin Holmes, part Maori, part European, an artist estran… read more

Similar categories in Keri Hulme's The Bone People book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

6. True History of the Kelly Gang

By: Peter Carey

3.87

Format: 334 pages,

"I lost my own father at 12 yr. of age and know what it is to be raised on lies and silences my dea… read more

Similar categories in Peter Carey's True History of the Kelly Gang book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

7. The Narrow Road to the Deep North

By: Richard Flanagan

3.96

Format: 464 pages, Paperback

A novel of the cruelty of war, and tenuousness of life and the impossibility of love. Richard Flana… read more

Similar categories in Richard Flanagan's The Narrow Road to the Deep North book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

Cover of Trust by Hernan Diaz

8. Trust

By: Hernan Diaz

3.83

Format: 402 pages, Hardcover

10 hours, 21 minutes From an award-winning chronicler of our nation's history and its legends co… read more

Similar categories in Hernan Diaz's Trust book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • mystery
  • novels
"Where there's a ventriloquist, there's a dummy."

-Hernan Diaz, Trust

"Chaos is a vortex that spins faster with each thing it swallows."

-Hernan Diaz, Trust

"Silence between 2 is always shared. But 1 of the 2 owns it and shares it with the other."

-Hernan Diaz, Trust

"Sleeplessness kept claiming her nights, and she used books as shields against the onslaught of her abstract terrors."

-Hernan Diaz, Trust

Cover of Prophet Song by Paul    Lynch

9. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literature
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
"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 Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry

10. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

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

-Sebastian Barry, Old God's Time

"Per ell aquest era el sentit de la jubilació, de l'existència: estar-de 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 The Wren, the Wren by Anne Enright

11. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"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 James by Percival Everett

12. James

By: Percival Everett

4.54

Format: 303 pages, Hardcover

A brilliant, action-packed reimagining of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , both harrowing and f… read more

Similar categories in Percival Everett's James book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

13. The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

By: Shehan Karunatilaka

3.92

Format: 386 pages, Hardcover

Colombo, 1990. Maali Almeida—war photographer, gambler, and closet queen—has woken up dead in what … read more

Similar categories in Shehan Karunatilaka's The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • mystery
"Even suicide requires perseverance."

-Shehan Karunatilaka, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

"Why should a Creator watch over you? Wasn't creating you enough?"

-Shehan Karunatilaka, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

"You were simply a handsome man who enjoyed beautiful boys. Nothing more, nothing less and no one's business."

-Shehan Karunatilaka, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

"Despair always begins as a snack that you nibble on when bored and then becomes a meal that you have thrice a day."

-Shehan Karunatilaka, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida

Cover of The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

14. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • 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 North Woods by Daniel       Mason

15. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

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

16. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

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

17. 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 Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literature
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"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 The Fraud by Zadie Smith

18. The Fraud

By: Zadie Smith

3.30

Format: 464 pages, Hardcover

The extraordinary first historical novel from bestselling author of White Teeth Zadie Smith It i… read more

Similar categories in Zadie Smith's The Fraud book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • mystery
  • novels
"Eliza had long understood her cousin to be beyond the reach of editorial intervention."

-Zadie Smith, The Fraud

"What possesses people? Unhappiness, always. Happiness is otherwise occupied. It has an object on which to focus. It has daisies, it has snowdrifts. Unhappiness opens up the void, which then requires …"

-Zadie Smith, The Fraud

"I know this country well. Well enough to understand that justice takes time, and that the freedoms of a minority are rarely self-evident to the majority. What is perfectly selfevident to God is – unf…"

-Zadie Smith, The Fraud

"God preserve me from novel-writing, thought Mrs Touchet. God preserve me from that tragic indulgence, that useless vanity, that blindness! In a cold dormitory, two hundred miles away, three heartbrok…"

-Zadie Smith, The Fraud

Cover of Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein

19. Study for Obedience

By: Sarah Bernstein

3.05

Format: 192 pages, Hardcover

A haunting, compressed masterwork from an extraordinary new voice in Canadian fiction. A young w… read more

Similar categories in Sarah Bernstein's Study for Obedience book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literature
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"I try always to be good."

-Sarah Bernstein, Study for Obedience

"How, I wondered, might a person, a people, take root, roots and rootlessness, the preservation of what little remains of the past, such were thoughts that blew through me on any given morning, standi…"

-Sarah Bernstein, Study for Obedience

"In taking a side, I thought uneasily, perhaps I ought to take the long view, the survival of the species as a whole. That was my problem, I thought, I was always thinking at the level of the individu…"

-Sarah Bernstein, Study for Obedience

"I had hoped that here in the country I would experience the turn of the seasons differently, with less apprehension, I might come to see the form and plan of the world. Not to frame it within systems…"

-Sarah Bernstein, Study for Obedience

Cover of The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff

20. The Vaster Wilds

By: Lauren Groff

3.77

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

A taut and electrifying novel from celebrated bestselling author Lauren Groff, about one spirited g… read more

Similar categories in Lauren Groff's The Vaster Wilds book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • historical
  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
"For what is a girl but a vessel made to hold the desires of men."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"O put the memory away, girl, she told herself sternly. For the sorrow could eat you entire."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"And humans were not made to be always alone; humans survive only in the company of other humans."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

"Against the resistance of other minds, one's thoughts are pulled out of their comfortable shapes, and true thinking begins."

-Lauren Groff, The Vaster Wilds

Cover of In Ascension by Martin MacInnes

21. In Ascension

By: Martin MacInnes

3.79

Format: 496 pages, Paperback

An astonishing novel about a young microbiologist investigating an unfathomable deep vent in the oc… read more

Similar categories in Martin MacInnes's In Ascension book and Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • novels
"I questioned what else I had already missed so far, in my own life, simply through the limits of my character."

-Martin MacInnes, In Ascension

"Once he had committed to this life, there was no way he could get out of it. He was angry at us, his daughters, because the financial demands of our existence bound him to it."

-Martin MacInnes, In Ascension

"I kind of love it. It's so macabre. The reason we haven't seen or heard from anything off-world is that reaching off-world status is a civilisational death knell. Life either gets stuck there or dest…"

-Martin MacInnes, In Ascension

"The air was thick with teeming life, just as the oceans and the rivers were. A spoonful of seawater or a pinch of soil between your fingers held billions of living things. We were blind to this out o…"

-Martin MacInnes, In Ascension

18 must-read fiction books like The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

Transform Your Habits

The Finkler Question

Howard Jacobson

2.83

Transform Your Habits

Bring Up the Bodies (Thomas Cromwell, #2)

Hilary Mantel

3.98

Transform Your Habits

Wolf Hall (Thomas Cromwell, #1)

Hilary Mantel

4.00

Transform Your Habits

The Luminaries

Eleanor Catton

3.67

View all the books

21 must-read fiction books like Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein

Transform Your Habits

Prophet Song

Paul Lynch

4.10

Transform Your Habits

Old God's Time

Sebastian Barry

3.85

Transform Your Habits

The Wren, the Wren

Anne Enright

3.55

Transform Your Habits

If I Survive You

Jonathan Escoffery

3.69

View all the books

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