17 must-read fiction books like Gilead (Gilead, #1) by Marilynne Robinson

Cover of Gilead (Gilead, #1) by Marilynne Robinson

Gilead (Gilead, #1)

By: Marilynne Robinson

3.85

Format: 247 pages, Paperback

Nearly 25 years after Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson returns with an intimate tale of three gener…

"How I wish you could have known me in my strength."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"Memory can make a thing seem to have been much more than it was."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"When something ought to be true then it proves to be a very powerful truth."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"That is to say, I pray for you. And there's an intimacy in it. That's the truth."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

If you liked the fiction plot in Gilead (Gilead, #1) by Marilynne Robinson , here is a list of 17 books like this:

Cover of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz

1. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

By: Junot Díaz

3.89

Format: 335 pages, Hardcover

Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghet… read more

Similar categories in Junot Díaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
"You can't regret the life you didn't lead."

-Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

"Like they say: los que menos corren, vuelan."

-Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

"It's never the changes we want that change everything."

-Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

"I might have no one in the world, but at least I’m free."

-Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Cover of Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry

2. Hannah Coulter

By: Wendell Berry

4.38

Format: 190 pages, Paperback

Hannah Coulter is Wendell Berry's seventh novel and his first to employ the voice of a woman charac… read more

Similar categories in Wendell Berry's Hannah Coulter book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • literature
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
"Time doesn't stop. Your life doesn't stop and wait until you get ready to start living it."

-Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter

"And so I learned about grief, and about the absence and emptiness that for a long time make grief unforgettable."

-Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter

"Living right on called for nothing out of the ordinary. We made no changes. We only accepted the changes as they came."

-Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter

"Grandmam came back from that distance in time that separates grandmothers from their grandchildren and made herself a mother to me."

-Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter

Cover of Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1) by Elizabeth Strout

3. Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

By: Elizabeth Strout

3.85

Format: 270 pages, Hardcover

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Olive Kitteridge offers profound insights into the human condition – … read more

Similar categories in Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1) book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
"The appetites of the body were private battles."

-Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

"She had spells of manic loquaciousness, followed by days of silence."

-Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

"It seems to Henry, as he takes his seat in his usual middle pew, that women are far braver than men"

-Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

"Don't be scared of your hunger. If you're scared of your hunger, you'll just be one more ninny like everyone else."

-Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

Cover of Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

4. Lincoln in the Bardo

By: George Saunders

4.17

Format: None pages, Hardcover

In his long-awaited first novel, American master George Saunders delivers his most original, transc… read more

Similar categories in George Saunders's Lincoln in the Bardo book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • audiobook
Cover of The Known World by Edward P. Jones

5. The Known World

By: Edward P. Jones

4.33

Format: 308 pages, Paperback

One of the most acclaimed novels in recent memory, The Known Worldis a daring and ambitious work by… read more

Similar categories in Edward P. Jones's The Known World book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
Cover of Gilead (Gilead, #1) by Marilynne Robinson

6. Gilead (Gilead, #1)

By: Marilynne Robinson

3.85

Format: 247 pages, Paperback

Nearly 25 years after Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson returns with an intimate tale of three gener… read more

Similar categories in Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1) book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • american
  • literature
  • historical
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
"How I wish you could have known me in my strength."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"Memory can make a thing seem to have been much more than it was."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"When something ought to be true then it proves to be a very powerful truth."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

"That is to say, I pray for you. And there's an intimacy in it. That's the truth."

-Marilynne Robinson, Gilead (Gilead, #1)

7. Tinkers

By: Paul Harding

3.99

Format: 112 pages, Hardcover

An old man lies dying. Propped up in his living room and surrounded by his children and grandchildr… read more

Similar categories in Paul Harding's Tinkers book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

8. A Visit from the Goon Squad

By: Jennifer Egan

3.57

Format: 416 pages, Hardcover

Jennifer Egan's spellbinding interlocking narratives circle the lives of Bennie Salazar, an aging f… read more

Similar categories in Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

9. Jayber Crow

By: Wendell Berry

3.95

Format: 253 pages,

From the simple setting of his own barber shop, Jayber Crow, orphan, seminarian, and native of Port… read more

Similar categories in Wendell Berry's Jayber Crow book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

10. Empire Falls

By: Richard Russo

3.57

Format: 10 pages, Paperback

Richard Russo--from his first novel, Mohawk, to his most recent, Straight Man--has demonstrated a p… read more

Similar categories in Richard Russo's Empire Falls book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

Cover of Trust by Hernan Diaz

11. 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 Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
"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 The Passenger (The Passenger #1) by Cormac McCarthy

12. The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

By: Cormac McCarthy

3.58

Format: 385 pages, Kindle Edition

1980, PASS CHRISTIAN, MISSISSIPPI: It is three in the morning when Bobby Western zips the jacket of… read more

Similar categories in Cormac McCarthy's The Passenger (The Passenger #1) book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • american
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
"All of history [is] a rehearsal for its own extinction."

-Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

"...do you think if you died drunk you’d sober up before you met Jesus?"

-Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

"The evil has no alternate plan. It is simply incapable of assuming failure"

-Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

"She asked the girl what she wanted to be when she grew up and she said dead."

-Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

Cover of Prophet Song by Paul    Lynch

13. 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 Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • literature
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"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 Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

14. Tom Lake

By: Ann Patchett

3.99

Format: 309 pages, Hardcover

In this beautiful and moving novel about family, love, and growing up, Ann Patchett once again prov… read more

Similar categories in Ann Patchett's Tom Lake book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"You can’t pretend this [Covid] isn’t happening,"

-Ann Patchett, Tom Lake

"In the summer the pear trees were fine. In the summer, all that is hideous about a pear tree is hidden by leaves and pears. But once those disguises were removed they were nothing but acres of murder…"

-Ann Patchett, Tom Lake

"Hazel, listen to me. I'm going to tell you something important, you need to be brave.' I then explained to the dog how I have told myself for so many years that my career fell apart because I wasn't …"

-Ann Patchett, Tom Lake

"It's as if someone bought all the diamonds at Tiffany's, and crushed them into dust, then spread that dust across the water so that it sifts down evenly, filtering through the shards of light that cu…"

-Ann Patchett, Tom Lake

Cover of The Covenant of Water by Abraham   Verghese

15. The Covenant of Water

By: Abraham Verghese

4.45

Format: 724 pages, Hardcover

From the New York Times-bestselling author of Cutting for Stone comes a stunning and magisterial ep… read more

Similar categories in Abraham Verghese's The Covenant of Water book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
Cover of James by Percival Everett

16. 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 Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • classics
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
Cover of North Woods by Daniel       Mason

17. 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 Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
Cover of The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James   McBride

18. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

By: James McBride

4.00

Format: 385 pages, Hardcover

In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new housing de… read more

Similar categories in James McBride's The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • historical
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar

19. Martyr!

By: Kaveh Akbar

4.24

Format: 352 pages, Hardcover

Kaveh Akbar’s Martyr! is a paean to how we spend our lives seeking meaning—in faith, art, ourselves… read more

Similar categories in Kaveh Akbar's Martyr! book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
Cover of Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

20. Demon Copperhead

By: Barbara Kingsolver

4.50

Format: 560 pages, Hardcover

"Anyone will tell you the born of this world are marked from the get-out, win or lose." Set in t… read more

Similar categories in Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • historical fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
"A kid is a terrible thing to be, in charge of nothing."

-Barbara Kingsolver, Demon Copperhead

"I can still feel in my bones how being mad was the one thing holding me together."

-Barbara Kingsolver, Demon Copperhead

"Counting on Jesus to save the day is no more real than sending up the Batman signal."

-Barbara Kingsolver, Demon Copperhead

"life is a wild, impetuous ride. There could be good shit up ahead, don’t rule it out."

-Barbara Kingsolver, Demon Copperhead

Cover of I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger

21. I Cheerfully Refuse

By: Leif Enger

4.03

Format: 336 pages, Hardcover

Set in a not-too-distant America, I Cheerfully Refuse is the tale of Rainy, an aspiring musician se… read more

Similar categories in Leif Enger's I Cheerfully Refuse book and Marilynne Robinson's Gilead (Gilead, #1)

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • audiobook
"Those thieves and lovers and wandering poets- what big lives they had! I began watching everyone I met for secret greatness."

-Leif Enger, I Cheerfully Refuse

"I think the sea has no in-between: you get either rage and wayward lightning and schizoid frenzy or such freehanded beauty that time contract or turns in on itself leaving you forgetful and no more n…"

-Leif Enger, I Cheerfully Refuse

"One shelf became two. Then a wall. Then eight-foot rolling racks from a shut library in Hayward, Wisconsin. Maudie suggested changing the shop name to reflect its inventory. Bread and Books. Loaves a…"

-Leif Enger, I Cheerfully Refuse

"Much as I wanted to think of Lark in someplace better, I knew from a thousand conversations that she never worried abut that place. Maybe it was real and full of saints and poets, or maybe it was poe…"

-Leif Enger, I Cheerfully Refuse

8 best-selling contemporary books like Gilead (Gilead, #1) by Marilynne Robinson

Transform Your Habits

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Junot Díaz

3.89

Transform Your Habits

Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

Elizabeth Strout

3.85

Transform Your Habits

Gilead (Gilead, #1)

Marilynne Robinson

3.85

Transform Your Habits

The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

Cormac McCarthy

3.58

View all the books

15 Top fiction books like Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1) by Elizabeth Strout

Transform Your Habits

Olive Kitteridge (Olive Kitteridge, #1)

Elizabeth Strout

3.85

Transform Your Habits

Gilead (Gilead, #1)

Marilynne Robinson

3.85

Transform Your Habits

The Women

Kristin Hannah

4.64

Transform Your Habits

Trust

Hernan Diaz

3.83

View all the books

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