Books like 'The Book of Living Secrets'
Readers who enjoyed The Book of Living Secrets by Madeleine Roux also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical fantasy horror urban fantasy 20th century gothic paranormal lgbtq magic historical-fiction
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Warbound by Larry Correia
18 ratingsNew York Times and Wall Street Journal best-selling author's gritty urban fantasy set in an alternate noir 1930s. A tough P.I. battles an interdimensional monster that wants to suck magic power out of the world. Sequel to Hard Magic and Spellbound. Book Three in the Grimnoir Chronicles...Categorized as:
historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult aliens alternate-history -
Wild Seed by Octavia E. Butler
26 ratingsDoro is an entity who changes bodies like clothes, killing his hosts by reflex--or design. He fears no one--until he meets Anyanwu. Anyanwu has also died many times. She can absorb bullets and make medicine with a kiss, give birth to tribes, nurture and heal, and savage anyone who threatens those she loves. She fears no one--until she meets Doro...Categorized as:
historical-fiction lgbtq magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult afrofuturism -
My Soul to Keep by Tananarive Due
18 ratingsWhen Jessica marries David, he is everything she wants in a family man: brilliant, attentive, ever youthful. Yet she still feels something about him is just out of reach...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century adult afrofuturism audiobook -
Hard Magic by Larry Correia
24 ratingsJake Sullivan is a licensed Private Eye—with a seriously hardboiled attitude. He also possesses raw magical talent and the ability to make objects in his vicinity light as a feather or as heavy as depleted uranium, all with a magical thought. It's no wonder the G-men turn to Jake when they need someone to go after a suspected killer who's been knocking off banks in a magic-enhanced crime spree... -
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The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
39 ratingsBarcelona, 1957. It is Christmas, and Daniel Sempere and his wife Bea have much to celebrate. They have a beautiful new baby son named Julian, and their close friend Fermín Romero de Torres is about to be wed. But their joy is eclipsed when a mysterious stranger visits the Sempere bookshop and threatens to divulge a terrible secret that has been buried for two decades in the city's dark past...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction 20th-century 21st-century action-adventure audiobook book classics -
Marina by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
33 ratingsFifteen-year-old Oscar Drai meets the strange Marina while he's exploring an old quarter of Barcelona. She leads Oscar to a cemetery, where they watch a macabre ritual that occurs on the last Sunday of each month. At exactly ten o'clock in the morning, a woman shrouded in a black velvet cloak descends from her carriage to place a single rose on an unmarked grave...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century action-adventure audiobook book classics -
The Forgotten Witch by Jessica Dodge
6 ratingsHelen Kent never dares to step outside her comfort zone. She lives a lonely mundane life in the city, grinding through her uninspiring marketing job. That is, until a spontaneous online purchase brings her to the little bay town of Oban, Scotland, where a 500-year-old cottage full of secrets and stories awaits her... -
The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice
42 ratingsLestat. The vampire hero of Anne Rice's enthralling new novel is a creature of the darkest and richest imagination. Once an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-revolutionary France, now a rock star in the demonic, shimmering 1980s, he rushes through the centuries in search of others like him, seeking answers to the mystery of his eternal, terrifying existence... -
Darkness on his Bones by Barbara Hambly
6 ratingsSimon. Something frightful has happened to Jamie. Please come...When James Asher is found unconscious in the cemetery of the Church of St. Clare Pieds-Nus with multiple puncture-wounds in his throat and arms, his wife, Lydia, knows of only one person to call: the vampire Don Simon Ysidro...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century adult alternate-history black-mc book -
Pale Guardian by Barbara Hambly
6 ratingsDuring the carnage of World War One, James Asher joins forces with the vampires of Europe to counter an even deadlier threat.The vampires call them The Others... -
The Kindred of Darkness by Barbara Hambly
8 ratingsWhen James Asher and his wife Lydia's baby daughter Miranda is kidnapped by the Master Vampire of London, the stakes are high: blindly follow the Master Vampire's instructions, keep out of the way of the human networks that serves the vampires, destroy the interloper who seeks to seize control of the London Nest, and find the key to the Nest's tortuous inner workings: The Book of the Kindred of...Categorized as:
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The Angel Chronicles, Vol. 2 by Richie Tankersley Cusick
10 ratingsThe course of love in Sunnydale never runs smoothly, especially for Buffy Summers the Vampire Slayer and her boyfriend, Angel the Vampire. They're going through the usual early stages of a romantic relationship--dressing to impress, going on coffee dates, and saving the world... -
The Loss by Julie Plec
12 ratingsFamily is power.The Original vampire family swore it to each other a thousand years ago. They pledged to remain together always and forever. But even when you're immortal, promises are hard to keep. After a hurricane destroyed their city, Klaus, Elijah and Rebekah Mikaelson have rebuilt New Orleans to even greater glory. The year is 1766. The witches live on the fringes in the bayou... -
The Coldest War by Ian Tregillis
16 ratingsSomeone is killing Britain's warlocks.Twenty-two years after the Second World War, a precarious balance of power maintains the peace between Great Britain and the USSR. For decades, the warlocks have been all that stand between the British Empire and the Soviet Union-- a vast domain stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the shores of the English Channel... -
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The Wolf's Hour by Robert McCammon
24 ratingsD-Day is threatened, but one man could rip the heart of the Nazis -- with his bare claws....He is Michael Gallatin, master spy, lover -- and werewolf. Able to change shape with lightning speed, to kill silently or with savage, snarling fury, he proved his talents against Rommel in Africa. Now he faces his most delicate, dangerous mission: to unravel the secret Nazi plan known as Iron Fist...Categorized as:
historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult alternate-history audiobook book -
Hollow City by Ransom Riggs
46 ratingsThis second novel begins in 1940, immediately after the first book ended. Having escaped Miss Peregrine’s island by the skin of their teeth, Jacob and his new friends must journey to London, the peculiar capital of the world. Along the way, they encounter new allies, a menagerie of peculiar animals, and other unexpected surprises...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure audiobook book -
A Witch in Time by Constance Sayers
18 ratingsA young woman in Belle Epoque France is cursed to relive a doomed love affair through many lifetimes, as both troubled muse and frustrated artist.In 1895, sixteen-year-old Juliet LaCompte has a passionate, doomed romance with the married Parisian painter Auguste Marchant... -
Declare by Tim Powers
18 ratingsAs a young double agent infiltrating the Soviet spy network in Nazi-occupied Paris, Andrew Hale finds himself caught up in a secret, even more ruthless war. Two decades later, in 1963, he will be forced to confront again the nightmare that has haunted his adult life: a lethal unfinished operation code-named Declare...Categorized as:
historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult alternate-history audiobook -
The Haunting of H. G. Wells by Robert Masello
18 ratingsA plot against England that even the genius of H. G. Wells could not have imagined. It’s 1914. The Great War grips the world—and from the Western Front a strange story emerges…a story of St. George and a brigade of angels descending from heaven to fight beside the beleaguered British troops. But can there be any truth to it?H. G...Categorized as:
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Tamsin by Peter S. Beagle
16 ratingsArriving in the English countryside to live with her mother and new stepfather, Jenny has no interest in her surroundings, until she meets Tamsin. Since her death over 300 years ago, Tamsin has haunted the lonely estate without rest, trapped by a hidden trauma she can't remember, and a powerful evil even the spirits of night cannot name...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure animals book -
The Death of the Necromancer by Martha Wells
16 ratingsNicholas Valiarde is a passionate, embittered nobleman with an enigmatic past. Consumed by thoughts of vengeance, he is consoled only by thoughts of the beautiful, dangerous Madeline. He is also the greatest thief in all of Ile-Rien.. -
Necessary Evil by Ian Tregillis
16 ratings12 May 1940. Westminster, London, England: the early days of World War II.Again.Raybould Marsh, one of "our" Britain's best spies, has travelled to another Earth in a desperate attempt to save at least one timeline from the Cthulhu-like monsters who have been observing our species from space and have already destroyed Marsh's timeline... -
The Curse of the Blue Figurine by John Bellairs
16 ratingsJohnny Dixon doesn't believe that the ghost of mad Father Baart haunts the town church. But then he takes an old scroll and a seemingly harmless figurine from the church basement, accepts a magic ring from a mysterious stranger--and is plunged into a terrifying adventure that may cost him his life...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure book children -
A Fine and Private Place by Peter S. Beagle
16 ratingsThis classic tale from the author of The Last Unicorn is a journey between the realms of the living and the dead, and a testament to the eternal power of love.Michael Morgan was not ready to die, but his funeral was carried out just the same. Trapped in the dark limbo between life and death as a ghost, he searches for an escape. Instead, he discovers the beautiful Laura.. -
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The Gilda Stories by Jewelle L. Gómez, Alexis Pauline Gumbs
14 ratingsBefore Buffy, before Twilight, before Octavia Butler's Fledgling, there was The Gilda Stories, Jewelle Gomez's sexy vampire novel."The Gilda Stories is groundbreaking not just for the wild lives it portrays, but for how it portrays them--communally, unapologetically, roaming fiercely over space and time."--Emma Donoghue, author of Room"Jewelle Gomez sees right into the heart...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction lgbtq paranormal 20th-century adult afrofuturism audiobook -
Ghosts I Have Been by Richard Peck
14 ratingsUpon discovering that she has the gift of Second Sight, Blossom also learns that whether glimpsing the future or traveling into the past, one is powerless to alter history...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century action-adventure alpha-mc book children -
The Lost Ones by Anita Frank
14 ratingsSome houses are never at peace. England, 1917 Reeling from the death of her fiancé, Stella Marcham welcomes the opportunity to stay with her pregnant sister, Madeleine, at her imposing country mansion, Greyswick – but she arrives to discover a house of unease and her sister gripped by fear and suspicion... -
The Angel Chronicles, Vol. 1 by Nancy Holder
12 ratingsAfter a century of killing without a care, the vampire Angelus was cursed with a conscience and eventually fled to Sunnydale, where he restricted his feeding to blood banks.Until 16-year-old Buffy Summers, the Vampire Slayer, arrived in town to battle vampires, demons and the Forces of Darkness. First, he has to convince her not to kill him... -
Thus Were Their Faces by Silvina Ocampo, Helen Oyeyemi
10 ratingsAn NYRB Classics OriginalSilvina Ocampo is undoubtedly one of the twentieth century’s great masters of the short story. Italo Calvino once said about her, “I don’t know another writer who better captures the magic inside everyday rituals, the forbidden or hidden face that our mirrors don’t show us...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction lgbtq 20th-century 21st-century action-adventure adult anthologies -
Who's Sorry Now? by Maggie Robinson
10 ratingsLondon, England 1925 A Russian prince. A wealthy heir. An impoverished earl's daughter. Which one will make an untimely exit from the London social scene? Scotland Yard Detective Inspector Devenand Hunter finds himself in the middle of a series of upper-class deaths in London... -
Magistrates of Hell by Barbara Hambly
8 ratingsJames Asher finds himself once more in alliance with vampire Don Simon Ysidro, as their investigations takes them to far-off Peking . . . October, 1912... -
Mirror Girls by Kelly McWilliams, Not Yet Available
6 ratingsA thrilling gothic horror novel about biracial twin sisters separated at birth, perfect for fans of Lovecraft Country and The Vanishing Half As infants, twin sisters Charlie Yates and Magnolia Heathwood were secretly separated after the brutal lynching of their parents, who died for loving across the color line... -
Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
48 ratingsThis is the story of Louis, as told in his own words, of his journey through mortal and immortal life. Louis recounts how he became a vampire at the hands of the radiant and sinister Lestat and how he became indoctrinated, unwillingly, into the vampire way of life... -
The Satanic Mill: Evil Lurks Within by Otfried Preußler
24 ratingsIn seventeenth-century Germany, a boy desperately wants to escape from a school for Black Magic where he is held captive by demonic forces...Categorized as:
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Silence for the Dead by Simone St. James
18 ratingsIn 1919, Kitty Weekes, pretty, resourceful, and on the run, falsifies her background to obtain a nursing position at Portis House, a remote hospital for soldiers left shell-shocked by the horrors of the Great War. Hiding the shame of their mental instability in what was once a magnificent private estate, the patients suffer from nervous attacks and tormenting dreams...Categorized as:
gothic historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century abuse action-adventure adult audiobook -
The Witch’s Lens by Luanne G. Smith
16 ratingsAs World War I rages, there are evils—both living and dead—that only a witch can see in a spellbinding novel by the Amazon Charts and Washington Post bestselling author of The Raven Spell.With her husband off fighting at World War I’s eastern front, Petra Kurková embraces her fleeting freedom, roaming the city at night with her camera...Categorized as:
historical-fiction paranormal magic gothic fantasy fiction witches-wizards historical -
Lavondyss by Robert Holdstock
14 ratingsA haunting entry in the World Fantasy Award-winning Mythago CycleIn Mythago Wood, Robert Holdstock gave us an intricate world spun from the stories of Irish and English mythology, a great forest steeped in mystery and legend, whose heart contains secrets that will change all who behold them.Young Tallis is one such seeker. When she was just an infant, she lost her brother Harry to Ryhope Wood... -
Nobody's Sweetheart Now by Maggie Robinson
12 ratingsA delightful English cozy series begins in August 1924. Lady Adelaide Compton has recently (and satisfactorily) interred her husband, Major Rupert Charles Cressleigh Compton, hero of the Somme, in the family vault in the village churchyard.Rupert died by smashing his Hispano-Suiza on a Cotswold country road while carrying a French mademoiselle in the passenger seat... -
Bloodcircle by P.N. Elrod
12 ratings"Critics are thirsting for "Vampire Files"...An entertaining blend of detective story and the supernatural". Science Fiction Chronicle"A blend of the hard-boiled detective novel and the vampire tale.. -
Blooded by Christopher Golden, Nancy Holder
12 ratingsChirayoju, a vampire of Chinese lore, and Sanno, the legendary Japanese Mountain King, have been locked in deadly battle for centuries. Literally. An ancient curse imprisoned the spirits of these two warriors in an antique sword.Until the sword arrives in Sunnydale.Freed by accident, Chirayoju searches for a host body that will allow him to continue wreaking havoc amoung the living and the dead... -
Lammas Night by Katherine Kurtz
10 ratingsWhat Magic Can Stop Adolf Hitler -- History's Most Evil Black Magician?Modern WarThe year is 1940. Hitler's Germany is about to employ the secret arts of evil witchcraft to destroy England...Categorized as:
historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century adult alternate-history book female-author -
Art in the Blood by P.N. Elrod
10 ratingsI'm a vampire, not an artist, but I know what I like.And I don't like murder:So when the career of a talented young artist is fatally cut short, I know I won't sleep easy in my coffin until I find the killer: But the world of high art--with its big money, bigger egos, and expensive forgeries--makes even bloodsucking seem simple. And safer... -
The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers
24 ratingsBrendan Doyle, a specialist in the work of the early-nineteenth century poet William Ashbless, reluctantly accepts an invitation from a millionaire to act as a guide to time-travelling tourists. But while attending a lecture given by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1810, he becomes marooned in Regency London, where dark and dangerous forces know about the gates in time...Categorized as:
historical-fiction magic paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult alternate-history audiobook -
Supping With Panthers by Tom Holland
8 ratingsDr. John Eliot's search for a missing friend leads him to the seductive Lilah--who will not rest until she has coaxed Eliot's most monstrous impulses out into the open--in this mesmerizing tale set in the back streets of 19th-century London... -
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Written in the Blood by Stephen Lloyd Jones
8 ratings"Chilling . . . A neo-gothic treat; original, richly imagined, and powerfully told." --The Guardian (UK) for The String Diaries See the girl. Leah Wilde is twenty-four, a runaway on a black motorbike, hunting for answers while changing her identity with each new Central European town...Categorized as:
historical-fiction paranormal 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook book dark -
The Horror on the Links by Seabury Quinn
6 ratingsToday the names of H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, August Derleth, and Clark Ashton Smith, all regular contributors to the pulp magazine Weird Tales during the first half of the twentieth century, are recognizable even to casual readers of the bizarre and fantastic... -
The Mammoth Book of The Best Of Best New Horror by Stephen Jones, Brian Lumley
6 ratingsThis twentieth anniversary showcase includes a single story from each of the Best New Horror annual anthologies.Contents: 1989. No sharks in the Med / Brian Lumley --1990. The man who drew cats / Michael Marshall Smith --1991. The same in any language / Ramsey Campbell --1992. Norman Wisdom and the Angel of Death / Christopher Fowler --1993. Mefisto in onyx / Harlan Ellison --1994... -
Bacchanal by Veronica G. Henry
20 ratingsEvil lives in a traveling carnival roaming the Depression-era South. But the carnival’s newest act, a peculiar young woman with latent magical powers, may hold the key to defeating it. Her time has come.Abandoned by her family, alone on the wrong side of the color line with little to call her own, Eliza Meeks is coming to terms with what she does have. It’s a gift for communicating with animals... -
The Drawing of the Dark by Tim Powers
19 ratings'The Drawing of the Dark is not only one of my favourite Tim Powers novels, it's simply one of my favourite novels. The seamless and seemingly effortless blend of action and humour, the wonderful characters, the rich settings, the brilliant plot - all of it is perfect' James P...Categorized as:
historical-fiction magic 20th-century action-adventure adult alternate-history arthurian book -
The Other Side of Midnight by Simone St. James
18 ratingsThe award-winning author of The Haunting of Maddy Clare and Silence for the Dead, presents another mesmerizing gothic story of intrigue...London, 1925. Glamorous medium Gloria Sutter made her fortune helping the bereaved contact loved ones killed during the Great War...
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