10 books for fans of Dead Wake
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In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin
by Erik Larson
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Chicago professor William Dodd becomes America's first ambassador to Hitler's Germany while his daughter Martha falls for Nazi charm in 1933.
★ 3.90 Goodreads (221.9K ratings) - 3
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The Frozen River
by Ariel Lawhon
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A midwife in 1789 Maine becomes a detective when a man's body is found frozen in the river, drawing on her intimate knowledge of every family secret in town. Lawhon turns colonial America into a forensic thriller.
★ 4.38 Goodreads (594.0K ratings) - 5
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The Song of Achilles
by Madeline Miller
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Patroclus narrates his devotion to godlike Achilles from their boyhood friendship through the brutal siege that will claim them both.
★ 4.30 Goodreads (2.0M ratings) - 7
Brethren
Foundation of the Dragon Series • Book 1
by Robb Pritchard
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When enemies destroy his hillfort and enslave his family, widowed Celtic father Cadwal must escape the mines to reclaim everything.
★ 4.22 Goodreads (395 ratings) - 8
Black Sam: Prince of Pirates
by Mat McLeod, James Lewis
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After the War of Spanish Succession, unemployed sailor Sam Bellamy turns pirate to prove himself worthy of a New England socialite. Historical piracy meets romance in colonial American waters.
★ 3.65 Goodreads (96 ratings) - 9
The Things We Cannot Say
by Kelly Rimmer
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Rimmer weaves together a Polish woman's wartime survival story with her granddaughter's modern family struggles, including caring for an autistic child. The parallel narratives explore how family secrets across generations can both wound and ultimately heal.
★ 4.54 Goodreads (284.0K ratings) - 10
Homegoing
by Yaa Gyasi
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Two family branches—one sold into slavery, one complicit in selling—unfold across three centuries from 18th-century Ghana to contemporary America.
★ 4.47 Goodreads (410.6K ratings)