2025 NoveList Reading Challenge - September - Read a book set in the decade you were bornLike this list

22 items

• The Stolen Queen

  a Novel

  Davis, Fiona, 1966-

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  In 1978, as a valuable Egyptian artifact disappears during the Met Gala, Met curator Charlotte Cross and young assistant Annie Jenkins embark on a high-stakes search that leads them to Egypt, where Charlotte must confront an ancient curse and the…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Witchcraft for Wayward Girls

  Hendrix, Grady,

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  Four teenage girls trapped in a secretive maternity home for unwed mothers in 1970 St. Augustine, Florida, find an unexpected source of power through witchcraft.

• Lazarus Man

  Price, Richard, 1949-

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  The acclaimed writer of The 25th Hour brings the story of a 2008 East Harlem tenement collapse that turns a survivor into an unlikely prophet.

• Taiwan Travelogue

  a Novel

  Yang, Shuangzi, 1984-

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  In May 1938, young novelist Aoyama Chizuko travels from Nagasaki to Taiwan, uninterested in the Japanese government’s agenda. She seeks authentic island life and cuisine. A younger Taiwanese woman, sharing her name’s characters, becomes her…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Mighty Red

  a Novel

  Erdrich, Louise,

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  It is 2008 in Argus, North Dakota, when a wedding intertwines the lives of Gary, Kismet, Hugo, and Crystal. Amidst personal struggles and love triangles, they face broader themes of time, climate change, and economic turmoil. The novel explores the…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• The Witches of El Paso

  Jaramillo, Luis,

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  A lawyer and her elderly great-aunt use their supernatural gifts to find a lost child in 1943.

• Women's Hotel

  a Novel

  Lavery, Daniel M.,

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  From the New York Times bestselling author and advice columnist, a poignant and funny debut novel about the residents of a women's hotel in 1960s New York City.

• Shred Sisters

  a Novel

  Lerner, Betsy,

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  Spanning the 70s to the 90s, an intimate and bittersweet story explores the fierce complexities of sisterhood, mental health, loss and love, showing that for all that threatens their sibling bond, Amy and Ollie Shred cannot escape or deny the…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• What I Know About You

  Chacour, Éric, 1983-

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  A heartbreaking tale of a family and an impossible love, torn apart by secrets and traditions in late-twentieth-century Cairo. This immersive novel looks back on the 1960's from the turn of the millennium.

• Us Fools

  Lange, Nora

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  A tragicomic, intimate American story of two precocious sisters coming of age during the Midwestern farm crisis of the 1980s.

• Elaine

  a Novel

  Self, Will,

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  Based on the author's mother's diaries, a housewife in Ithaca, New York pushes back against the confines of her life in 1950s America, beginning a disastrous affair with a former member of the Communist Party.

• Black Butterflies

  Morris, Priscilla (College teacher),

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  Zora, an artist and teacher, sends her husband and elderly mother safely to England but stays in Sarajevo to fight and rebuild as the city fractures along ethnic lines during the Balkan conflict in 1992.

• 54 Miles

  Pitts, Leonard, Jr.,

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  Two families in mid-1960s Harlem and Alabama grapple with the promise and brutality of the civil rights era while reckoning with family secrets, unresolved trauma and the question of what justice demands.

• Swift River

  Chambers, Essie,

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  A sweeping family saga about the complicated bond between mothers and daughters, the disappearance of a father and the long-hidden history of a declining New England mill town in the 1980s.

• Malas

  Fuentes, Marcela (Fiction writer),

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  When her beloved grandmother passes away in 1991, 14-year-old Lulu is drawn to the glamorous stranger who crashed the funeral and their unexpected kinship picks at the secrets of Lulu's family and a curse that reverberates across generation as one…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Daughter of the Merciful Deep

  Penelope, L., 1978-

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  A woman journeys into a submerged world of gods and myth to save her home in this powerful historical fantasy -- set in 1935 -- that shines a light on the drowned Black towns of the American South

• Enlightenment

  a Novel

  Perry, Sarah, 1979-

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  Two unlikely best friends in Aldleigh, England in the 1990s investigate the mystery of a vanished nineteenth century explorer, uncovering a devastating tale of love and scientific pursuit.

• Horror Movie

  a Novel

  Tremblay, Paul,

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  In 1993, guerilla filmmakers created Horror Movie, a disturbing art-house film with only three released scenes, yet it gained a cult following. Thirty years later, Hollywood plans a reboot. The sole surviving cast member, “The Thin Kid,” must…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Tiananmen Square

  [a Novel]

  Wen, Lai, 1970-

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  This mesmerizing coming-of-age novel follows Lai, living near the heart of Beijing, as she opens her heart to the emotional power of literature and her mind to different perspectives, joining the masses of demonstrators and dreamers who display…Read moreRead more of this annotation

• Cinema Love

  a Novel

  Tang, Jiaming,

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  After emigrating to New York City's Chinatown Old Second and Bao Mei reminisce about their secret past in a rural Chinese cinema in the 1980s that taught them to navigate forbidden love, societal pressures and an uncertain future.