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Books like The Pull of the Stars
24 connected reads, with a reason for every recommendation.
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8 reading possibilities- 01
Donoghue again brings a watchful medical professional into an intimate Irish story shaped by faith, illness, and uncertainty.
- 02
This novella’s account of the 1918 influenza and wartime life offers a strikingly close historical parallel.
- 03
A young midwife’s work and choices during the First World War echo the seed’s focus on care and women’s lives.
- 04
An unexpected connectionA strange outbreak reshapes a small community, shifting the seed’s pandemic premise into quietly uncanny territory.
- 05
Its intimate portrait of women navigating wartime danger shares the seed’s interest in courage under historical pressure.
- 06
A midwife’s hands-on care for a close-knit community makes this a natural companion to a nurse-centered historical novel.
- 07
This lyrical wartime novel centers on an injured patient and the people who care for him amid upheaval.
- 08
An unexpected connectionThis contemporary pandemic novel offers a more satirical, dislocated counterpart to Donoghue’s grounded historical crisis.
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- 09
Its wartime chapters include nursing work and the strain of caring for the wounded during a sweeping historical crisis.
- 10
Hannah’s portrait of a woman enduring a period of mass hardship will suit readers seeking emotionally immersive history.
- 11
Its close attention to a woman’s changing sense of self offers a quieter bridge to Donoghue’s intimate character work.
- 12
An unexpected connectionIts post-pandemic world expands the seed’s interest in epidemic upheaval into a reflective story about what people preserve.
- 13
This Irish historical novel examines a woman’s life through memory and institutions, complementing the seed’s Irish setting.
- 14
Its focus on community and ordinary lives during wartime offers a warmer, more epistolary take on historical upheaval.
- 15
Women’s work and friendship under wartime pressure make this a strong choice for readers who want another immersive historical story.
- 16
An unexpected connectionThis spare post-pandemic survival story offers a nature-centered contrast to the seed’s crowded city hospital.
- 17
A layered historical mystery links women’s lives to the lingering disruptions of war.
- 18
A determined young healer’s education and medical ambitions make this a natural fit for readers drawn to medicine in historical fiction.
- 19
This medical historical novel connects plague-era care with a modern disease investigation.
- 20
An unexpected connectionAn epidemic of memory loss gives this imaginative novel a distinct but clear connection to illness and social breakdown.
- 21
A village’s response to plague gives this novel the same interest in illness, collective fear, and everyday acts of care.
- 22
Its First World War setting and women-centered narrative provide a strong historical and thematic connection.
- 23
Readers interested in the ethical stakes surrounding medicine may appreciate this thriller’s investigation into the pharmaceutical world.
- 24
An unexpected connectionA survival story shaped by a possible epidemic offers a brisk, suspenseful departure from Donoghue’s historical realism.
About the book
Emma Donoghue’s 2020 historical novel follows a nurse in a Dublin maternity ward during the 1918 influenza pandemic and the First World War.
About the author
Emma Donoghue is an Irish-Canadian novelist and playwright whose work includes historical fiction and the bestselling novel Room.