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Miguel Street

V.S. Naipaul · back to the book

What’s in it

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24 books with the same feel

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In the Castle of My Skin

George Lamming · 313 pages

George Lamming's "In the Castle of My Skin" skilfully depicts the Barbadian psyche. Set against the backdrop of the 1930s riots which helped to pave the way for Independence and the modern Barbados, through the eyes of a young boy, Lamming portrays the social, racial, political and urban struggles with which Barbados continues to grapple even with some thirty-three years of Political Independence

CaribbeanChild NarratorComing of AgeWorking-Class Protagonist
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How Green Was My Valley

Richard Llewellyn · 495 pages

**This is a story set in a south Wales coal mining valley and tells of a family striving to improve their lives through hard work, education and their non-conformist faith.** The main character is the youngest son, Huw Morgan and his life's journey through the difficulties associated with the mining industry and the awful risks involved in deep coal mining in the **mid nineteenth century**. The

Child NarratorComing of AgeWorking-Class ProtagonistBittersweet
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Bud, Not Buddy

Christopher Paul Curtis · 249 pages

It's 1936, in Flint, Michigan. Times may be hard, and ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but Bud's got a few things going for him: 1. He has his own suitcase filled with his own important, secret things. 2. He's the author of Bud Caldwell's Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar Out of Yourself. 3. His momma never told him who his father was, but

Child NarratorComing of AgeBittersweetCharming
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The House on Mango Street

Sandra Cisneros · 110 pages

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A coming-of-age classic, acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught in schools and universities alike, and translated around the world—from the winner of the 2019 PEN/Nabokov Award for Achievement in International Literature. The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero, a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for he

Child NarratorWorking-Class ProtagonistComing of AgeShort Stories
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Sweet Thursday

John Steinbeck · 262 pages

In Monterey, on the California coast, Sweet Thursday is what they call the day after Lousy Wednesday, which is one of those days that are just naturally bad. Returning to the scene of Cannery Row—the weedy lots and junk heaps and flophouses of Monterey, John Steinbeck once more brings to life the denizens of a netherworld of laughter and tears—from Fauna, new headmistress of the local brothel, to

Working-Class ProtagonistEnsemble CastCharmingBittersweet
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Dubliners

James Joyce · 226 pages

James Joyce's disillusion with the publication of Dubliners in 1914 was the result of ten years battling with publishers, resisting their demands to remove swear words, real place names and much else, including two entire stories. Although only 24 when he signed his first publishing contract for the book, Joyce already knew its worth: to alter it in any way would 'retard the course of civilisation

Working-Class ProtagonistShort StoriesComing of AgeChild Narrator
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A Painted House

John Grisham · 465 pages

Using his own childhood for inspiration (and leaving the lawyers behind), bestselling author John Grisham sets A Painted House in 1950s rural Arkansas. During harvest time, together with hired Mexicans and hill people, seven-year-old Luke Chandler picks cotton on his family's rented 80 acres. But racial tension, a forbidden love affair, and murder cause Luke to grow up before he's ready.

Child NarratorWorking-Class ProtagonistBittersweetComing of Age
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Hideous Kinky

Esther Freud · 186 pages

Two little girls are taken by their mother to Morocco on a 1960s pilgrimage of self-discovery. For Mum it is not just an escape from the grinding conventions of English life but a quest for personal fulfilment; her children, however, seek something more solid and stable amidst the shifting desert sands.'Just open the book and begin, and instantly you will be first of all charmed, then intrigued an

Child NarratorComing of AgeBittersweetCharming
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Dirty Havana Trilogy

Pedro Juan Gutierrez · 400 pages

CaribbeanWorking-Class ProtagonistShort StoriesLiterary Fiction
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We the Animals

Justin Torres · 144 pages

"An exquisite, blistering debut novel. Three brothers tear their way through childhood-- smashing tomatoes all over each other, building kites from trash, hiding out when their parents do battle, tiptoeing around the house as their mother sleeps off her graveyard shift. Paps and Ma are from Brooklyn--he's Puerto Rican, she's white--and their love is a serious, dangerous thing that makes and unmake

Child NarratorWorking-Class ProtagonistComing of AgeLiterary Fiction
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Sour Heart

Jenny Zhang · 310 pages

Child NarratorWorking-Class ProtagonistComing of AgeShort Stories
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Nine Stories

J.D. Salinger · 208 pages

First published short story volume by the author of Catcher In The Rye.

Child NarratorBittersweetShort StoriesComing of Age
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Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha

Roddy Doyle · 282 pages

In this national bestseller and winner of the Booker Prize, Roddy Doyle, author of the "Barrytown Trilogy," takes us to a new level of emotional richness with the story of ten-year-old Padraic Clarke. Witty and poignant--and adored by critics and readers alike--Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha charts the trumphs, indignities, and bewilderment of Paddy as he tries to make sense of his changing world.

Child NarratorComing of AgeLiterary FictionBittersweet
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Everyone Leaves

Wendy Guerra · 254 pages

"When Nieve Guerra finds herself caught between the tides of her parents' turbulent relationship and a country torn apart by political unrest, she begins recording the intimate and harsh details of her life within the pages of her Diary. Nieve is sent away from her mother, her mother's free-spirited and loving Swedish boyfriend Fausto, and her childhood city of Cienfuegos and forced to endure unre

CaribbeanChild NarratorComing of AgeLiterary Fiction
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David Copperfield

Charles Dickens · 742 pages

Coming of AgeEnsemble CastWorking-Class ProtagonistFirst Person Narrator
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CaribbeanWorking-Class ProtagonistEnsemble CastLiterary Fiction
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Child NarratorShort StoriesWorking-Class ProtagonistBittersweet
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Mark Twain · 330 pages

Child NarratorComing of AgeFirst Person NarratorLiterary Fiction
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Voyage In The Dark

Jean Rhys · 188 pages

"Often considered Jean Rhys's most autobiographical novel, this masterful and moving work follows a chorus girl, Anna, who struggles to adjust to cold and inhospitable England after a childhood in the West Indies. When an affair that at first feels like salvation comes to a disastrous end, Anna begins to unravel"--

CaribbeanWorking-Class ProtagonistBittersweetLiterary Fiction
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Marcovaldo

Italo Calvino · 192 pages

Short StoriesBittersweetCharmingWorking-Class Protagonist
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The Bean Trees

Barbara Kingsolver · 240 pages

Taylor, a poor Kentuckian making her way west with an abandoned baby girl, stops in Tucson where she finds friends and discovers resources in apparently empty places.

Working-Class ProtagonistComing of AgeCharmingEnsemble Cast
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Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing

Judy Blume · 120 pages

Any fourth grader would agree that Peter Hatcher has a terrible problem—his little brother, Fudge. But the grown-ups in his life just can't see that there is something wrong with a two-year-old who breaks his front teeth try- ing to fly, decides that he is a dog, goes on a no-eat strike, and scribbles all over his brother's homework. Peter is always asked to perform so that Fudge will be less of

Child NarratorCharmingClassicsComing of Age
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In the Country of Men

Hisham Matar · 252 pages

Libya, 1979. Nine-year-old Suleiman's days are circumscribed by the narrow rituals of childhood: outings to the ruins surrounding Tripoli, games with friends played under the burning sun, exotic gifts from his father's constant business trips abroad. But his nights have come to revolve around his mother's increasingly disturbing bedside stories full of old family bitterness. And then one day Su

Child NarratorComing of AgeBittersweetLiterary Fiction
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To Kill a Mockingbird

Harper Lee · 309 pages

One of the best-loved stories of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird has been translated into more than 40 languages, sold more than 30 million copies worldwide, served as the basis for an enormously popular motion picture, and voted one of the best novels of the 20th century by librarians across the United States. A gripping, heart-wrenching, and wholly remarkable tale of coming-of-age in a South poi

Child NarratorComing of AgeBittersweetLiterary Fiction
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