Books like

Books like Shopgirl

12 books with a reading profile close to Shopgirl by Steve Martin. Inward-looking and thought-provoking; an easy read.

1

Green Dot

by Madeleine Gray

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Hera, a woman in her twenties in Sydney, works a dull job at a magazine and wants to be a writer.
2

Why We Broke Up

by Daniel Handler

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Minny Green, a high school junior and film fanatic, writes a lengthy letter to her ex-boyfriend, Ed Slaterton, the school’s star basketball player.
3

Vinegar Girl

by Anne Tyler

romance, narrative

Kate Battista, twenty-nine, works as a preschool teaching assistant and keeps house for her father, a scientist in Baltimore, and her flighty younger sister.
4

You Are Here

by David Nicholls

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Marnie and Michael are two solitary individuals stuck in professional and emotional ruts.
5

Echoes

by Maeve Binchy

romance, narrative

Set in the 1950s seaside town of Castlebay, the story centers on Clare O’Brien, a shopkeeper's daughter, and David Power, the son of the local doctor.
6

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

by Jamie Ford

romance, narrative

Set in Seattle during World War II, the narrative follows Henry Lee, a Chinese American boy caught between his father’s nationalist fervor and his secret bond with Keiko Okabe, a Japanese American classmate.
7

Cleopatra and Frankenstein

by Coco Mellors

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Twenty-four-year-old Cleo, a British painter living in New York on an expiring student visa, impulsively marries Frank, an advertising executive twenty years her senior.
8

As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow

by Zoulfa Katouh

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Salama Kassab is a pharmacy student working as a surgeon in a Homs hospital during the Syrian revolution.
9

Peony in Love

by Lisa See

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Set in seventeenth-century China, this story follows Peony, a sheltered girl from a wealthy family who becomes obsessed with the opera The Peony Pavilion.
10

I'll Give You the Sun

by Jandy Nelson

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Jandy Nelson’s novel centers on twins Jude and Noah, told through two shifting timelines.
11

Eleanor & Park

by Rainbow Rowell

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

In 1986 Omaha, sixteen-year-old Eleanor Douglas joins a new school with bright red hair and mismatched clothes that invite immediate bullying.
12

The Little Paris Bookshop

by Nina George, Nina George

Also inward-looking · romance, narrative

Jean Perdu operates a floating bookstore on a barge called the Literary Apothecary, moored on the Seine.

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