Books like Celestial Navigation

Loved Celestial Navigation by Anne Tyler? Here are 8 books with the same pull, and why each one fits.

8 books

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1Housekeeping
Housekeeping
Marilynne Robinson
A quiet domestic novel about a household run by women in a small town, with a slow, observant voice and a sense of a home coming apart.
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2Empire Falls
Empire Falls
Richard Russo
A small-town novel about an ordinary man stuck in a place and in his obligations, told with warmth and wry detail.
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3Plainsong
Plainsong
Kent Haruf
A plain-spoken novel about ordinary people in a rural town, with spare prose and attention to daily routines and small kindnesses.
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4Olive Kitteridge
Olive Kitteridge
Elizabeth Strout
Linked stories about a New England community and its difficult family relationships, written with close attention to ordinary lives.
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5Crossing to Safety
Crossing to Safety
Wallace Stegner
A long, reflective novel about two couples whose friendship lasts decades, with a measured voice on family, loyalty and ageing.
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6Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
Gail Honeyman
A story about a socially isolated woman whose routines and loneliness are shown with dry humour and a gradual opening up to others.
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7Stoner
Stoner
John Williams
A quiet, unshowy novel about one ordinary life, shaped by routine, duty and the limits a person sets on himself.
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8Ordinary People
Ordinary People
Judith Guest
A family novel that follows a household's quiet strain after a death, told through the inner lives of its members.
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