Read-alikes: Sue Monk Kidd

If you enjoyed the diversity and magic of The Secret Life of Bees, try one of these titles on for size.

Thereafter Johnnie by Carolivia Herron
Framed by a narrative that uses twenty-four chapters to describe a full day, Johnnie Snowdon embarks on a personal genealogy project and learns passionate truths about her family, history, and culture.

Gods in Alabama by Joshilyn Jackson
Much against her will, Arlene Fleet returns to her hometown of Possett, Alabama, to straighten out the mysterious mess surrounding the murder of a high school football star in 1985.

Distant Lover by Gloria Mallette
Tandi Crawford struggles to make peace with her father, for whom she becomes responsible when he suffers a near-fatal stroke.

Right as Rain by Bev Marshall
A highly competitive friendship and an interracial love story are the centerpieces of this novel, set on a Southern farm in 1968.

Getting Mother's Body by Suzan-Lori Parks
The possibility of inherited jewels sends Billy Beede on a road trip to recover her mother Willa Mae's remains. However, Billy must compete for both baubles and body with Dill, Willa Mae's former lover.

A Year and A Day by Leslie Pietrzyk
A series of conversations with her dead mother helps Alice Martin better understand her own past, present, and possible futures.

All the Way Home by Ann Tatlock
Angie and Sunny's friendship was torn apart when Sunny and her family were sent to an internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II. Reunited as adults, the two women must work together to advance the cause of racial justice in the Vietnam-era South.

Swan Place by Augusta Trobaugh
Fourteen-year-old Dove relies on the powers of faith and family ties to survive a series of tragedies that come to her small town in Georgia.

Eden by Olympia Vernon
Rebellious Maddy Dangerfield navigates her way through the thicket of her family's dysfunction by forming an alliance with her aunt, who is dying of breast cancer.

Visible Spirits by Steve Yarbrough
In the year 1902, brothers Tandy and Leighton Payne spar over whether or not an African American woman should hold the job of postmistress in their hometown of Loring, Mississippi.