Books like The Polished Hoe by Austin Clarke

The Warmth of Other Suns is a non‑fiction study of the Great Migration, tracing the journey of nearly six million African Americans from the South to northern and western cities between 1915 and 1970.

A poignant tale of identity and change in Nigeria, chronicling the journey of a thief who finds purpose and connection in his community.

A vivid portrait of life on a Jamaican sugar plantation at the turn of the nineteenth century, following Lilith, a young enslaved woman whose emerging powers draw her into a secret rebel faction.

Portrait of an Eye by Kathy Acker is a provocative American experimental fiction that pushes the boundaries of narrative form and interrogates gender and power through unconventional storytelling.

A Southern plantation drama where family bonds and buried secrets intertwine against the backdrop of modern South Carolina.

In the last days of World War II, the Japanese occupation of Manchuria has collapsed. As the Chinese move in, the elders of the Japanese settler village of Sakito decide to preserve their honour by killing all the villagers in an act of mass suicide. Only 16-year-old Tatsuru escapes. But Tatsuru's trials have just begun. As she flees, she falls into the hands of human traffickers. She is sold to a wealthy Chinese family, where she becomes Duohe - the clandestine second wife to the only son, and the secret bearer of his children. Against all odds, Duohe forms an unlikely friendship with the first wife Xiaohuan, united by the unshakeable bonds of motherhood and family.

When Lily steps into the Egyptian Afterlife, she must rescue her friend Amon and stop the deadly Devouror of the Underworld from tearing the world apart.

In Joseph Boyden’s The Orenda, a brutal massacre forces a hybrid narrative of Iroquois and Huron tribes, Jesuit missionary zeal, and the emergence of a new world at the edge of Canada’s wilderness.

Mary Anne follows the footsteps of a Regency London woman who must outwit men to survive, becoming a royal mistress and meddling in military commerce before the scandal damages her.

Kathy Acker’s "Don Quixote, which was a dream" explores whimsical quests and complex man-woman relationships within an American literary context.

A quiet, powerful tale of Henry Townsend, a former slave who rises to become a plantation owner in antebellum Virginia, and the turbulent world of his estate and the wider South as slavery persists and challenges surface.

Taken by Surprise, Nina Quinn’s landscaping firm specializing in surprise garden makeovers, is the only thing in her life that seems to be thriving. Her marriage to adulterous police detective Kevin Quinn has wilted. Her antisocial stepson Riley is spreading trouble like pungent manure. Even her gardening tools are disappearing, including a rather valuable set of hoes. Worst of all, the delightful old man who first introduced her to the joys of horticulture is dead—and not by natural causes. Something evil has taken root in Nina’s small Ohio town, and the local police—including dearly unbeloved Kev—are baffled. But it’s amazing what a resourceful gardener can dig up when she puts her mind to it—though, by sticking her hands too deeply into this fetid, fertile soil, Nina might well end up planted beneath her own petunias.