Books like Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel


Giving Up the Ghost is Hilary Mantel’s introspective autobiography, detailing her childhood in the 1950s and the complex family relationships that influenced her writing. The book examines the impact of early bereavement, chronic pain, and the search for identity. Mantel also addresses the challenges of motherhood and the lingering effects of medical misunderstandings, offering a raw and personal perspective on how these experiences inform her work as a novelist.
First publish date: 2003
Genre: Biography & Autobiography/Autobiography
Authors: Hilary Mantel
★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 5.0 (1 community ratings)

Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel

How are these books recommended?

The books recommended for Giving Up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel are shaped by reader interaction. Votes on how closely books relate, user ratings, and community comments all help refine these recommendations and highlight books readers genuinely find similar in theme, ideas, and overall reading experience.


Have you read any of these books?
Your votes, ratings, and comments help improve recommendations and make it easier for other readers to discover books they’ll enjoy.

Books similar to Giving Up the Ghost (25 similar books)

The lovely bones by 5206325|Alice Sebold book cover

πŸ“˜ The lovely bones

After being murdered at fourteen, Susie Salmon watches from heaven as her family, friends, and killer grapple with grief and justice, revealing how love and forgiveness shape a family's future.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 3.4 (68 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
The Glass Castle by 7747663|Jeannette Walls book cover

πŸ“˜ The Glass Castle

Jeannette Walls' memoir chronicles her turbulent childhood in a dysfunctional, itinerant family, detailing poverty, alcoholism, and homelessness across the United States as she seeks stability and personal growth.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 4.4 (45 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
The Bell Jar by 8634469|Sylvia Plath book cover

πŸ“˜ The Bell Jar

The Bell Jar is the sole novel by Sylvia Plath, a psychologically intense and autobiographical look at a young woman’s decline into mental illness.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 4.2 (42 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Boy by 7736575|Roald Dahl book cover

πŸ“˜ Boy
 by Roald Dahl

Roaldβ€―Dahl’s humorous memoir of his early years, from birth through his time at an English boarding school and his first job at Royalβ€―Dutchβ€―Shell.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 4.0 (38 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
The hours by 6915447|Michael Cunningham book cover

πŸ“˜ The hours

Michael Cunningham’s lyrical novel weaves Virginia Woolf’s final days with contemporary tales of love, inheritance, hope, and despair, centering on poet Richard and his friend Clarissa as they navigate fame and personal fulfillment.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 3.7 (7 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Committed by 7387694|Elizabeth Gilbert book cover

πŸ“˜ Committed

After a life‑altering romance, Elizabeth Gilbert confronts her fear of marriage by researching its history and meaning, turning a personal dilemma into a witty, reflective exploration of love and commitment.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 2.7 (3 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Born round by 9691996|Frank Bruni book cover

πŸ“˜ Born round

Frank Bruni, a lifelong β€˜boy who knew he would grow up with a thick belly’, chronicles his journey from a struggling, Italian‑American child to the Newβ€―Yorkβ€―Times restaurant critic who finally learns to love food in moderation.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 3.3 (3 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
The silence of the girls by 6575108|Pat Barker book cover

πŸ“˜ The silence of the girls
 by Pat Barker

Pat Barker reimagines the final days of the Trojan War through the eyes of Briseis, the captured concubine of Achilles, revealing the voices of the women walled in the Greek camp.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 4.5 (2 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
About Alice by 6765881|Calvin Trillin book cover

πŸ“˜ About Alice

A heartfelt memoir in which Calvin Trillin honors his late wife, Alice Trillin, celebrating her intellect, beauty, and the enduring love that bound them.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 3.0 (2 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Little heathens by 7084433|Mildred Armstrong Kalish book cover

πŸ“˜ Little heathens

Mildred Kalish shares her childhood on an Iowa farm during the Great Depression, blending humor, family traditions, and practical lessons about farm life, recipes, and resilience.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 2.5 (2 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Foreskin's lament by 7112357|Shalom Auslander book cover

πŸ“˜ Foreskin's lament

Shalom Auslander’s memoir, *Foreskin's Lament*, chronicles his turbulent youth in an isolated Orthodox community, his rebellionβ€”including a reform‑school exile in Israelβ€”and his ongoing struggle to reconcile faith, law, and personal freedom.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 2.5 (2 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Something in the blood by 8379097|David J. Skal book cover

πŸ“˜ Something in the blood

First published in 1897, Dracula has had a long and multifaceted afterlife - one rivaling even its immortal creation; yet Bram Stoker has remained a hovering specter in this pervasive mythology. In Something in the Blood, David J. Skal exhumes the inner world and strange genius of the writer who birthed an undying cultural icon, painting an astonishing portrait of the age in which Stoker was born - a time when death was no metaphor but a constant threat easily imagined as a character existing in flesh and blood.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 5.0 (1 rating)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Closing Time by 7185540|Joe Queenan book cover

πŸ“˜ Closing Time

A funny, heartbreaking memoir of Joe Queenan’s escape from a harsh 1960s Philadelphia housing project, driven by a tumultuous Irish‑Catholic family and a relentless pursuit of books, music, and mentors.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 5.0 (1 rating)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Give up the Ghost by 11192040|Juliet Blackwell book cover

πŸ“˜ Give up the Ghost


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 5.0 (1 rating)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Jane Austen by 6677000|Carol Shields book cover

πŸ“˜ Jane Austen

Carol Shields’s biography traces Jane Austen’s journey from her early family life in Steventown through her years in Bath, revealing the private woman behind the celebrated classics Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Emma.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Brooklyn by 12571985|Colm Tóibín book cover

πŸ“˜ Brooklyn

A young Irish woman, Eilis Lacey, leaves 1950s Ireland for Brooklyn, finding work, education, and love, only to be confronted with an impossible choice between a new life across the ocean and her roots back home.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Bad blood by 6745970|Lorna Sage book cover

πŸ“˜ Bad blood
 by Lorna Sage

Lorna Sage’s frank autobiography traces her upbringing in postwar Britain, the turbulent lives of her vicar grandfather on the Welsh border, and the complexities of her own family, culminating in the themes of marriage and identity.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Oleander, Jacaranda by 6721775|Penelope Lively book cover

πŸ“˜ Oleander, Jacaranda

Penelope Lively’s memoir, Oleander, Jacaranda, traces her childhood in 1930s–40s Egypt, from fellaheen villages to the Gezira Sporting Club, blending vivid memories of Nile wildlife with reflections on culture and identity.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Time To Be In Earnest by 7707518|P. D. James book cover

πŸ“˜ Time To Be In Earnest


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Beatrix Potter by 7107851|Linda Lear book cover

πŸ“˜ Beatrix Potter
 by Linda Lear

Linda Lear’s biography reveals the extraordinary life of Beatrix Potter, celebrated artist, illustrator, author, businesswoman, scientist, and Lakeland landowner.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Brother, I'm dying by 6496014|Edwidge Danticat book cover

πŸ“˜ Brother, I'm dying

Edwidge Danticat tells the true story of her family’s migration from Haiti to Newβ€―York and the perilous journey home in 2004, revealing the intimate struggles of emigration amid Haiti’s political turmoil.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Give up the Ghost by 10505720|Angie Fox book cover

πŸ“˜ Give up the Ghost
 by Angie Fox


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
How to Cure a Ghost by 13415314|Fariha Róisín book cover

πŸ“˜ How to Cure a Ghost


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
Ghost of by 11886675|Diana Khoi Nguyen book cover

πŸ“˜ Ghost of


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0
A Man Called Ove by 13702378|Fredrik Backman book cover

πŸ“˜ A Man Called Ove


β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 0.0 (0 ratings)
Similar? ✓ Yes 0 ✗ No 0

Some Other Similar Books

White Oleander by Janet Fitch
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Have a similar book in mind? Let others know!

Please login to submit books!