A Separate Peace by John Knowles
Novel set in the first half of the 20th Century HUNGARY
Ten Great Books set in NEW HAMPSHIRE
7th August 2026
Ten great books set in New Hampshire
Nestled in the New England region of the United States, New Hampshire is known as the Granite State due to its extensive rock formations and quarries. It is celebrated for its dramatic natural landscape, which features the rugged White Mountains – home to towering Mount Washington – alongside peaceful glacial lakes like Winnipesaukee.
Embodying the famous state motto, “Live Free or Die”, New Hampshire holds a unique place in American history as the first colony to establish its own constitution. It also plays an outsized role in national politics by hosting the country’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary every four years.
The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve
On Smuttynose Island, off the coast of New Hampshire, more than a century ago, two Norwegian immigrant women were brutally murdered. A third woman survived by hiding in a cave until dawn. In 1995, Jean, a photographer, is sent on an assignment to shoot a photo essay about the legendary crime. Taking her extended family with her, Jean stays in a sailboat anchored off the coast, and finds herself gradually becoming more and more engrossed in the bay’s mysterious and gruesome past. Wandering into a library one day, she unearths letters written by Maren, the sole survivor of the murder spree. Jean’s fear of losing all that she cares about is reflected in Maren’s poignant tale of love and loss, and her obsession with the ancient story drives her to wild impulsive action — with unrecoverable consequences.
A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
Eleven-year-old Owen Meany, playing in a Little League baseball game in Gravesend, New Hampshire, hits a foul ball and kills his best friend’s mother. Owen doesn’t believe in accidents: he believes he is God’s instrument. What happens to Owen after that 1953 foul ball is both extraordinary and terrifying.
A Separate Peace by John Knowles
An American classic and great bestseller for over thirty years, A Separate Peace is timeless in its description of adolescence during a period when the entire country was losing its innocence to the second world war.
Set at a boys boarding school in New England during the early years of World War II, A Separate Peace is a harrowing and luminous parable of the dark side of adolescence. Gene is a lonely, introverted intellectual. Phineas is a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. What happens between the two friends one summer, like the war itself, banishes the innocence of these boys and their world.
A bestseller for more than thirty years, A Separate Peace is John Knowles crowning achievement and an undisputed American classic.
Calico Captive by Elizabeth George Speare
In the year 1754, the stillness of Charlestown, New Hampshire, is shattered by the terrifying cries of an Indian raid. Young Miriam Willard, on a day that had promised new happiness, finds herself instead a captive on a forest trail, caught up in the ebb and flow of the French and Indian War.
It is a harrowing march north. Miriam can only force herself to the next stopping place, the next small portion of food, the next icy stream to be crossed. At the end of the trail waits a life of hard work and, perhaps, even a life of slavery. Mingled with her thoughts of Phineas Whitney, her sweetheart on his way to Harvard, is the crying of her sister’s baby, Captive, born on the trail.
Miriam and her companions finally reach Montreal, a city of shifting loyalties filled with the intrigue of war, and here, by a sudden twist of fortune, Miriam meets the prominent Du Quesne family, who introduce her to a life she has never imagined. Based on an actual narrative diary published in 1807, Calico Captive skillfully reenacts an absorbing facet of history.
Crash & Burn by Lisa Gardner
My name is Nicky Frank. I’m in hospital after crashing my car. I am afraid. The only thing that I can think about is Vero. I know I have to save her but why couldn’t I find her? She’s just a little girl. The man standing in my hospital room tells me we are married but there is no Vero. That six months ago I suffered a traumatic brain injury which caused changes to my personality. I have dramatic mood swings, an inability to concentrate and large gaps in my memory. I’m much easier to anger these days. And I drink. All of which he says explains the car accident and my confusion. Now a Sergeant Wyatt Foster is investigating. He has questions about the car accident. He has concerns about my husband. And he’s worried about a missing girl. He would like to know what happened to me.
House Rules by Jodi Picoult
Emma Hunt has spent fifteen years raising Theo and Jacob on her own, and has created what she sees to be a stable and happy life for them, despite the challenges of Jacob’s Asperger’s syndrome.
Jacob’s behaviour has sometimes frustrated Emma, but she has never doubted her son’s good heart. Yet, when his tutor is found dead, suspicion begins to surround Jacob and the Hunt family, who have never quite fitted into the community.
Now, as more and more evident links Jacob to the crime, Emma is determined to prove her son’s innocence.
Can she believe in it?
I Have Some Questions For You by Rebecca Makkai
The riveting new novel from the author of The Great Believers, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award
A successful film professor and podcaster, Bodie Kane is content to forget her past: the family tragedy that marred her adolescence, her four largely miserable years at a New Hampshire boarding school, and the 1995 murder of a classmate, Thalia Keith. Though the circumstances surrounding Thalia’s death and the conviction of the school’s athletics coach, Omar Evans, are the subject of intense fascination online, Bodie prefers-needs-to let sleeping dogs lie.
But when The Granby School invites her back to teach a two-week course, Bodie finds herself inexorably drawn to the case and its increasingly apparent flaws. In their rush to convict Omar, did the school and the police overlook other suspects? Is the real killer still out there? As she falls down the very rabbit hole she was so determined to avoid, Bodie begins to wonder if she wasn’t as much of an outsider at Granby as she’d thought-if, perhaps, back in 1995, she knew something that might have held the key to solving the case.
One of the most acclaimed contemporary American writers, Rebecca Makkai reinvents herself with each of her brilliant novels. Both a transfixing mystery and a deeply felt examination of one woman’s reckoning with her past, I Have Some Questions for You is her finest achievement yet.
Live Free and Eat Pie by Rebecca Rule
Anyone who hopes to visit or has visited New Hampshire, and, heck, even anyone who lives there, will delight in this hilarious guide to the Granite State. Popular New Hampshire storyteller Rebecca Rule provides her interpretation of the state’s history, culture, climate, attractions, vernacular, and more.
Midwives by Chris Bohjalian
On an icy winter night in an isolated house in rural Vermont, a seasoned midwife named Sibyl Danforth takes desperate measures to save a baby’s life. She performs an emergency caesarean section on a mother she believes has died of a stroke. But what if Sibyl’s patient wasn’t dead – and Sibyl inadvertently killed her? As Sibyl faces the antagonism of the law, the hostility of traditional doctors, and the accusations of her own conscience, Midwives engages, moves, and transfixes us as only the very best novels ever do.
The Passions of Chelsea Kane by Barbara Delinsky
An enthralling and unforgettable story of a woman’s search for her past, The Passions of Chelsea Kane is a beloved classic from New York Times bestselling author Barbara Delinsky.
After the death of her beloved adoptive mother, thirty-six-year-old Chelsea Kane is consumed by the need to learn the truth about her birth parents. Taking a break from her successful architecture career, she arrives in the New Hampshire town where she was born, determined to find answers, her only clue a tarnished silver key that was bequeathed to her after her mother’s passing.
One of her first discoveries, however, is something quite unexpected: the irresistible Judd Street. Buoyed by love and resolution, Chelsea slowly begins to uncover the dark mystery of her past. But as she inches closer to the truth, she realizes that someone is trying to stop her, and will go to any lengths to prevent her from finding answers. The danger escalates until one terrifying night when all secrets are laid bare.
Full of danger, intrigue, and love, The Passions of Chelsea Kane is a riveting and heartfelt story that can only be told by master storyteller Barbara Delinsky.
We hope you enjoy our selection of great books set in New Hampshire!
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