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Abbott Kahler‘s new book, “Eden Undone,” revisits a true story of sex and murder in a 1930s utopian island community. Below, the best-selling author of “The Ghosts of Eden Park” and “Sin in the Second City” recommends six other island novels.
‘Lord of the Flies’ by William Golding (1954)
Golding’s singular debut novel, with its group of prepubescent boys stranded on an uninhabited island, highlights the delicate balance between civilization and savagery. As Ralph, Piggy, and the rest show us, even the most noble will break under sufficient strain. Buy it here.
‘The Island of Doctor Moreau’ by H.G. Wells (1896)
Narrator Edward Prendick, after being shipwrecked, is rescued and taken to a deserted island in the South Pacific. There, Doctor Moreau’s ghoulish attempts to create “Beast Folk” — grotesque hybrids of humans and animals — vividly illustrate that, as Wells wrote, “humanity is but animal rough-hewn to a reasonable shape.” Buy it here.
‘Galápagos’ by Kurt Vonnegut (1985)
Do you consider the evolved human brain to be an asset? Think again, urges Vonnegut: That big brain we cherish is the same restless organ that invents nuclear weapons and makes you love people who hurt you. For the unfortunates stranded on Vonnegut’s fictional Galápagos island after an apocalypse, losing their “oversized” human brains is the only path to contentment. Buy it here.
‘And Then There Were None’ by Agatha Christie (1939)
Agatha Christie’s 29th book — which is also the best-selling mystery of all time — gathers 10 strangers on remote Soldier Island. Each of these invited guests is accused of an unspeakable crime, and then they are murdered, one by one. Come for the menacing setting and twisted plot; stay for the moral ambiguity and the corrosive effects of guilt. Buy it here.
‘The Sicilian Inheritance’ by Jo Piazza (2024)
Piazza’s gripping mystery follows chef Sara Marsala on a journey to the fictional village of Caltabellessa, Sicily, where Marsala’s great-grandmother was possibly murdered a hundred years earlier. Piazza was inspired by the real-life murder of one of her Sicilian ancestors, and her lush and lusty descriptions of the island are the next best thing to being there. Buy it here.
‘The Beach’ by Alex Garland (1996)
Venturing to a remote Thai island, a young backpacker is shocked to find a seemingly utopian community of likeminded tourists. This astonishingly atmospheric debut novel, published when the author was just 26, is Gen X’s Lord of the Flies. Buy it here.
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