When The Tattooist of Auschwitz dropped in 2018, it immediately took the world by storm. And it’s easy to see why: Heather Morris’ international bestseller is a moving tale of resilience, love, and survival amid the horrors of Nazi Germany that’s based on a true story.
This historical novel’s popularity persists today, with Peacock recently releasing a limited series adaptation. It’s no wonder many readers (myself included!) are on the lookout for more books like The Tattooist of Auschwitz.
The readalikes I’ve gathered here include more historical fiction, love stories that unfold in the face of tragedy, plus nonfiction and memoirs about the Holocaust.
If you’re looking for a stunning start, you can’t go wrong with Anthony Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize-winning All the Light We Cannot See. Or, if you liked The Tattooist of Auschwitz because it was based on a true story, dive into The Librarian of Auschwitz. No matter what you read first, prepare to be moved.
1. Three Sisters by Heather Morris
Let’s start with another novel by Morris. Three Sisters is also inspired by real Auschwitz survivors: Slovakian sisters Livia, Magda, and Cibi Meller. After reading The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Livia’s son reached out to Morris to tell this story about the unbreakable bond of sisterhood.
After living through the horrors of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Holocaust’s most infamous concentration camp, Livia, Magda, and Cibi manage to hide and evade the death marches, eventually making their way to Israel to start over. Morris novelizes the atrocities they witnessed and experienced at Auschwitz, and she continues tracking the Mellers throughout their lives, highlighting their resilience despite the lasting effects of unimaginable trauma.
For more historical fiction from Morris, try Cilka’s Journey next.
2. The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe
After her family is transferred to Auschwitz, 14-year-old Dita takes on the role of “librarian,” ferrying eight books around the camp to her fellow prisoners (and risking her life in the process). Iturbe’s moving work reveals how books help us hold onto humanity and hope even in the darkest circumstances.
Like The Tattooist of Auschwitz, this book was inspired by a true story. The real Dita Kraus wrote a memoir called A Delayed Life, which details her harrowing experiences.
3. Schindler’s List by Thomas Keneally
Even if you’ve seen the award-winning 1993 film adaptation starring Liam Neeson and Ralph Fiennes, Keneally’s novel is well worth a read. The bestselling Booker Prize recipient is based on the true story of Oskar Schindler, a German factory director credited with saving the lives of over 1,200 Jewish people during the Holocaust.
Schindler’s List explores the courage, brilliance, and determination required to do good in the face of evil.
4. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
No list of books similar to The Tattooist of Auschwitz is complete without Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. It follows the twin narratives of Marie-Laure, a blind French girl, and Werner, a German orphan recruited to the Nazi military, at the height of World War II. The story is haunting, the imagery of war-torn France beautiful, and the characters so rich in depth that devouring every page feels inevitable.
All the Light We Cannot See inspired a 2023 Netflix Original series starring Aria Mia Loberti, Mark Ruffalo, and Hugh Laurie.
5. Everyone Brave is Forgiven by Chris Cleave
This historical novel — also loosely based on a true story — is for anyone who enjoyed the romantic side of The Tattooist of Auschwitz.
Inspired by love letters exchanged between his grandparents, Cleave wrote this book about people falling in love, clinging to hope, and enduring hardship even as war ravages the world. The stark realities of World War II are rendered in achingly beautiful prose, from London during the Blitz to Malta under fire.
6. The Lost Wife by Alyson Richman
Richman’s historical novel is an entrancing and beautiful story about love surviving against all odds, across decades and continents.
In Prague on the cusp of war, Lenka and Josef fall in love, marry, and plan to immigrate before the Nazis take power. But things go awry, leading them to get separated, with each assuming the other is dead. Josef builds a new life in America, while Lenka uses her artistic talents to survive a Nazi ghetto and, later, Auschwitz.
And then, against all odds, Lenka and Josef find one another again — after over 60 years apart.
7. Night by Elie Wiesel
Learn about the horrors of the Holocaust through this chilling first-person account. Night is a haunting preservation of a horrific chapter in history, providing a stark portrait of the atrocities suffered by Jews at the hands of fellow human beings.
Wiesel’s memoir of his experiences in Auschwitz and Buchenwald — including the murders of his entire family — remains one of the most important books in World War II literature. The author won the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize for “being a messenger to mankind: his message is one of peace, atonement, and dignity.”
8. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Another vital entry in Holocaust literature, The Diary of a Young Girl offers an everyday perspective on how the Third Reich’s regime affected Jewish families. This diary was written while the Frank family hid in a factory annex concealed behind a bookshelf. Despite her young age, Anne’s strong will shines through in every entry, painting a picture of hope, vulnerability, and resilience.
9. This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen by Tadeusz Borowski
In this work of autobiographical fiction, Borowski writes from the perspective of a non-Jewish prisoner at a concentration camp, where he regularly witnessed the murder of fellow inmates. The result is a heartbreaking story collection that gives a clear picture of daily life in the death camps.
Borowski was imprisoned in Auschwitz for illegally distributing poetry. He survived the ordeal, but tragically, later died by suicide.
10. Nazi Hunting by Jess McHugh
In the aftermath of World War II, an unlikely duo dedicated their lives to holding Nazi officials accountable for their actions: married couple Beate and Serge Klarsfeld.
Beate slapped German chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger, a former Nazi, across the face to call attention to his crimes. Her husband, Serge, held a former Nazi official at gunpoint. These are some of the flashier moments of the couple’s dangerous, tireless, and wholeheartedly inspiring work bringing Nazis to justice.
If ever you needed reassurance that ordinary people wield extraordinary power to do good, Serge and Beate’s story is it.
11. The Nazi Officer’s Wife by Edith Hahn Beer
After losing her mother and surviving a brutal labor camp, a Viennese Jewish woman abandoned the life she’d always known to hide in plain sight among the enemy.
Hahn Beer forged a new persona as Grete Denner, then went on to marry a Nazi officer. For years, she lived in constant fear of exposure and death. Through it all, she remained resilient. After the war, Hahn Beer divorced her husband and, finally free, immigrated to England.
Like Morris’ novel, this tense and beautifully told memoir explores the extreme, often morally gray choices people must make in order to survive.
12. The Book of Lost Names by Kristin Harmel
Based on a true story, The Book of Lost Names features dual timelines with two Evas.
In 1942, Eva is a young Polish Jew who helps forge documents for Jewish children, preserving their real identities in a book encrypted with a secret code. In the present day, a librarian named Eva discovers that book of encrypted stories.
Harmel’s catalog includes many popular historical fiction titles set during World War II, including The Forest of Vanishing Stars and The Sweetness of Forgetting.
13. Daughters of the Occupation by Shelly Sanders
Daughters of the Occupation draws upon real-life events and people to share an incredible journey of three generations of women bonded by trauma and hope for a better future. The story of Miriam Talan, her daughter, and granddaughter is set against the backdrop of war-ravaged Latvia and shines a light on the oft-forgotten persecution of Latvian Jews.
14. Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay
In July 1942, the Nazis commissioned Parisian policemen to arrest thousands of Jewish people in an event known as the Vel’ d’Hiv Roundup. Deported to Auschwitz, many of these men, women, and children were systematically murdered upon arrival.
De Rosnay’s dual timeline novel follows the arrest of 10-year-old Sarah in 1942 and journalist Julia Jarmond, who, in 2002, is writing an article about the 60th anniversary of one of France’s darkest days. Emotionally intense, Sarah’s Key serves as a haunting reminder of long-forgotten atrocities committed by ordinary people against their fellow citizens.
15. The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult
Baker Sage Singer forms an unlikely friendship with Josef Weber, an elderly German man in her support group. But when Josef confesses a dark secret about his past, and asks Sage for an immense favor, she struggles to make the moral choice.
Picoult’s novel moves between the past and present, allowing readers to witness Sage’s present-day struggles alongside the horrific realities of the Holocaust. In true Picoult fashion, the characters here are forced to make gut-wrenching decisions even when nothing feels black and white.
16. Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah
This work of historical fiction takes the bittersweet complexities of relationships, womanhood, and family and turns them into a fairy tale dating back to pre-World War I.
Winter Garden moves between timelines, following two estranged sisters in the present and their mother’s dark past during Stalin’s terrors. As Meredith and Nina clash over how best to care for their mother, whose dementia is getting worse, they slowly learn the devastating truth of their family history — a story their mother has never shared before.
This is one of my favorite Hannah novels. It’s a must-read for fans of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, as is her most well-known novel, The Nightingale.
