Books like The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
You were drawn to Evelyn Hugo not simply for the glamour, but for the intoxicating tension between a woman’s public legend and the private choices that created it. These novels offer that same blend of ambition, self-invention, desire, and reckoning.
If you liked The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, you’ll love these
Not lookalikes — kindred books. Each one shares something essential with The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, and we tell you exactly what.
Marian Graves becomes famous for attempting an unprecedented flight around the globe; decades later, a disgraced Hollywood actress is cast in the film of her life. From there, Great Circle explores the distance between an unruly woman and the simplified version of her that history—and the entertainment industry—prefers.
Like Evelyn Hugo, Marian refuses to apologize for wanting an enormous life. Shipstead gives her ambition genuine grandeur while remaining alert to its costs, and the novel’s queer relationships, hidden histories, and competing narratives make fame feel both seductive and falsifying. Shortlisted for both the Booker Prize and the Women’s Prize, this is a sweeping, immersive novel worthy of its title.
At eighty-nine, Vivian Morris looks back on the summer of 1940, when she arrived at a shabby Manhattan theater and entered a world of showgirls, actors, costumes, sex, and exhilaratingly flexible morals. Her voice—witty, candid, worldly, and conscious of what her younger self failed to understand—has the confessional magnetism that makes Evelyn’s story so irresistible.
But City of Girls is more than a glamorous reminiscence. It is a generous, surprisingly moving novel about female desire, public disgrace, chosen family, and learning to build a life after you have badly misjudged yourself. Gilbert’s bestseller has become especially beloved by readers who want women’s sexual freedom depicted without punishment or sentimentality; Vivian is difficult to leave behind.
In 1970s New York, audacious Black singer Opal Jewel and British songwriter Nev Charles become an unlikely rock duo. Years later, a music journalist assembles an oral history of their meteoric partnership—only to discover that the accepted story of their fame may conceal something far more troubling.
The interview format supplies the delicious feeling of privileged access that drives Evelyn Hugo, but Walton uses many conflicting voices rather than one commanding confession. The result is a sharp, propulsive examination of celebrity mythology: who gets labeled difficult, whose compromises become invisible, and who controls the official version of the past. Winner of the Aspen Words Literary Prize, this acclaimed debut feels so convincingly documented that you may catch yourself wanting to search for Opal’s records.