11/22/63 by Stephen King - Read-a-likes

The assassination of American president John F. Kennedy shocked the world in 1963. What if you could travel back to 1963 and prevent that tragedy? Stephen King contemplates that in his latest suspense novel 11/22/63 (M). Jeff Eppings a teacher from Maine receives an essay from one of his GED students about a horrific personal event that triggers a turn of events that takes Eppings spiraling back to 1963 in this intricately plotted story. This fast-paced novel takes readers on a nostalgic journey to the fabled age of the Kennedys.

As with most King books, this book is popular and you may want something to read while you wait to move up the library holds list. We’ve compiled a list of read-a-likes to keep you entertained in the meantime.


Set in the 1950s, Pale Horse Coming (M) by Stephen Hunter brings back gritty Arkansas cop Earl Swagger. Swagger brings together a group of gunslingers in this fast paced suspense story. Violence reigns when they set off to search for a friend who’s gone missing investigating a secret African American prison in Mississippi.



In The Legacy (M), author Stephen Frey explores the conspiracy theory of a second shooter on the “grassy knoll.” This fast-paced suspenseful tale takes us from a surprise inheritance of a safety deposit box key that contains a video of the JFK assassination from another angle.



In The Shot (M) by Philip Kerr, the mob decides to pick up the CIA’s work of assassinating Fidel Castro. They hire a hitman, but the reader finds the target is not the one they expected in this suspenseful story. This fast-paced, plot-driven story provides a new perspective on the Kennedy-Castro assassination conspiracies.



In Penumbra (M), Carolyn Haines tells the story of two half sisters - one white and one biracial - growing up in the south in the 1950s. When one sister is beaten and her daughter kidnapped, this suspenseful story tells the parallels of two half-sisters as they live separate lives.