The market for Mother’s Day books has always been very broad and a little ‘obvious’…titles promoted often range from the latest romancy-fiction through to cookbooks that you know she’ll never actually cook from…that’s why we’ve decided to change it up a little this year and share books with you that really do deserve a spot on your mum’s bookshelf…and ones you may actually want to borrow back.

The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart by Holly Ringland

If your mum is into the latest fiction then this enchanting debut novel of 2018 is a must-read. It is a deeply moving and romantic story of a young girl who has to learn the hard way that she can break the patterns of the past, live on her own terms and find her own strength.

After her family suffers a tragedy, nine-year-old Alice Hart is forced to leave her idyllic seaside home. She is taken in by her grandmother, June, a flower farmer who raises Alice on the language of Australian native flowers, a way to say the things that are too hard to speak. Under the watchful eye of June and the women who run the farm, Alice settles, but grows up increasingly frustrated by how little she knows of her family’s story. In her early twenties, Alice’s life is thrown into upheaval again when she suffers devastating betrayal and loss. Desperate to outrun grief, Alice flees to the dramatically beautiful central Australian desert. In this otherworldly landscape Alice thinks she has found solace, until she meets a charismatic and ultimately dangerous man. Spanning two decades, set between sugar cane fields by the sea, a native Australian flower farm, and a celestial crater in the central desert, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart follows Alice’s unforgettable journey, as she learns that the most powerful story she will ever possess is her own.

The Wisdom of Sundays by Oprah Winfrey

This book is filled with meaningful conversations from Oprah’s show, Super Soul Sunday. Organised into ten chapters, each one representing a powerful step in Oprah’s own spiritual journey and introduced with an intimate, personal essay by Oprah herself. The Wisdom of Sundays features selections from the most meaningful conversations between Oprah and some of today’s most admired thought leaders. Visionaries like Tony Robbins, Arianna Huffington, and Shonda Rhimes share their lessons in finding purpose through mindfulness and intention.

The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn

If your mum is someone who enjoys the thriller genre, give her The Woman in the Window.

It’s been ten long months since Anna Fox last left her home. Ten months during which she has haunted the rooms of her old New York house like a ghost, lost in her memories, too terrified to step outside. Anna’s lifeline to the real world is her window, where she sits day after day, watching her neighbours. When the Russells move in, Anna is instantly drawn to them. A picture-perfect family of three, they are an echo of the life that was once hers. But one evening, a frenzied scream rips across the silence, and Anna witnesses something no one was supposed to see. Now she must do everything she can to uncover the truth about what really happened. But even if she does, will anyone believe her? And can she even trust herself?

I See You by Clare Mackintosh

Here’s another one for the Mum that loves a thrill. When Zoe Walker sees her photo in the classifieds section of a London newspaper, she is determined to find out why it’s there. There’s no explanation: just a grainy image, a website address and a phone number. She takes it home to her family, who are convinced it’s just someone who looks like Zoe. But the next day the advert shows a photo of a different woman, and another the day after that. Is it a mistake? A coincidence? Or is someone keeping track of every move they make…

The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan

This is a charming and moving story exploring the objects that hold meaning to our lives, and the surprising connections that bind us. This book is great for the mums who have kept everything.

Anthony Peardew has spent half his life collecting lost objects, trying to atone for a promise broken many years before. Realising he is running out of time, he leaves his house and all its lost treasures to his assistant Laura, the one person he can trust to fulfil his legacy and reunite the thousands of objects with their rightful owners. But the final wishes of the ‘Keeper of Lost Things’ have unforeseen repercussions which trigger a most serendipitous series of encounters.

Only Child by Rhiannon Navin

We went to school that Tuesday like normal. Not all of us came home…

Huddled in a cloakroom with his classmates and teacher, six-year-old Zach can hear shots ringing through the corridors of his school. A gunman has entered the building and, in a matter of minutes, will have taken nineteen lives. In the aftermath of the shooting, the close knit community and its families are devastated. Everyone deals with the tragedy differently. Zach’s father absents himself; his mother pursues a quest for justice – while Zach retreats into his super-secret hideout and loses himself in a world of books and drawing. Ultimately though, it is Zach who will show the adults in his life the way forward – as, sometimes, only a child can. If you’re looking for a book to stop and make mum think, then this is it.

Enjoy!