The Nightingale
Kristin Hannah
Like Pino guiding refugees over the Alps, one sister here leads downed airmen across the Pyrenees, in an emotional story of resistance and sacrifice in occupied France.
12 books to read next
Books Like Beneath a Scarlet Sky
If you loved Beneath a Scarlet Sky by Mark T. Sullivan
Beneath a Scarlet Sky follows Pino Lella, a teenager in Nazi-occupied Italy who guides Jews over the Alps and then becomes driver to a high-ranking German general while spying for the Resistance. Readers love its basis in a true story, its sweeping mix of danger, romance and moral complexity, and its fast, cinematic pace. It shines a light on a lesser-known corner of World War II, the Italian front, and on ordinary people forced into extraordinary courage.
Ordinary heroes in occupied Europe
All the Light We Cannot See
Anthony Doerr
Readers who loved Pino's coming-of-age under occupation will connect with these two young people, one French and one German, swept up in the war's moral choices.
Lilac Girls
Martha Hall Kelly, María Puerto Barruetabeña Díez
Inspired by real women, it blends true history with fiction just as Sullivan does with Pino's story, following courage and cruelty across wartime Europe.
Based on true war stories
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Heather Morris, Heather Morris
Another novel built from a real survivor's recollections, with a love story at its heart, offering the same blend of hardship, romance and resilience as Pino's tale.
We Were the Lucky Ones
Georgia Hunter
Based on the author's own family history, it tracks Jewish siblings scattered by the war, with the sweep and urgency fans of Sullivan's novel appreciate.
The women in the castle
Jessica Shattuck
For readers drawn to the moral grey areas around Pino's German general, this explores German resisters' widows and the complicated aftermath of complicity.
More wartime Italy
Catch-22
Joseph Heller
Set among American airmen in Italy, this satirical classic shows a darker, absurd side of the same war front Pino lived through.
The English Patient
Michael Ondaatje
In a ruined Italian villa at war's end, damaged survivors share secrets, giving a lyrical, reflective take on the Italian campaign's final days.
A Farewell to Arms
Ernest Hemingway
A wartime romance on the Italian front, set in the earlier world war, it pairs love and danger in the mountains much as Sullivan's novel does.
Go deeper with nonfiction
Unbroken
Laura Hillenbrand
If Pino's endurance moved you, this true account of Louis Zamperini's survival reads with the pace of a thriller and the heart of a hero's story.
The Boys in the Boat
Daniel James Brown
Young men rising to an extraordinary challenge on the eve of war, told with the narrative drive and warmth readers enjoyed in Sullivan's book.
Night
Elie Wiesel
A brief, essential memoir of the Holocaust that gives deeper context to the persecution Pino risked his life to help people escape.
We earn a commission if you buy through these links. Learn more