Hello everyone,
In all my years of reading, I have spied with my little eye more things beginning with ‘S’ than for any other letter. This includes the names of characters and authors, plus settings and book titles. It is just a very common letter for naming things!
So that means this will be quite a long post. For my own sake, I have tried to condense them the best way I can, so here they are!
Saardam
The ship that is the setting for The Devil And The Dark Water by Stuart Turton. Sailing to Indonesia with a largely Dutch crew, it becomes afflicted by a ghostly entity called Old Tom that terrorises those on board. But also on board is the world’s greatest detective, Samuel Pipps, who everyone expects to work out what is really going on.
Among the other passengers is Sara, who is a boss character who works with Pipps’ assistant Arent Hayes to solve the case.
Sacha
Vasalisa Petrovna’s brother in the Winternight Trilogy by Katherine Arden. He becomes a monk.
Saffyre Maddox
A lonely girl who eventually ends up going missing in Invisible Girl by Lisa Jewell. A bit of a lost soul who has a wandering imagination, Saffyre is one of the two main protagonists in the book.
Sal
A little Pomeranian dog who is one of the residents of Arthur Parnassus’ orphanage in The House In The Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune. He is quite an adorable character.
Sal Singh
A teenage boy who according to the police and nearly everyone in the town of Little Kilton, killed his girlfriend Andie and then hung himself soon after. In A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder, Pippa Fitz-Amobi investigates the case as she is convinced Sal was not guilty.
Sam Blake
The author of The Dark Room, which I read for a blog tour right at the very beginning of 2021. I have wanted to read some of her other books too, while I have also connected with her on social media.
Samuel
Other than Samuel Pipps, two other characters called Samuel have stood out. One was January’s best friend in The Ten Thousand Doors Of January by Alix E. Harrow, and the other was Nat Davy’s brother in The Smallest Man by Frances Quinn.
Sandra Pankhurst
A transgender trauma cleaner who was the subject of a non-fiction book by Sarah Krasnostein, which I read in 2018. Sandra, who sadly passed away last year, lived an utterly fascinating life, which along with her occupation, made the book an impactful read.
Sanjida Kay
The author of four psychological thrillers which I have read, including three that I picked up in 2018. Local to me, I once saw her at a literature event but was a bit too nervous to approach her for a chat at the time. My favourite of her books is Bone By Bone.
Sara Collins
The author of the powerful historical novel The Confessions Of Frannie Langton. This was about a girl who had suffered at the hands of a slave owner who now stands accused of killing her mistress.
Sarah Bainbridge
The cousin of the main character Elsie in The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell. She is a very interesting character whose role in the story comes into question in the very last chapter.
Sarah Grimke
A woman who grew up on her family’s plantation and grew up to become one of the leading female abolitionists of the nineteenth century along with her sister Nina. A real person, Sarah is a main character in The Invention Of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd.
Sarah Pekkanen
One half of a writing duo with Greer Hendricks. I have read two of their novels, including An Anonymous Girl in 2020.
Sarah Penner
The author of The Lost Apothecary, a book which combines contemporary London with events nearly 300 years prior, as an amateur historian finds an old perfume bottle which leads her to some interesting discoveries, all while in the process of leaving her husband.
Sarah Pinborough
The author of, among other things, Behind Your Eyes. This thriller was famous for its crazy ending – I read it in 2018 and have not picked up any of her other books since.
Sasha
The alpha female at Amber Prescott’s school in All Your Twisted Secrets by Diana Urban. She thinks she is better than everyone else and shows her true colours when faced with a life or death situation. One of the other people caught up in the scheme is Scott, who is less privileged to his classmates and a bit of a drug user.
Satoru
The owner of the cat called Nana who is the main character in The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa. Satoru finds Nana as a stray and takes him in, but the story sees him try and give Nana away – the reason why only emerges towards the end and it is heartbreaking.
Schmitt’s List
The list of tradespeople that Petronella Brandt consults in The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton. This is where she first writes to the Miniaturist herself after finding her in the directory. The Miniaturist lives near the Stadhuis, one of the book’s primary settings.
Scriptorium
The informal name of the outhouse where lexicographers are putting together the first ever edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, in The Dictionary Of Lost Words by Pip Williams. The main character Esme likes to spend time there as a child.
Second Mrs De Winter
The unnamed narrator of Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. A mild, unassuming lady, she meets and quickly becomes married to Maxime de Winter before coming to Manderley with him, but the shadow of his first wife Rebecca looms over her throughout.
Security Larry
The security guard at Ellingham Academy during the Truly Devious series by Maureen Johnson. He is a former police officer and helps investigate when a number of deaths happen at the school.
Seredith
An elderly bookbinder in The Binding by Bridget Collins, with whom the main character Edward serves an apprenticeship early in the book. Her role as a bookbinder is to bind people’s physical memories into the pages of books.
The Seven Deaths Of Evelyn Hardcastle
A mystery novel by Stuart Turton, which I read in April 2019 and absolutely loved. It is so complex and intricate that I would describe it as labyrinthine, and it has a paranormal element to boot. One of the characters is Sebastian Bell, who follows the protagonist Aiden Bishop around giving hints about the case.
The Seven Husbands Of Evelyn Hugo
An extremely popular book by Taylor Jenkins Reid that got crazy amounts of hype around the time of its publication. I finally read it in 2022 and it was indeed very good, with the plot surrounding a famous former actress telling her life story to a magazine correspondent.
Severin Montagnet-Alerie
The main character in the Gilded Wolves trilogy by Roshani Chokshi. He leads a group of young, learned people who collect antiquities from all over Europe and practices the science of Forging. He has a complex romance with Laila and harbours ambitions of becoming a god.
Shadow And Bone
The debut novel by Leigh Bardugo and the one which spawned the Grishaverse. It is also the name given to the original trilogy. It tells the story of the Sun Summoner, Alina Starkov and her eventual battle against the Darkling as leader of the Second Army of Ravka. People with Grisha abilities practice the Small Science.
The second book in the series is called Siege And Storm. Among other things, they spend a lot of time in the True Sea, travelling on a schooner and then on a ship owned by the privateer Sturmhond, who turns out to be someone else entirely.
The series also introduces us to the nation of Shu Han, one of the other realms of the Grishaverse.
Shanghai
The setting for These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong and its sequels. One of the reasons these books are so amazing is because of how incredibly this setting is realised – so awash with culture and detail that it is another character on its own.
Shari Lapena
The author of a number of crime and mystery novels; one of the leading names in the genre. She is still best known for her debut The Couple Next Door, but is also noted for her writing style that is very concise and matter of fact, giving you lots of information but never the full picture.
Shea Ernshaw
The author of A History Of Wild Places, a book about a commune that I read in 2021. I have been meaning to read some of her other books too.
Silas
A taxidermist living in Victorian London, in The Doll Factory by Elizabeth Macneal. As the story develops, he builds an infatuation with a young lady called Iris, where his twisted mind becomes very evident.
The Silence Of Bones
A book by June He that I read in 2021 and really loved. It is set in Seoul and has a main character called…Seol. She helps an inspector investigate the death of a woman, but her loyalty to him is tested when he becomes the prime suspect.
The Silent Companions
The first of Laura Purcell’s spooky, Gothic novels – and possibly the scariest of them all! With three timelines, the story revolves around large ornaments known as Silent Companions, who become responsible for a series of grisly deaths.
The Silvered Serpents
The second book in the Gilded Wolves trilogy. In this one, Severin and his crew head to Russia in search of an acquisition. There is a massive twist near the end that leads to a cliffhanger!
Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Another popular author who I have only read one book from, I picked up Mexican Gothic in 2021 but am keen to read more. Her novels seem to span several genres too, so she is clearly versatile.
Simon Kelleher
A pupil at Bayview High School who makes a living by revealing the deepest, darkest secrets of his classmates for everyone to know. When he dies in detention at the start of One Of Us Is Lying by Karen M. McManus, four of his fellow students are implicated.
Six Of Crows
The first book of a duology known by the same name, which forms the second part of the Grishaverse. Featuring Kaz Brekker and his group of Crows, it is one of the most popular young adult novels of the past decade. I read it in 2021 and it was indeed spectacular.
Six Stories
A series of fantastic crime books by Matt Wesolowski. Hosted by elusive journalist Scott King, Six Stories is a true crime podcast which investigates a crime or cold case and digs up ghosts of the past, where six different people connected to the case are interviewed on the way to finding out the truth – or not.
The Six
A band originally known as The Dunne Brothers, founded by Billy and Graham Dunne. They are eventually joined by soloist Daisy Jones, and together they form Daisy Jones And The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
The Smallest Man
The debut novel by Frances Quinn, a historical fiction based partly on the true story. It features a man called Nathaniel Davy who is only a few feet tall and becomes involved in the English Civil War as a kind of confidant to Queen Henrietta Maria.
Social media
Lots of books I have read feature social media in one way or another. Some are in multimedia format and involve messages and forums. In others, social media is used a plot device, especially in modern thrillers.
Sofia Segovia
The author of The Murmur Of Bees, written originally in Spanish but translated by Simon Bruni. It is a very special, unique book – and my review, which Sofia actually left a comment on, is my most viewed blog post of all time. The main character in the book is Simonopio, a mute boy who learns innovative ways of communicating after being taken in as an abandoned baby by the Morales family.
The Song Of Achilles
One of the best books I have ever read! I picked up The Song Of Achilles in late 2019 and fell in love with Greek mythology even more. Written by Madeline Miller, it tells the story of the Trojan War and more specifically the relationship between Achilles and the narrator, Patroclus.
Sophia
The daughter of the main character Mina in Hostage by Clare Mackintosh. While Mina is up in the air on a hijacked flight, Sophia is in danger in the basement of her home with her father Adam, and is being threatened.
Soren Sveistrup
The author of The Chestnut Man, a totally thrilling and edge-of-the-seat crime novel originally written in Danish.
Spanish Civil War
The Muse by Jessie Burton is told over two timelines. The second of them is in the 1930s in civil war era Spain, where a young artist called Olive Schloss paints something that turns out to be very significant.
Stacey Halls
The author of four historical fiction books. I have met her twice, firstly in 2019 when she gave me a signed copy of The Familiars, which I soon read and immediately fell in love with her gorgeous writing style. I have read all her books since, and they make me smile, especially as Stacey is genuinely a lovely person.
Stacey Lee
The author of Luck Of The Titanic, a book about Chinese passengers who board the Titanic seeking to gain employment in the United States. Of course, it ends in tragedy.
Stafford Grayson
The father of Grayson Hawthorne in the Inheritance Games trilogy by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. He becomes one of the main antagonists of the second book, The Hawthorne Legacy.
Stanley Forbes
The local newspaper journalist in A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder by Holly Jackson. He is the first person Pippa goes to for information about the Andie Bell case, and becomes very important later on in the trilogy…
Starr Carter
The main character in The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. After witnessing her unarmed friend get fatally shot by a police officer, she fronts a campaign against police brutality and racism. Her older brother is called Seven and I am sure her younger brother’s name begins with ‘S’ too, but I cannot remember his name.
Stella McKeever
A local night time radio host in Call Me Star Girl by Louise Beech. She presents alone in her eerie student except when the head of the station Stephen Sainty comes to read the news. She becomes involved in a local murder case that turns out very close to home.
Stephanie Marcham
The main character in The Lost Ones by Anita Frank. She comes to stay at the haunted Greyswick House after learning her sister is unwell, and investigates all the eerie events which take place there, uncovering the many past secrets of its residents.
Steve Cavanagh
The author of numerous legal thrillers, including the Eddie Flynn series. Rather criminally, I have only read one of them, which was the brilliant Thirteen in 2020. I know that I really must get to more of his work.
Stevie Bell
The main character in the Truly Devious series. She becomes a pupil at exclusive boarding school Ellingham Academy with the aim of solving the mystery of what happened to founder Albert Ellingham’s wife and daughter after they disappeared in 1936. But then she has lots of other deaths to deal with in the present.
Still Water
The debut novel by my friend Rebecca Pert. She gifted me an advance copy a few years ago and it remains one of the most special books I own for that very reason. It was a pretty good read, too!
Stuart Turton
I have mentioned his books already in this post, but the author of The Seven Deaths Of Evelyn Hardcastle and The Devil And The Dark Water. I really admire the intricacy and intelligence of his plotting, and also his writing style.
Sue
I have come across two notable characters called Sue. One was a secret agent in The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman, and the other was the main character in The Accident by C.L. Taylor, a mother who is trying to find out what happened to her daughter.
Sue Lynn Tan
The author of Daughter Of The Moon Goddess. As soon as I read that, now one of my favourite books of all time, she became one of my top authors and everything else I have read by her since that is set in that world is equally beautiful.
Sue Wallman
An author of young adult thrillers. I have read all her books to date except for her most recent, and they are all notable for having unique settings. My favourite so far was See How They Lie, about a teenage girl unknowingly trapped in her father’s health spa.
Survive The Night
A fictional television programme in The Guest List by Lucy Foley. The groom is well known for starring on that show and it is referenced occasionally throughout.
Susan Stokes-Chapman
The author of Pandora, which I read in 2022. A historical novel, it tells the story of a young woman who finds an ancient pithos in the cellar of her uncle’s shop and strikes up a relationship with an aspiring antiquarian. I have seen Susan speak twice at the Bath Literature Festival, and she is very well spoken.
Let’s Chat
Wow, that was a lot!! Have you come across any of these books, settings, authors, or characters? Let me know in the comments!
Happy reading 🙂
Stephen Reads Books 