10 Highly-Rated Books Set in Charleston, SC

Book Summary

This novel follows a group of friends for twenty years of life in Charleston, starting in the 1960s. The main character and narrator, Leopold, is the son of a science teacher and former nun, who is now the school’s principal. After Leo’s brother commits suicide, the family struggles to resume any kind of normalcy and connection. 

Leo finds solace in a new group of friends. Sheba and Trevor are twins with an alcoholic mom and a prison escapee dad. Niles & Starla are siblings who ran away from a hard life in the mountains, and Molly is a socialite with a boyfriend named Chadworth Rutledge the 10th. The group will experience highs and lows over twenty years, from 1960s counterculture to the 1980s AIDS crisis.

Book Summary

Evie has worked for Southern Service Paws in Charleston for a few years, and has her own service dog to help with her epilepsy. She thought she could handle any client needing a match, but then Jacob came looking for a service dog for his daughter, Sam.

Evie is the person person to help Sam as she learns about her new dog as they both experience seizures. And she’s thrilled to help…but she’s also distracted by how instantly attracted she was to single-dad Jacob.

Book Summary

In 1739 when she was 16, Eliza’s father left his three plantations in her hands as he pursued military ambitions. However, he also spent all the money from the estates, leaving her in a terrible position. Failure would have been fine with her mother, who would prefer they leave South Carolina behind and return to England. 

Eliza finds hope for the plantations in an unlikely place. She has heard that the French will pay exorbitant amounts for indigo dye, one of the state’s largest exports. However, the process of making the dye is a closely guarded secret. Eliza will do just about anything to gain the knowledge she needs to save her family’s finances.

Book Summary

Celia Fairchild, who writes a NYC advice column, seems to have answers for everyone’s problems but her own. She dreamed of a family of her own before her marriage ended, but she gets a second chance when a young woman considers Celia to adopt her baby. Celia is eager to prove that she’s perfect mother material with a stable home and income – then she loses her job.

Celia still has one option left – selling the house in Charleston that she recently inherited from her estranged Aunt Calpurnia. But when she arrives in Charleston, she learns that her aunt was a horder and there’s no way she can sell the house without major cleanup and renovations. To pull it off, she’ll have to lean on old friends, new neighbors, and an unlikely sisterhood of strong, creative women.

Book Summary

This novel is the first in Karen White’s Tradd Street series, which features a Charleston real estate agent who loves old, storied homes. Thanks to her ability to see ghosts, she’s also able to discover secrets hidden within these historic homes.

Hoping to land a new listing, Melanie meets with the homeowner and immediately feels a connection with him. But she’s shocked when he passes away shortly after and leaves his Tradd Street home to her, complete with housekeeper, dog, and a family of ghosts with secrets to share.

Melanie is contacted by an handsome author named Jack who wants to write a book about the house and the family who owned it. He has reason to believe that diamonds from the Confederate Treasury might be hidden in the home and he’s eager to solve they mystery.

As Jack becomes smitten with Melanie, it turns out that he’s unfortunately caught the attention of a malevolent ghost. Jack and Melanie will have to work together to unravel a mystery of heartbreak and murder.

Book Summary

When Hanna’s husband is found murdered in Charleston, both her family and her finances are left in ruins. The FBI thinks Hanna knows more about her husband’s involvement in a failed land deal than she’s letting on, and a dangerous stranger thinks she’s hiding millions of dollars from him.

After taking refuge in her family’s acentral beach house on Pawley’s Island, Hanna discovers that her distant grandmother, Amanda, endured a similar fate of emotional loss and financial hardship during the time of the Civil War when her husband was killed in a senseless battle fought weeks after the war had ended.

Told in alternating timelines, two mysteries unravel – one in the past and one in the present. Along the way, readers are introduced to Charleston Police Detective Alex Frank, who Hanna goes on to solve other mysteries with in later books in the series.

Book Summary

Charleston tea shop owner and event caterer Theodosia is hired to serve 200 guests at an annual historic homes garden party. Everyone is enjoying her blueberry scones and freshly steamed tea, until a guest is found dead clutching their teacup. Theo must solve the crime to save her business!

Book Summary

Patricia Campbell, a devoted housewife and member of a true-crime book club, leads an ordinary life—until she meets James Harris, a charismatic newcomer to her neighborhood. When children start disappearing and strange events unfold, Patricia begins to suspect that James is not what he seems.

As she digs deeper, she realizes he may be a vampire preying on their community. However, convincing her skeptical husband and friends proves difficult. With her book club as her only allies, Patricia must fight against both supernatural evil and the societal constraints that silence women.