This week's readers advisory request comes to us as a list of books. The reader says that for her, a good book is language driven and the voice should ring through as authentic. Do we have any authentic voices for this reader?

The two books that come to immediately to mind for me are both memoirs: Patti Smith's beautiful memoir about her friendship with Robert Mapplethorpe, Just Kids and Jim Carroll's The Basketball Diaries.  In non-fiction I recommend Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers.   —Lynn Lobash, Readers Services

I love Paddy Clarke, Ha-ha-ha by Roddy Doyle.  It won the Booker Prize in 1993. The book is written in the voice of a 10-year-old Irish boy. It is positively brilliant. The reader mentions liking Sherman Alexie, so this could be a nice fit. —Maura Muller, Volunteers Office

I see a lot of my favorites on this reader's list!  I'd recommend: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout, short stories tied together by the memorable character of Oliver Kitteridge. These Is My Words by Nancy E. Turner, an historical fiction about a frontier woman's journey. The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker, super sad and haunting but lovely dystopic fiction. The Paris Wife by Paula McLain, based on the life of Ernest Hemingway's first wife Hadley. I also think My Life in France by Julia Child and Little Heathens by Mildred Armstrong Kalish, both memoirs, might click for this reader.  —Susan Tucker Heimbach, Mulberry Street

Based on those titles, I'd suggest: Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells. Bastard our of Carolina by Dorothy Allison. Anywhere but Here by Mona Simpson. —Jill Rothstein, Andrew Heiskell Library

What about Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls? That is a title that jumps out at me as "authentic voice."  —Danita Nichols, Inwood Library

I would recommend Empire of the Sun by J.G. Ballard, an autobiographical novel from point of view of a young boy, and The Art of Joy by Goliarda Sapienza with a strong female protagonist; both have an authentic voice. —Jessica Cline, Mid-Manhattan Library

For an authentic voice try The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, by Mark Haddon. It's told from the view point of a 15-year old autistic boy named Christopher John Francis Boone. It's so authentic that even the chapters are numbered using prime numbers (2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13...). Reading this book is like seeing five red cards in a row, which, as you will learn upon reading the book, is a super good day! —Billy Parrott, Mid-Manhattan Library

I'll stick with the memoir aspect of the theme:  The first is Stop-Time by Frank Conroy, a stunning coming-of-age tale that is thought to be the "granddaddy" of the memoir as we know it today.  Also, Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life which is a riveting account of Wolff's tempestuous relationship with his stepfather.  That book should absolutely be paired with Geoffrey Wolff's The Duke of Deception, because both writers were brothers, each raised by a separate parent.  Each of them writes about the other brother and the other parent but they both had to deal with a relationship with a less-than-ideal male authority figure.  All three voices (and especially Conroy's) are mesmerizing.  —Wayne Roylance, Selection Team

What I'm currently reading might fit with this theme: My Struggle by Karl Ove Knausgård. I'm reading Book 2 and his writing style is very compelling but difficult to describe. It's fiction but there are clearly autobiographical elements and his attention to quotidian details has been described as Proustian. I would definitely describe his voice as "authentic." I might also recommend The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer, a memoir. The Catalog description says is in the tradition of Mary Karr's The Liars Club. —Jenny Baum, Jefferson Market

True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey —Jennifer Craft, Mulberry Street

Please Kill Me: An Uncensored Oral History of Punk by Legs McNeil is a gritty, nasty, sad and frequently hilarious memoir that traces the nascent punk scene of 1970's New York, Detroit, London and beyond. I think a reader who loves fiction will find what they are looking for in this oral history book—Iggy Pop, Richard Hell, Lou Reed, Andy Warhol and their contemporaries were mythic in act and deed, but at the same time honest, real originals. So real and unbelievable sometimes that the only thing you can do is take their word for it—for instance, when Richard Hell DIY'ed a t-shirt that read "Please Kill Me" across the front, and then was too scared to walk down the Bowery wearing it, such was the situation on the Lower East Side at the time that he worried someone may, indeed, fulfill his wish.  —Charlie Radin, Inwood Library