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After

Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng

Kylie Lee Baker2025

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

Same tense register, still horror

1 more ↓

  • Play Nice

    Rachel Harrison2025

    An influencer returns to her childhood home after her mother's death. She must determine if the house is possessed or if her mother was delusional.

    tense → eerie, still horror

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

tense → dreamlike

3 more ↓

  • Android Karenina

    Лев Толстой2010

    The text of Tolstoy's classic is modified to include robots, cyborgs, and space travel in a 19th-century Russian setting.

    tense → elegiac, still horror

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Racconti [55 stories]

    Edgar Allan Poe2011

    A collection of 55 stories featuring unreliable narrators and gothic settings. Themes include obsession, premature burial, and the macabre.

    tense → dreamlike, still horror

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak0

  • Gormenghast

    Mervyn Peake1950

    A young heir and a social climber navigate the rigid rituals of a decaying, labyrinthine castle. The prose is dense and descriptive.

    tense → dark

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1

To recover

3 more ↓

  • The Da Vinci Code

    Dan Brown2003

    A symbologist and a cryptologist flee the police while solving puzzles hidden in art. They search for a secret regarding the Holy Grail.

    tense → propulsive

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

  • Fifty Shades of Grey

    E.L. James2000

    A college student enters a sexual contract with a wealthy businessman. The story focuses on their power dynamics and BDSM encounters.

    tense → earnest

    pace0·prose-1·bleak-2

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

    A man does arithmetic to stay alive on Mars. Problem, attempt, result, repeat.

    tense → wry

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

Faster

tense → eerie, still horror

3 more ↓

  • The Possession of Alba Díaz

    Isabel Cañas2025

    In 1840s Mexico, a woman undergoes an exorcism while her family struggles with the political aftermath of the war.

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Deeper

    James Moore2009

    Divers off the New England coast recover a strange creature that survives on land and begins hunting humans.

    Same tense register, still horror

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1

  • Temperature

    Adam Santo2010

    After dying in a car crash, Sally is resurrected by a stranger and led through a world of the undead.

    Same tense register, still horror

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Ulysses

    James Joyce1914

    Three characters wander through Dublin on a single day in 1904. Each chapter uses a different literary style to mimic thoughts and sensations.

    tense → playful

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak-1

  • Absalom, Absalom!

    William Faulkner1936

    The rise and fall of Thomas Sutpen is recounted through multiple, conflicting memories. The prose uses extremely long, complex sentences.

    tense → elegiac

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Either/Or

    Søren Kierkegaard1992

    A collection of papers presents two life philosophies: the aesthetic pursuit of pleasure and the ethical commitment to duty.

    tense → meditative

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak-1

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • Immaculate Conception

    Ling Ling Huang2025

    tense → eerie, still horror

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

  • The Buffalo Hunter Hunter

    Stephen Graham Jones2025

    tense → eerie, still horror

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • What Hunger

    Catherine Dang2025

    tense → eerie, still horror

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak+1