LitQueuelitqueue

After

Honor

Thrity Umrigar2022

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

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  • The Art of Racing in the Rain

    Garth Stein2008

    A dog nearing the end of his life reflects on his time with a race car driver. He observes human grief and perseverance from a distance.

    tense → tender, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak-1

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • Don Quixote

    Kathy Acker1986

    A woman undergoes an abortion and adopts the persona of Don Quixote to pursue a quest in a fragmented, postmodern landscape.

    tense → sardonic

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Translated Accounts

    James Kelman2001

    Anonymous witnesses describe life under a military regime. The prose uses broken, bureaucratic syntax to mimic a literal translation.

    tense → bleak

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Gravity's Rainbow

    Thomas Pynchon1973

    During the end of WWII, an American lieutenant's sexual encounters seem to predict where German V-2 rockets will fall. The narrative is fragmented.

    tense → sardonic

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak0

To recover

3 more ↓

  • Killer Blonde

    Laura Levine2004

    A freelance writer investigates a murder in the Hamptons after a socialite is killed. She balances the case with her work for a demanding boss.

    tense → playful

    pace0·prose-1·bleak-2

  • Two for the dough

    Janet Evanovich1996

    An inexperienced bounty hunter tracks a man who jumped bail for shooting his friend. She competes with a vice cop to find him first.

    tense → playful

    pace0·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

Faster

3 more ↓

  • Candide

    Voltaire

    A naive young man travels the world while his tutor insists that everything is for the best. He encounters a series of global catastrophes.

    tense → sardonic

    pace+1·prose0·bleak-1

  • 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

  • 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

Slower

3 more ↓

  • The English Patient

    Michael Ondaatje1992

    Four people shelter in a ruined Italian villa at the end of WWII. They care for a burned, anonymous man who recounts his past in the desert.

    tense → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace-2·prose+1·bleak0

  • Moby Dick

    Herman Melville1851

    A sailor joins a whaling voyage led by a captain seeking revenge on a specific whale. Large sections digress into the mechanics of 1850s whaling.

    tense → meditative, still literary fiction

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak0

  • To the Lighthouse

    Virginia Woolf1927

    A family and their guests visit a house in the Hebrides. The narrative follows their internal thoughts over two days separated by ten years.

    tense → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak0

Heavier

tense → bleak, still literary fiction

3 more ↓

  • The story of a brief marriage

    Anuk Arudpragasam2016

    Two refugees enter an arranged marriage in a Sri Lankan camp during the final days of the civil war. It focuses on the physical details of survival.

    tense → meditative, still literary fiction

    pace-2·prose+1·bleak+1

  • A Distant Shore

    Caryl Phillips2003

    A retired teacher and an African refugee form a quiet bond in a xenophobic English village. Their past traumas emerge through alternating stories.

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • The Nickel Boys

    Colson Whitehead2019

    A studious black teenager in 1960s Florida is sent to a brutal reform school where physical abuse is systemic.

    tense → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1