LitQueuelitqueue

After

Machines Like Me

Ian McEwan2019

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

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  • Queen of Angels

    Greg Bear1990

    In a future where nanotechnology can 'cure' mental illness, a detective hunts a murderer. A scientist enters the killer's mind via a digital link.

    Same clinical register, still artificial intelligence

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • All Those Vanished Engines

    Paul Park2014

    Three linked stories follow the Park family through an alternate history where the American Civil War ended in a two-nation settlement.

    clinical → dreamlike, still alternate history

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

  • Beelzebub's tales to his grandson

    Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff1950

    An extraterrestrial being explains the history and strange behaviors of humanity to his grandson during a long space voyage.

    clinical → meditative, still science fiction

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

  • Against the Day

    Thomas Pynchon2006

    A massive ensemble cast navigates the globe between the 1893 World's Fair and WWI. The plot spans airships, math, and secret societies.

    clinical → playful

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

To recover

3 more ↓

  • Love Is Blind

    Lynsay Sands2006

    A clumsy woman removes her glasses to appear attractive to a suitor, resulting in physical comedy and accidents. They navigate a Regency romance.

    clinical → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

  • The Boy Next Door

    Meg Cabot2002

    A gossip columnist looks after her neighbor's pets after an attack and falls for the man she thinks is the woman's nephew. It is told in emails.

    clinical → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

  • On a Pale Horse

    Piers Anthony1983

    After accidentally killing the personification of Death, a man must take over the office. He navigates the bureaucracy of the afterlife.

    clinical → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

Faster

3 more ↓

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    clinical → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

  • Ready Player One

    Ernest Cline2008

    A teenager in a dystopian future hunts for a digital easter egg inside a massive simulation. The quest relies on 1980s pop culture trivia.

    clinical → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

  • All Systems Red

    Martha Wells2017

    A self-aware security android hacks its own governor module to watch soap operas while protecting a team of scientists on a distant planet.

    clinical → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Invisible Cities

    Italo Calvino1972

    Marco Polo describes fifty-five imaginary cities to Kublai Khan. The book is a series of short, prose-poem meditations on urban existence.

    clinical → meditative

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

  • Hav

    Jan Morris2006

    A travel writer describes the culture and history of a fictional Mediterranean city-state before and after a massive political upheaval.

    clinical → elegiac, still alternate history

    pace-1·prose0·bleak-1

  • Gödel, Escher, Bach

    Douglas R. Hofstadter1979

    An exploration of how cognition emerges from hidden neurological patterns. It uses math, art, and music to explain self-referential systems.

    clinical → playful

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-2

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • Elvissey

    Jack Womack1993

    Travelers from a corporate dystopia visit an alternate 1954 to kidnap Elvis Presley. They find a version of him that is dangerous and unstable.

    clinical → bleak, still alternate history

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1

  • Hellspark

    Janet Kagan1988

    A linguist travels to a new planet to investigate a murder. She must determine if the local species is sentient while navigating a conspiracy.

    clinical → tense, still science fiction

    pace+2·prose0·bleak+1

  • The Running Man

    Richard Bachman

    A man enters a deadly reality show to fund medical care for his daughter. He must survive thirty days while the entire world hunts him for money.

    clinical → propulsive, still science fiction

    pace+2·prose-1·bleak+1