Middlesex

An Artist of the Floating World

Kazuo Ishiguro1986

An aging painter in post-WWII Japan reflects on his career and his support for the former imperialist regime while arranging his daughter's marriage.

wry → meditative, still historical fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak0

As I Lay Dying

William Faulkner1915

The Bundren family travels by wagon to bury their matriarch. Fifteen different narrators describe the journey as the corpse decomposes.

wry → sardonic, still unreliable narrator

pace0·prose+1·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.

wry → sardonic, still historical fiction

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Briefing for a Descent into Hell

Doris Lessing1971

A man is found wandering London and placed in a psychiatric ward. The narrative shifts between the hospital and his internal cosmic hallucinations.

wry → dreamlike, still unreliable narrator

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Going Cowboy Crazy

Katie Lane2011

A woman travels to a small Texas town to find her secret twin sister and is mistaken for her by the local residents and her sister's ex-flame.

wry → playful

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Marrying Mr. Wrong

Claire Kingsley

Two rivals wake up married in Las Vegas and decide to stay together to help their respective careers.

wry → playful

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Hot Number

Carly Phillips

A sports publicist undergoes a physical makeover to shed her tomboy image. She attempts to catch the attention of a professional ballplayer.

wry → playful

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

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.

wry → sardonic

pace+2·prose-1·bleak0

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.

wry → propulsive

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

The Martian

Andy Weir2011

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

Same wry register

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

A Month in the Country

J. L. Carr1980

A WWI veteran spends a summer in a quiet village restoring a medieval mural in a church. He reflects on his trauma while observing local life.

wry → elegiac, still historical fiction

pace-1·prose-1·bleak0

Umbrella

Will Self2013

A psychiatrist in 1971 treats a woman who has been catatonic for decades. The prose shifts between eras and consciousnesses without paragraph breaks.

wry → clinical

pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

History of the Rain

Niall Williams2014

A bedridden girl in Ireland tells the story of her family and her father's obsession with finding a specific book. It is a history of a lineage.

wry → elegiac, still family saga

pace-1·prose0·bleak0

The Known World

Edward P. Jones2003

A black man who was once a slave becomes a slave owner in antebellum Virginia. The story follows the fallout on the plantation after his death.

wry → meditative, still historical fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak+2

A Long Long Way

Sebastian Barry2005

A young Irishman joins the British Army to fight in the trenches of World War I while his home country moves toward rebellion.

wry → elegiac, still historical fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak+2

The Underground Railroad

Colson Whitehead2016

Two slaves escape a Georgia plantation via a literal underground train system while being pursued by a slave catcher.

pace+1·prose0·bleak+2