The Black Prince

Notes on a Scandal

Zoë Heller2003

An older teacher documents her colleague's affair with a student. The narrator's own obsession and manipulation drive the story.

Same sardonic register, still psychological fiction

pace+1·prose0·bleak0

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.

sardonic → dreamlike, still psychological fiction

pace0·prose+1·bleak0

The Sound and the Fury

William Faulkner1929

The decline of a Southern family told through four perspectives, including a non-linear stream of consciousness from a man with a disability.

sardonic → elegiac, 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.

Same sardonic register, still unreliable narrator

pace0·prose+1·bleak0

This Man

Jodi Ellen Malpas2013

An interior designer begins an affair with a wealthy client who demands total control over her life and schedule.

sardonic → tense

pace+1·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.

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

Real Murders

Charlaine Harris1990

A librarian in a small Georgia town belongs to a club that studies famous crimes. A real murder occurs that mimics a historical case.

sardonic → wry

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

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.

Same sardonic register

pace+2·prose-1·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.

sardonic → propulsive

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

The Martian

Andy Weir2011

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

sardonic → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

The Wilderness

Samantha Harvey2009

An architect with Alzheimer's attempts to reconstruct his life story. The narrative fragments as his memory and sense of time dissolve.

sardonic → elegiac, still psychological fiction

pace-1·prose0·bleak0

The Next Big Thing

Anita Brookner2002

A seventy-three-year-old man in London contemplates his few remaining options for the future. He considers travel, marriage, and his isolation.

sardonic → meditative, still psychological fiction

pace-1·prose0·bleak0

Study for Obedience

Sarah Bernstein2023

A woman moves to a remote northern country to care for her brother. The local community grows hostile as she observes them.

sardonic → cold, still psychological fiction

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

The Lighthouse

Alison Moore2012

A recently separated man takes a walking tour of Germany while reflecting on his childhood abandonment and his failing marriage.

sardonic → bleak, still psychological fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak+1

The White Hotel

D. M. Thomas1981

A woman's life is told through poems, a Freudian case study, and a narrative. It moves from her sexual fantasies to her death in the Holocaust.

sardonic → dreamlike, still psychological fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak+1

My Dark Vanessa

Kate Elizabeth Russell2020

Vanessa reflects on her teenage relationship with a teacher after he is accused of abuse. The narrative shifts between 2000 and 2017.

sardonic → bleak, still psychological fiction

pace+1·prose0·bleak+1