After
The City in the Middle of the Night
Charlie Jane Anders2019
- pace
- prose
- structure
- bleakness
6 of 6 directions open
More like it
- pace0prose0bleak0
Windhaven
Lisa Tuttle1981
On a planet of islands, people use wings made of starship metal to fly. A young woman challenges the rigid laws of the flyer caste to earn her wings.
Same earnest register, still soft sci-fi
pace0·prose0·bleak0
- pace0prose0bleak0
Rollback
Robert J. Sawyer2007
An elderly couple undergoes a rejuvenation treatment to help decode an alien signal. It works for the husband but fails for the wife.
Same earnest register, still first contact
pace0·prose0·bleak0
- pace0prose0bleak0
Survival
Julie E. Czerneda2004
A salmon biologist is recruited by an alien to investigate the disappearance of several species. It is a slow-paced first-contact procedural.
Same earnest register, still first contact
pace0·prose0·bleak0
- pace0prose+1bleak+1
The Book of Strange New Things
Michel Faber2014
A Christian missionary travels to a distant planet to teach the Gospel to aliens. While he bonds with them, Earth suffers ecological collapse.
earnest → elegiac, still soft sci-fi
pace0·prose+1·bleak+1
1 more ↓ ↑
- pace0prose0bleak0
Fire Time
Poul Anderson1974
A planet with three suns enters a period of extreme heat. The native species and human colonists must survive the resulting social chaos.
Same earnest register, still first contact
pace0·prose0·bleak0
Denser prose
- pace-1prose+2bleak+1
Dhalgren
Samuel R. Delany1975
An amnesiac wanderer enters Bellona, a city cut off from the world where time and geography shift. He joins a gang and writes poetry.
earnest → dreamlike
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace0prose+2bleak+1
Too Like the Lightning
Ada Palmer2016
In a 25th-century utopia, a convict narrates the discovery of a boy who can perform miracles. The prose uses 18th-century styles and gender terms.
earnest → sardonic
pace0·prose+2·bleak+1
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace0prose+2bleak+1
Valis
Philip K. Dick1981
A man experiences a beam of pink light that imparts vast information. The narrative explores his mental breakdown and search for God in California.
earnest → meditative
pace0·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace0prose+2bleak+1
Shadow & Claw
Gene Wolfe1983
A torturer travels across a far-future Earth where technology is indistinguishable from magic. He recounts his exile in dense, archaic prose.
earnest → meditative
pace0·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace0prose+2bleak+1
Radiance
Catherynne M. Valente2015
A documentary filmmaker disappears on Venus in an alternate 1980s solar system. The story is told through scripts, interviews, and letters.
earnest → dreamlike
pace0·prose+2·bleak+1
To recover
- pace+1prose-1bleak-1
Surrounded by Idiots
Thomas Erikson2014
A guide to a four-color personality model designed to help readers categorize and communicate with different behavioral types in the workplace.
earnest → wry
pace+1·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace+1prose-1bleak-1
Wallbanger
Alice Clayton2012
Caroline is kept awake by her neighbor's loud sexual encounters. She confronts him, leading to a relationship built on banter and frustration.
earnest → playful
pace+1·prose-1·bleak-1
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace0prose-1bleak-1
Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus
John Gray1992
A guide to heterosexual relationships that attributes communication conflicts to inherent psychological differences between men and women.
Same earnest register
pace0·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace+1prose-1bleak-1
Wildfire
Hannah Grace2023
Two college students who had a one-night stand discover they are working as counselors at the same summer camp.
earnest → playful
pace+1·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace+1prose-1bleak-1
Love Her or Lose Her
Tessa Bailey2020
A woman enrolls her distant, ex-soldier husband in a marriage boot camp to save their relationship and pursue her dream of opening a restaurant.
earnest → playful
pace+1·prose-1·bleak-1
Faster
- pace+2prose-1bleak-1
The Martian
Andy Weir2011
A man does arithmetic to stay alive on Mars. Problem, attempt, result, repeat.
earnest → wry
pace+2·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace+2prose-1bleak-1
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.
earnest → propulsive
pace+2·prose-1·bleak-1
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace+2prose-1bleak-1
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.
earnest → wry
pace+2·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace+2prose-1bleak0
Skin Game
Jim Butcher2014
Wizard Harry Dresden joins a team of villains to rob a vault in the Underworld. It is a fast-paced heist set in a modern fantasy Chicago.
earnest → propulsive
pace+2·prose-1·bleak0
- pace+2prose-1bleak-1
The Kaiju Preservation Society
John Scalzi2022
A food delivery driver joins a secret organization that travels to an alternate Earth to care for massive, dinosaur-like creatures.
earnest → playful
pace+2·prose-1·bleak-1
Slower
- pace-1prose+2bleak+1
Dhalgren
Samuel R. Delany1975
An amnesiac wanderer enters Bellona, a city cut off from the world where time and geography shift. He joins a gang and writes poetry.
earnest → dreamlike
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace-1prose+2bleak0
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.
earnest → meditative
pace-1·prose+2·bleak0
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace-1prose+2bleak0
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.
earnest → meditative
pace-1·prose+2·bleak0
- pace-1prose+2bleak-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.
earnest → playful
pace-1·prose+2·bleak-1
- pace-1prose+2bleak0
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.
earnest → playful
pace-1·prose+2·bleak0
Heavier
- pace0prose0bleak+2
On the Beach
Nevil Shute1957
Survivors in Australia wait for a lethal radiation cloud to arrive after a nuclear war. They spend their final months in quiet, domestic routines.
earnest → elegiac, still soft sci-fi
pace0·prose0·bleak+2
- pace0prose+1bleak+2
The Handmaid's Tale
Margaret Atwood1985
In a totalitarian state with a plummeting birth rate, a woman is enslaved as a reproductive vessel. She records her daily life and memories.
earnest → cold
pace0·prose+1·bleak+2
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace0prose0bleak+2
Doomsday Book
Connie Willis1992
A student travels to 14th-century England while a virus spreads in the present. She arrives during the Black Death due to a technical error.
earnest → bleak
pace0·prose0·bleak+2
- pace0prose+2bleak+2
Perdido Street Station
China Miéville2000
A scientist in a sprawling, industrial city agrees to help a winged refugee fly again. His research accidentally unleashes a psychic predator.
earnest → bleak
pace0·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace0prose+1bleak+2
The Sparrow
Mary Doria Russell1996
A Jesuit priest joins a mission to a newly discovered planet. The story is told in flashbacks after he returns as the sole, traumatized survivor.
earnest → elegiac
pace0·prose+1·bleak+2
