The Folding Star

The Edge of Sadness

Edwin O'Connor1961

A recovering alcoholic priest returns to his home parish and reconnects with an old friend's family. He reflects on his past and his faith.

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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.

elegiac → meditative, still literary fiction

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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.

Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

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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.

elegiac → sardonic

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Beautiful Bastard

Christina Lauren2013

An MBA intern and her demanding media executive boss engage in a series of sexual encounters while competing at work. It is an erotic romance.

elegiac → playful

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The Lost Symbol

Dan Brown2009

Symbologist Robert Langdon follows a trail of Masonic puzzles through Washington D.C. monuments to save his kidnapped mentor.

elegiac → propulsive

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Walking Disaster

Jamie McGuire2013

This novel retells the events of 'Beautiful Disaster' from the perspective of Travis Maddox. It follows his college years and obsession with Abby.

elegiac → propulsive

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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.

elegiac → sardonic

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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.

elegiac → propulsive

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The Martian

Andy Weir2011

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

elegiac → wry

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Orbital

Samantha Harvey2024

Six astronauts orbit Earth over twenty-four hours. The narrative focuses on their routine tasks and observations of the planet below.

elegiac → meditative, still literary fiction

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The Waters of Kronos

Conrad Richter1960

An elderly man travels back in time to his childhood Pennsylvania town, which in his present day is submerged beneath a reservoir.

Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

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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.

elegiac → meditative, still literary fiction

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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.

elegiac → bleak, still literary fiction

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A Little Life

Hanya Yanagihara2015

Four friends in New York over thirty years. One of them is being destroyed, and the book does not look away.

elegiac → bleak, still literary fiction

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The Nickel Boys

Colson Whitehead2019

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

Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

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