LitQueuelitqueue

After

The Museum of Extraordinary Things

Alice Hoffman2014

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

1 more ↓

  • The Night Tiger

    Yangsze Choo2019

    In 1930s Malaya, a houseboy and a dance-hall girl are linked by a series of deaths and rumors of a man-eating tiger.

    Same dreamlike register, still magical realism

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    Same dreamlike register

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Don Quixote

    Kathy Acker1986

    A woman undergoes an abortion and adopts the persona of Don Quixote to pursue a quest in a fragmented, postmodern landscape.

    dreamlike → sardonic

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+2

  • 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.

    dreamlike → sardonic

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

To recover

dreamlike → playful

3 more ↓

  • Twice Bitten

    Lynsay Sands2018

    An immortal woman hunting rogue vampires encounters a man who claims they have a history she cannot remember.

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

  • Love in the Time of Dragons

    Katie MacAlister2010

    A mother wakes up in a world of dragon-shifters who believe she is a historical figure and sentence her to death for her past crimes.

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

  • Romancing Mister Bridgerton

    Julia Quinn2002

    A long-time wallflower and her friend's brother discover each other's secrets in Regency London. The plot centers on the identity of a gossip writer.

    dreamlike → warm

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Faster

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    dreamlike → 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.

    dreamlike → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    dreamlike → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Absalom, Absalom!

    William Faulkner1936

    The rise and fall of Thomas Sutpen is recounted through multiple, conflicting memories. The prose uses extremely long, complex sentences.

    dreamlike → elegiac

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+2

  • Translated Accounts

    James Kelman2001

    Anonymous witnesses describe life under a military regime. The prose uses broken, bureaucratic syntax to mimic a literal translation.

    dreamlike → bleak

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+2

  • 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.

    dreamlike → meditative, still magical realism

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • The Summer that Melted Everything

    Tiffany McDaniel2016

    A boy claiming to be the devil arrives in a small Ohio town during a 1984 heatwave. His presence triggers a series of local tragedies.

    dreamlike → elegiac, still magical realism

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • The Lives of Others

    Neel Mukherjee2014

    A multi-generational family in 1960s Calcutta disintegrates while one grandson joins a violent Maoist insurgency. It tracks the family's collapse.

    dreamlike → bleak, still historical

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • The Road

    Cormac McCarthy2006

    A father and son walk through a landscape of ash and scavengers toward the coast. They carry only what fits in a shopping cart.

    dreamlike → bleak

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+2