After
The Ship That Sailed the Time Stream
G. C. Edmondson1965
- pace
- prose
- structure
- bleakness
5 of 6 directions open — nothing to recover from
More like it
- pace-1prose0bleak+1
Time and Again
Jack Finney1970
An artist is recruited by the government to travel to 1882 New York via self-hypnosis. He must observe the past without altering it.
playful → earnest, still time travel
pace-1·prose0·bleak+1
- pace0prose0bleak0
The Door into Summer
Robert A. Heinlein1957
An engineer is tricked into a thirty-year cryogenic sleep by his business partner. He wakes up in 2000 and seeks a way to use time travel for revenge.
playful → wry, still time travel
pace0·prose0·bleak0
- pace0prose0bleak+1
Blackout
Connie Willis2010
Three historians from 2060 travel to WWII-era England. They become trapped when their exit points fail and must survive the Blitz.
playful → tense, still time travel
pace0·prose0·bleak+1
- pace0prose0bleak0
The Practice Effect
David Brin1984
A physicist enters a world where objects improve with use rather than wearing out. He uses this law to build tools and fight a warlord.
Same playful register, still fish out of water
pace0·prose0·bleak0
1 more ↓ ↑
- pace0prose0bleak0
Roadmarks
Roger Zelazny1979
A man drives a literal road that connects all of history and alternate timelines. He is being hunted by assassins hired by his own son.
Same playful register, still time travel
pace0·prose0·bleak0
Denser prose
- pace-1prose+2bleak+2
Against the Day
Thomas Pynchon2006
A massive ensemble cast navigates the globe between the 1893 World's Fair and WWI. The plot spans airships, math, and secret societies.
Same playful register, still historical fiction
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace-2prose+2bleak+2
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.
playful → dreamlike
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+2
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace-1prose+2bleak+2
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.
playful → sardonic
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace-1prose+2bleak+2
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.
playful → meditative
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace-1prose+2bleak+2
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.
playful → meditative
pace-1·prose+2·bleak+2
Faster
- pace+1prose-1bleak+1
Lost in Time
A.G. Riddle2022
A man is exiled to the Triassic period for a murder he didn't commit while his daughter tries to bring him back.
playful → propulsive, still time travel
pace+1·prose-1·bleak+1
- pace+1prose-1bleak0
The Martian
Andy Weir2011
A man does arithmetic to stay alive on Mars. Problem, attempt, result, repeat.
playful → wry
pace+1·prose-1·bleak0
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace+1prose-1bleak0
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.
playful → propulsive
pace+1·prose-1·bleak0
- pace+1prose-1bleak0
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.
playful → wry
pace+1·prose-1·bleak0
- pace+1prose-1bleak+1
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.
playful → propulsive
pace+1·prose-1·bleak+1
Slower
- pace-2prose+2bleak+2
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.
playful → dreamlike
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace-2prose+2bleak+1
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.
playful → meditative
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace-2prose+2bleak+1
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.
playful → meditative
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace-2prose+2bleak+3
Absalom, Absalom!
William Faulkner1936
The rise and fall of Thomas Sutpen is recounted through multiple, conflicting memories. The prose uses extremely long, complex sentences.
playful → elegiac, still historical fiction
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+3
- pace-2prose+2bleak+3
Kolyma tales
Varlam SHALAMOV1980
Short stories documenting daily life and survival in a Soviet labor camp. The prose is detached and focuses on the physical reality of starvation.
playful → clinical, still historical fiction
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+3
Heavier
- pace-1prose0bleak+3
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.
playful → bleak, still time travel
pace-1·prose0·bleak+3
- pace-2prose+2bleak+3
Kolyma tales
Varlam SHALAMOV1980
Short stories documenting daily life and survival in a Soviet labor camp. The prose is detached and focuses on the physical reality of starvation.
playful → clinical, still historical fiction
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+3
3 more ↓ ↑
- pace-1prose+1bleak+3
Behold the Man
Michael Moorcock1968
A man uses a time machine to travel to 28 AD to meet Jesus. Finding only a disabled man who cannot fulfill the gospels, he takes the role himself.
playful → bleak, still time travel
pace-1·prose+1·bleak+3
- pace-1prose0bleak+3
The Year of the Quiet Sun
Wilson Tucker1970
A social scientist travels forward in time to document the collapse of the United States through racial conflict and nuclear war.
playful → bleak, still time travel
pace-1·prose0·bleak+3
- pace0prose+1bleak+3
The Gone World
Tom Sweterlitsch2018
An investigator travels to possible futures to solve a murder and stop an approaching apocalypse. The timeline changes based on her observations.
playful → bleak, still time travel
pace0·prose+1·bleak+3
