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After

The Unlimited Dream Company

J. G. Ballard1979

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

1 more ↓

  • Strange Toys

    Patricia Geary1987

    Pet grows up in the shadow of her sister's occult predictions. The narrative follows her at ages nine, sixteen, and thirty as she seeks vengeance.

    Same dreamlike register, still magical realism

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    Same dreamlike register

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Star Maker

    Olaf Stapledon1937

    A narrator travels through space and time to observe the birth and death of civilizations across the universe.

    dreamlike → elegiac, still speculative fiction

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak+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.

    dreamlike → sardonic

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

To recover

3 more ↓

  • 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

  • Fifty Shades of Grey

    E.L. James2000

    A college student enters a sexual contract with a wealthy businessman. The story focuses on their power dynamics and BDSM encounters.

    dreamlike → earnest

    pace+1·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

Faster

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    dreamlike → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-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.

    dreamlike → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak0

  • 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.

    dreamlike → playful

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Dandelion Wine

    Ray Bradbury1946

    A twelve-year-old boy experiences a series of vignettes over one summer in 1928 Illinois. The chapters focus on small-town life and aging.

    dreamlike → elegiac, still magical realism

    pace-1·prose0·bleak-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.

    dreamlike → meditative

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

  • After London

    Richard Jefferies1885

    Nature reclaims England after an unspecified catastrophe destroys civilization. A young man explores the toxic swamps that were once London.

    dreamlike → elegiac, still speculative fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak+1

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • The Birth of the People's Republic of Antarctica

    John Batchelor1983

    A man born in Sweden travels south as Europe collapses into war. He eventually leads a group of refugees to found a new society in Antarctica.

    dreamlike → bleak, still speculative fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • The Blood of Angels

    Johanna Sinisalo2011

    A father grieving his son discovers a portal to another world while bees disappear globally. It explores ecological collapse and grief.

    dreamlike → elegiac, still speculative fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • The children's hospital

    Chris Adrian2006

    The world floods under seven miles of water, leaving a children's hospital as the only dry land. Survivors navigate a new, mythic reality.

    Same dreamlike register, still magical realism

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2