LitQueuelitqueue

After

The Walking Dead, Book One

Robert Kirkman2006

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

Same bleak register, still horror

1 more ↓

  • Red Hill

    Jamie McGuire2013

    Three groups of survivors attempt to reach a ranch during a sudden zombie outbreak. The story follows their separate paths to the same refuge.

    bleak → tense, still horror

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

bleak → dreamlike

3 more ↓

  • Android Karenina

    Лев Толстой2010

    The text of Tolstoy's classic is modified to include robots, cyborgs, and space travel in a 19th-century Russian setting.

    bleak → elegiac, still horror

    pace-1·prose+3·bleak+1

  • Racconti [55 stories]

    Edgar Allan Poe2011

    A collection of 55 stories featuring unreliable narrators and gothic settings. Themes include obsession, premature burial, and the macabre.

    bleak → dreamlike, still horror

    pace-1·prose+3·bleak0

  • Gormenghast

    Mervyn Peake1950

    A young heir and a social climber navigate the rigid rituals of a decaying, labyrinthine castle. The prose is dense and descriptive.

    bleak → dark

    pace-1·prose+3·bleak+1

To recover

3 more ↓

  • The Colour of Magic

    Terry Pratchett1983

    A failed wizard and a naive tourist travel across a flat world carried by a turtle. The story parodies fantasy tropes and clichés.

    bleak → playful

    pace0·prose+1·bleak-2

  • A Choice of Gods

    Clifford D. Simak1972

    After humanity vanishes, a few survivors live for centuries on a quiet Earth. They eventually learn where the rest of the population went.

    bleak → meditative, still post-apocalyptic

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-2

  • The Rowan

    Anne McCaffrey1990

    A powerful telepath living in isolation connects with a distant mind to defend against an alien invasion. It follows their psychic courtship.

    bleak → earnest

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-2

Faster

3 more ↓

  • The Burning Side

    Sarah Damoff

    bleak → tense, still horror

    pace+1·prose+2·bleak+1

  • The Rats

    James Herbert1974

    Giant, man-eating rats overrun London, attacking citizens in homes and subways. The story follows the escalating biological disaster.

    bleak → propulsive, still horror

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak0

  • Shattered

    Dean Koontz1973

    A man and his future stepson drive across America while being stalked by the woman's vengeful ex-husband.

    bleak → tense, still horror

    pace+1·prose0·bleak-1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    bleak → playful

    pace-2·prose+3·bleak-2

  • 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.

    bleak → playful

    pace-2·prose+3·bleak-1

  • Absalom, Absalom!

    William Faulkner1936

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

    bleak → elegiac

    pace-2·prose+3·bleak+1

Heavier

Same bleak register, still horror

3 more ↓

  • The Burning Side

    Sarah Damoff

    bleak → tense, still horror

    pace+1·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Mapping the Interior

    Stephen Graham Jones2017

    A teenager follows a figure resembling his dead father into the hidden spaces of his home. He maps a shifting, dangerous interior.

    bleak → elegiac, still horror

    pace0·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Flowers in the Attic

    V.C. Andrews1979

    Four children are hidden in an attic for years by their mother and grandmother to secure an inheritance. They face gradual poisoning and abuse.

    bleak → elegiac, still horror

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1