Year One

A Conjuring of Light

V. E. Schwab2017

The final entry in a trilogy about four parallel Londons facing a magical shadow. It follows a magician and a thief trying to save their city.

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Ficciones

Jorge Luis Borges1945

A collection of short stories exploring philosophical paradoxes, infinite libraries, and imaginary encyclopedias.

propulsive → meditative

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At Swim-Two-Birds

Flann O'Brien1939

A student writes a story about a man whose own characters rebel and plot against him. It incorporates Irish myth and multiple layers of fiction.

propulsive → playful

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Love & Sleep

John Crowley1994

Pierce Moffett researches the history of magic while living in a small town. The narrative shifts between his life and the Renaissance.

propulsive → meditative

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Grunge

Larry Correia2016

A Marine killed in a bombing is resurrected to hunt supernatural creatures. He joins a private company that kills monsters for government bounties.

propulsive → sardonic, still urban fantasy

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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.

propulsive → playful, still found family

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Smokin' Seventeen

Janet Evanovich2011

A bounty hunter investigates bodies found in her boss's lot while choosing between three suitors. The story follows her daily mishaps in New Jersey.

propulsive → playful

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Touch the dark

Karen Chance2006

A clairvoyant woman is forced to work for a vampire senator to escape a mob boss. She navigates a supernatural underworld with high-speed action.

Same propulsive register, still urban fantasy

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Dungeon Crawler Carl

Matt Dinniman2020

Earth is converted into an 18-level televised death game. A man and a cat must navigate traps and monsters to survive.

propulsive → sardonic

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The Stainless Steel Rat

Harry Harrison1961

A futuristic con man is caught by the Special Corps and forced to use his criminal skills to catch other lawbreakers.

propulsive → playful

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The Habitation of the Blessed

Catherynne M. Valente2010

A priest finds the lost kingdom of Prester John. The story is told through three nested layers of journals, myths, and historical accounts.

propulsive → dreamlike

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Unfinished Tales

J.R.R. Tolkien1980

A collection of incomplete narratives and essays that expand the history, geography, and lore of Middle-earth.

propulsive → meditative

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Translated Accounts

James Kelman2001

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

propulsive → bleak, still dystopian

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We

Yevgeny Zamyatin1983

A mathematician in a glass-walled city keeps a diary as he begins to doubt the logic of his totalitarian state.

propulsive → cold, still dystopian

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The Alchemy of Stone

Ekaterina Sedia2008

An alchemist automaton is caught in a political struggle between gargoyles and her creators. She must find a way to wind her own heart key.

propulsive → elegiac, still urban fantasy

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Doctor Rat

William Kotzwinkle1976

A laboratory rat loyal to his human captors defends the practice of vivisection while animals worldwide begin a bloody revolt.

propulsive → sardonic, still dystopian

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