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After

Azanian Bridges

Nick Wood2016

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

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  • The Chrysalids

    John Wyndham1955

    In a fundamentalist post-nuclear society, a boy discovers he has telepathic abilities. He must hide his mutation to avoid execution or exile.

    Same tense register, still dystopian

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

tense → dreamlike, still alternate history

3 more ↓

  • Infinite Jest

    David Foster Wallace1996

    A sprawling narrative centered on a tennis academy, a halfway house, and a lethal film. The text includes hundreds of pages of detailed endnotes.

    tense → sardonic, still dystopian

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak0

  • Naked Lunch: The Restored Text

    William S. Burroughs

    A series of nonlinear vignettes follow a drug addict's hallucinations and travels. The prose is fragmented and satirical.

    tense → sardonic, still dystopian

    pace-1·prose+2·bleak+1

  • 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.

    tense → dreamlike

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak0

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.

    tense → propulsive

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

  • 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.

    tense → earnest

    pace0·prose-1·bleak-2

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    tense → wry

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

Faster

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    tense → propulsive

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

  • Red Rising

    Pierce Brown2014

    A laborer on Mars discovers his caste is being lied to and undergoes surgery to infiltrate the ruling elite. He joins a brutal war games academy.

    tense → propulsive, still dystopian

    pace+1·prose0·bleak0

  • 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.

    tense → wry

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak-2

Slower

3 more ↓

  • 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.

    tense → meditative

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak-1

  • Translated Accounts

    James Kelman2001

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

    tense → bleak, still dystopian

    pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1

  • Hav

    Jan Morris2006

    A travel writer describes the culture and history of a fictional Mediterranean city-state before and after a massive political upheaval.

    tense → elegiac, still alternate history

    pace-2·prose+1·bleak-1

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • Watchmen

    Alan Moore1986

    Retired masked vigilantes investigate the murder of a former teammate. The story takes place in an alternate 1985 on the brink of nuclear war.

    tense → bleak, still dystopian

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

  • A Clockwork Orange

    Anthony Burgess1962

    A teenage gang leader is imprisoned and subjected to state-mandated psychological conditioning. The story is told in a slang called Nadsat.

    tense → sardonic, still dystopian

    pace0·prose+2·bleak+1

  • A Scanner Darkly

    Philip K. Dick1977

    An undercover narcotics agent in a near-future California becomes addicted to the drug he is investigating and begins to spy on himself.

    tense → bleak, still dystopian

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1