LitQueuelitqueue

After

Commonwealth

Ann Patchett2016

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

1 more ↓

  • Find Me

    André Aciman2019

    The lives of three men intersect across years in Italy and New York. The narrative focuses on chance encounters and the passage of time.

    Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • Umbrella

    Will Self2013

    A psychiatrist in 1971 treats a woman who has been catatonic for decades. The prose shifts between eras and consciousnesses without paragraph breaks.

    elegiac → clinical

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • The Sea

    John Banville2005

    A widower returns to a coastal resort to reflect on a childhood summer and his wife's death. The narrator's memory is fluid and dense.

    Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Gravity's Rainbow

    Thomas Pynchon1973

    During the end of WWII, an American lieutenant's sexual encounters seem to predict where German V-2 rockets will fall. The narrative is fragmented.

    elegiac → sardonic

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

To recover

3 more ↓

  • Assistant to the Villain

    Hannah Nicole Maehrer2023

    A woman takes a job as an administrative assistant to a local villain to support her family. She manages his office while ignoring his evil deeds.

    elegiac → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

  • The Marriage Bargain

    Jennifer Probst2012

    A bookstore owner enters a one-year contract marriage with a billionaire to save her family's land. They must follow a set of rules to stay platonic.

    elegiac → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

  • A Quick Bite

    Lynsay Sands2005

    A vampire who faints at the sight of blood finds a psychologist tied to her bed as a gift. They navigate his kidnapping and her family dynamics.

    elegiac → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Faster

3 more ↓

  • Candide

    Voltaire

    A naive young man travels the world while his tutor insists that everything is for the best. He encounters a series of global catastrophes.

    elegiac → sardonic

    pace+2·prose-1·bleak0

  • 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.

    elegiac → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    elegiac → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Blackouts

    Justin Torres2023

    A young man cares for a dying elder in a medical facility. They use a 1930s study on homosexuality to reconstruct their personal histories.

    Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak+1

  • The Waters of Kronos

    Conrad Richter1960

    An elderly man travels back in time to his childhood Pennsylvania town, which in his present day is submerged beneath a reservoir.

    Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak0

  • The story of a brief marriage

    Anuk Arudpragasam2016

    Two refugees enter an arranged marriage in a Sri Lankan camp during the final days of the civil war. It focuses on the physical details of survival.

    elegiac → meditative, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak+2

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • A Distant Shore

    Caryl Phillips2003

    A retired teacher and an African refugee form a quiet bond in a xenophobic English village. Their past traumas emerge through alternating stories.

    elegiac → bleak, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • A Little Life

    Hanya Yanagihara2015

    Four friends in New York over thirty years. One of them is being destroyed, and the book does not look away.

    elegiac → bleak, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+2

  • The Nickel Boys

    Colson Whitehead2019

    A studious black teenager in 1960s Florida is sent to a brutal reform school where physical abuse is systemic.

    Same elegiac register, still literary fiction

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+2