Engine Summer

Transcendent

Stephen Baxter2005

A grieving engineer in 2047 witnesses the collapse of Earth's ecosystem while a post-human entity from the far future observes human history.

pace0·prose0·bleak0

Rakesfall

Vajra Chandrasekera2024

Two souls reincarnate across centuries of Sri Lankan history and a distant future. The narrative shifts through different bodies and realities.

elegiac → dreamlike

pace0·prose+1·bleak0

Invisible Cities

Italo Calvino1972

Marco Polo describes fifty-five imaginary cities to Kublai Khan. The book is a series of short, prose-poem meditations on urban existence.

elegiac → meditative

pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

All Those Vanished Engines

Paul Park2014

Three linked stories follow the Park family through an alternate history where the American Civil War ended in a two-nation settlement.

elegiac → dreamlike

pace0·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-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.

elegiac → earnest

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

The Martian

Andy Weir2011

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

elegiac → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

The Martian

Andy Weir2011

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

elegiac → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

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.

elegiac → propulsive

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

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.

elegiac → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

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.

elegiac → meditative

pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

After London

Richard Jefferies1885

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

Same elegiac register, still post-apocalyptic

pace-1·prose0·bleak0

Night Land

William Hope Hodgson2014

In the distant future, a man leaves the last human stronghold to find a woman across a sunless, monster-filled wasteland.

elegiac → dreamlike, still dying earth

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

The Walking Dead: Compendium One

Robert Kirkman2009

A sheriff wakes from a coma into a zombie apocalypse. He leads a group of survivors through various temporary shelters over several years.

elegiac → bleak, still post-apocalyptic

pace+1·prose-2·bleak+1

One Second After

William R. Forstchen2009

An EMP strike destroys the American power grid. A history professor attempts to manage the starvation and societal collapse of his small town.

elegiac → bleak, still post-apocalyptic

pace+1·prose-1·bleak+1

The Death of Grass

John Christopher1956

A virus kills the world's grass and grain, causing total societal collapse. A family attempts to flee London for a farm in the north.

elegiac → bleak, still post-apocalyptic

pace+1·prose-1·bleak+1