After
Freedom™
Daniel Suarez2010
- pace
- prose
- structure
- bleakness
5 of 6 directions open — nothing faster
More like it
Same propulsive register, still techno-thriller
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Nexus
Ramez Naam2012
A scientist develops a nanotech drug that links minds and is hunted by government agencies. It is a high-speed global conspiracy thriller.
pace0·prose0·bleak0
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This Is Not a Game
Walter Jon Williams2009
A game designer uses her global network of players to solve a real-world murder and navigate a financial conspiracy.
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Daemon
Leinad Zeraus2006
A deceased game designer leaves behind a computer program that begins killing people and restructuring society. It is a high-tech manhunt.
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(R)evolution
PJ Manney2015
A scientist uploads his consciousness into a digital form to survive. He gains superhuman abilities and uncovers a global conspiracy.
pace-1·prose0·bleak0
1 more ↓ ↑
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Constance
Matthew FitzSimmons2021
A woman wakes up to find she is a clone who has lost eighteen months of memories. She must discover who murdered her original self.
pace-1·prose0·bleak0
Denser prose
- pace-2prose+2bleak+1
Against the Day
Thomas Pynchon2006
A massive ensemble cast navigates the globe between the 1893 World's Fair and WWI. The plot spans airships, math, and secret societies.
propulsive → playful
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace-2prose+2bleak+1
Too Like the Lightning
Ada Palmer2016
In a 25th-century utopia, a convict narrates the discovery of a boy who can perform miracles. The prose uses 18th-century styles and gender terms.
propulsive → sardonic
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
3 more ↓ ↑
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Shadow & Claw
Gene Wolfe1983
A torturer travels across a far-future Earth where technology is indistinguishable from magic. He recounts his exile in dense, archaic prose.
propulsive → meditative
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace-2prose+2bleak+2
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.
propulsive → sardonic
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+2
- pace-2prose+2bleak+1
VAS
Steve Tomasula2002
A man considers a vasectomy while the book uses diagrams and varied typography to explore the history of eugenics and biotechnology.
propulsive → clinical, still cyberpunk
pace-2·prose+2·bleak+1
To recover
- pace-1prose-1bleak-1
Starter Villain
John Scalzi2023
A substitute teacher inherits his uncle's secret supervillain business, including a volcano lair and talking cats.
propulsive → wry
pace-1·prose-1·bleak-1
- pace0prose-1bleak-1
Digital Fortress
Dan Brown1998
The NSA's code-breaking supercomputer encounters an unbreakable algorithm. A cryptographer and a professor race to find the kill code.
Same propulsive register, still techno-thriller
pace0·prose-1·bleak-1
3 more ↓ ↑
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Snow Crash
Neal Stephenson1992
A pizza delivery driver and a teenage skateboarder investigate a digital virus that can crash the brains of hackers in a corporate-run Los Angeles.
propulsive → sardonic, still cyberpunk
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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.
Same propulsive register, still cyberpunk
pace0·prose-1·bleak-1
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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.
propulsive → earnest
pace-1·prose-1·bleak-1
Slower
- pace-3prose+2bleak+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.
propulsive → dreamlike
pace-3·prose+2·bleak+1
- pace-3prose+2bleak0
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.
propulsive → meditative
pace-3·prose+2·bleak0
3 more ↓ ↑
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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.
propulsive → meditative
pace-3·prose+2·bleak0
- pace-3prose+2bleak-1
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.
propulsive → playful
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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.
propulsive → playful
pace-3·prose+2·bleak0
Heavier
- pace-1prose0bleak+2
Dr. Adder
K. W. Jeter1984
In a broken future Los Angeles, a surgeon performs extreme genital modifications for a subculture of outcasts.
propulsive → cynical, still cyberpunk
pace-1·prose0·bleak+2
- pace-1prose0bleak+2
Down to a Sunless Sea
David Graham1979
A commercial pilot flies a plane full of passengers while nuclear war destroys the world below. They search for a place to land and survive.
propulsive → tense, still techno-thriller
pace-1·prose0·bleak+2
3 more ↓ ↑
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Market Forces
Richard K. Morgan2004
In a future where executives duel in armored cars for promotions, Chris Faulkner joins a firm that profits from civil wars. It is a corporate satire.
propulsive → sardonic, still cyberpunk
pace-1·prose0·bleak+2
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Random Acts of Senseless Violence
Jack Womack1994
A twelve-year-old girl records her life in a diary as New York City collapses into riots and hyperinflation. Her family falls into poverty.
propulsive → bleak, still cyberpunk
pace-1·prose+1·bleak+2
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Hellspark
Janet Kagan1988
A linguist travels to a new planet to investigate a murder. She must determine if the local species is sentient while navigating a conspiracy.
propulsive → tense, still cyberpunk
pace0·prose+1·bleak+2
