LitQueuelitqueue

After

Illywhacker

Peter Carey1985

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

Same sardonic register, still unreliable narrator

1 more ↓

  • Walking on Glass

    Iain Banks1985

    Three separate stories follow a man in love, a paranoid laborer, and two prisoners in a castle. The narratives eventually intersect.

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Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • The Famished Road

    Ben Okri1991

    An abiku, or spirit child, narrates his life in a Nigerian ghetto. He fluctuates between the world of the living and the world of spirits.

    sardonic → dreamlike, still magical realism

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

  • Don Quixote

    Kathy Acker1986

    A woman undergoes an abortion and adopts the persona of Don Quixote to pursue a quest in a fragmented, postmodern landscape.

    Same sardonic register

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Shroud

    John Banville2002

    An aging scholar with a stolen identity meets a woman who knows his secret. They travel to Turin to confront his past.

    sardonic → cold, still unreliable narrator

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

To recover

sardonic → playful

3 more ↓

  • The Mane Event

    Shelly Laurenston2007

    A female cop reunites with a childhood friend who is now a lion-shifter. They navigate a romantic attraction while he pursues her in New York.

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

  • Mile High

    Liz Tomforde2023

    A professional hockey player and a flight attendant clash on the team's private plane during a season-long road trip.

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

  • Behind the Net

    Stephanie Archer2024

    A former musician becomes the live-in assistant for a professional hockey goalie she knew in high school.

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

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.

    Same sardonic register

    pace+2·prose-1·bleak-1

  • 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.

    sardonic → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    sardonic → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Suttree

    Cormac McCarthy1979

    A man lives on a houseboat among the outcasts and criminals of 1950s Knoxville. The book tracks his daily survival and interactions in the slums.

    Same sardonic register, still picaresque

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

  • 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.

    sardonic → clinical

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

  • Translated Accounts

    James Kelman2001

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

    sardonic → bleak

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak+1

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • The Summer that Melted Everything

    Tiffany McDaniel2016

    A boy claiming to be the devil arrives in a small Ohio town during a 1984 heatwave. His presence triggers a series of local tragedies.

    sardonic → elegiac, still magical realism

    pace0·prose0·bleak+1

  • The Road

    Cormac McCarthy2006

    A father and son walk through a landscape of ash and scavengers toward the coast. They carry only what fits in a shopping cart.

    sardonic → bleak

    pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

  • Oryx and Crake

    Margaret Atwood2003

    A man survives a genetic apocalypse in a world of engineered creatures. He remembers his past with a scientist and the woman they both loved.

    Same sardonic register

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1