LitQueuelitqueue

After

Soldier of the Mist

Gene Wolfe1986

6 of 6 directions open

More like it

1 more ↓

  • Every Heart a Doorway

    Seanan McGuire2016

    Children who returned from magical worlds live at a boarding school while seeking ways back. A series of murders begins after a new girl arrives.

    Same elegiac register

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • Iron Council

    China Miéville2004

    Revolutionaries steal a train to build a mobile socialist colony while a city collapses into civil war. The prose is dense and the world is grimy.

    Same elegiac register

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

  • Witchcraft for Wayward Girls

    Grady Hendrix2024

    In 1970, pregnant teens at a home for unwed mothers discover a book of magic and use it to seize power over their lives.

    elegiac → dark

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak0

  • A Midsummer Night's Dream

    William Shakespeare

    Four lovers and a troupe of amateur actors wander into a forest where fairies use magic to manipulate their affections.

    elegiac → playful

    pace+1·prose+1·bleak-2

To recover

3 more ↓

  • 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

  • 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

Faster

3 more ↓

  • Mind's Eye

    Douglas E. Richards2014

    A man discovers he has the ability to access the internet and process data directly with his mind. He is hunted by a secret organization.

    elegiac → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

  • The Atlantis Gene

    A.G. Riddle2013

    A geneticist and a counter-terrorism agent uncover a global conspiracy involving human evolution and an ancient Antarctic discovery.

    elegiac → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

  • Monster Hunter International

    Larry Correia2007

    An accountant kills his boss, who has become a werewolf, and is recruited by a private company that hunts monsters for government bounties.

    elegiac → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Little, Big

    John Crowley1981

    A man marries into a family living in a massive house where the borders of the natural world blur. It follows several generations over a century.

    elegiac → dreamlike

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

  • Unfinished Tales

    J.R.R. Tolkien1980

    A collection of incomplete narratives and essays that expand the history, geography, and lore of Middle-earth.

    elegiac → meditative

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

  • A Slow Regard of Silent Things

    Patrick Rothfuss2013

    A young woman lives alone in the tunnels beneath a university, finding meaning in discarded objects and daily rituals.

    elegiac → tender

    pace-1·prose0·bleak-2

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • The Poppy War

    R.F. Kuang2018

    A war orphan enters a military academy and discovers shamanic powers. She leads a unit into a total war inspired by 20th-century Chinese history.

    elegiac → bleak

    pace+1·prose-1·bleak+1

  • The Traitor Baru Cormorant

    Seth Dickinson2015

    An accountant infiltrates the empire that conquered her home to destroy it from within. She uses economics and politics as her primary weapons.

    elegiac → cold

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1

  • Song of Kali

    Dan Simmons1985

    An American poet travels to Calcutta to find a manuscript by a dead writer. He encounters a cult that worships the goddess of destruction.

    elegiac → bleak

    pace+1·prose0·bleak+1