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Barbara Kingsolver2018

6 of 6 directions open

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  • Long Island

    Colm Tóibín2024

    An Irish woman living in 1970s Long Island discovers her husband has fathered a child with another woman. She returns to her childhood village.

    Same meditative register, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak0

Denser prose

3 more ↓

  • Absalom, Absalom!

    William Faulkner1936

    The rise and fall of Thomas Sutpen is recounted through multiple, conflicting memories. The prose uses extremely long, complex sentences.

    meditative → elegiac, still historical 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.

    meditative → sardonic, still historical fiction

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

  • Briefing for a Descent into Hell

    Doris Lessing1971

    A man is found wandering London and placed in a psychiatric ward. The narrative shifts between the hospital and his internal cosmic hallucinations.

    meditative → dreamlike

    pace0·prose+1·bleak0

To recover

3 more ↓

  • King of Pride

    Ana Huang2023

    A buttoned-up billionaire heir falls for an impulsive bartender while trying to secure a CEO position. They navigate a forbidden workplace romance.

    meditative → playful

    pace+1·prose-2·bleak-2

  • The Inspector and Mrs. Jeffries

    Emily Brightwell1993

    A Victorian housekeeper and her staff secretly solve crimes for their employer, a clueless Scotland Yard inspector.

    meditative → playful

    pace0·prose-2·bleak-2

  • Royally Screwed

    Emma Chase2016

    A crown prince visiting Manhattan pursues a bakery worker who threw a pie at him. The story follows their class-clash courtship.

    meditative → playful

    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.

    meditative → sardonic

    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.

    meditative → propulsive

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

  • The Martian

    Andy Weir2011

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

    meditative → wry

    pace+2·prose-2·bleak-2

Slower

3 more ↓

  • Rhine Journey

    Ann Schlee1981

    A middle-aged woman travels by steamer down the Rhine in 1851. She observes her family and internalizes a chance encounter with a man from her past.

    Same meditative register, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak0

  • Gathering the Water

    Robert Edric2006

    In 1840s Yorkshire, a man oversees the flooding of a valley for a reservoir. He records the final days of a village and its remaining residents.

    meditative → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose0·bleak0

  • 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.

    meditative → playful, still literary fiction

    pace-1·prose+1·bleak-1

Heavier

3 more ↓

  • The Prophets

    Robert Jones Jr.2021

    Two enslaved men on a Mississippi plantation find refuge in their love for each other. Their relationship is threatened by a betrayal.

    meditative → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+1

  • The Deposition of Father McGreevy

    Brian O'Doherty2000

    A priest recounts the physical and moral decline of an isolated Irish village during a harsh winter in the 1940s.

    meditative → elegiac, still literary fiction

    pace0·prose0·bleak+1

  • A Fine Balance

    Rohinton Mistry1995

    Four people from different castes share a small apartment during the 1975 Indian Emergency. Their lives are upended by state-sanctioned violence.

    meditative → bleak, still historical fiction

    pace0·prose-1·bleak+1