What are the top suggestions for books matching 'grim and despairing'?
We found 110 book recommendations
What do readers say about The Dark Tower I?
post apocalyptic tone his end-times work grim and despairing slow almost meditative storytellingThe Dark Tower is now a major motion picture starring Matthew McConaughey and Idris Elba.
'The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.' The iconic opening line of Stephen King's groundbreaking series, The Dark Tower, introd... More details on The Dark Tower I
The desert was the apotheosis of all deserts, huge, standing to the sky for what might have been parsecs in all directions. White; blinding; waterless; without feature save for the faint, cloudy haze ...
See 3354 Book Recommendations like The Dark Tower I
What do readers say about The Road?
propulsive and never meanders sparse and stark bleak and grim plain and poeticNATIONAL BESTSELLER
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE
The searing, post-apocalyptic novel about a father and son's fight to survive.
A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. I... More details on The Road
When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of the night he'd reach out to touch the child sleeping beside him. Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone be...
See 3231 Book Recommendations like The Road
What do readers say about Blood Meridian?
gritty and gruesome macabre magical realism profound and intense lyrical and dark proseAn epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America's westward expansion, Blood Meridian brilliantly subverts the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the "wild west."
Based on historical events that took place on the ... More details on Blood Meridian
See the child. He is pale and thin, he wears a thin and ragged linen shirt. He stokes the scullery fire. Outside lie dark turned fields with rags of snow and darker woods beyond that harbor yet a few ...
See 3097 Book Recommendations like Blood Meridian
What do readers say about The Blade Itself?
cynical, dark, high fantasy vivid, visceral prose the characters are well-written compelling and wittyThe first novel in the First Law Trilogy and debut fantasy novel from New York Times bestseller, Joe Abercrombie.
Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught in one feud too many, he's on the verge of becoming a dead ba... More details on The Blade Itself
Logen opened his eyes a crack. Light, blurry bright through leaves. This was death? Then why did it hurt so much? His whole left side was throbbing. He tried to take a proper breath, choked, coughed u...
See 2370 Book Recommendations like The Blade Itself
What do readers say about The Handmaid's Tale?
provocative discussion very thought provoking dystopian literature brilliant dystopian fantasy#1 New York Times bestseller
An instant classic and eerily prescient cultural phenomenon, from "the patron saint of feminist dystopian fiction" (New York Times). Now an award-winning Hulu series starring Elizabeth Moss.
In Margaret Atwood's dystopia... More details on The Handmaid's Tale
We slept in what had once been the gymnasium. The floor was of varnished wood, with stripes and circles painted on it, for the games that were formerly played there; the hoops for the basketball nets ...
See 3415 Book Recommendations like The Handmaid's Tale
What do readers say about A Man Called Ove?
rule based thinking sadness and humor quirky, heartfelt, and humourous grief and lossMORE THAN TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD
"You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll feel new sympathy for the curmudgeons in your life." -People
Meet Ove. He's a curmudgeon-the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his... More details on A Man Called Ove
He drives a Saab. He’s the kind of man who points at people he doesn’t like the look of, as if they were burglars and his forefinger a policeman’s flashlight. He stands at the counter of a shop where ...
See 3260 Book Recommendations like A Man Called Ove
What do readers say about The Colour of Magic?
fast-paced and funny very, very funny light fantastical fantasy inventive and funny'His spectacular inventiveness makes the Discworld series one of the perennial joys of modern fiction' Mail on Sunday
NAMED AS ONE OF THE BBC'S 100 MOST INSPIRING NOVELS
The Discworld is very much like our own - if our own were to consist of a flat ... More details on The Colour of Magic
FIRE ROARED through the bifurcated city of Ankh-Morpork. Where it licked the Wizards’ Quarter it burned blue and green and was even laced with strange sparks of the eighth color, octarine; where its o...
See 5591 Book Recommendations like The Colour of Magic
What do readers say about The Book Thief?
prose like poetry repressed freedom and true empathy a girl growing up in nazi germany a heartwarming taleIt's 1939 in Molching, Germany, and horror is everywhere. Nazi rule has divided the nation into those who are brutalized and those who are merely oppressed. Hunger, fear, and isolation reign. There are stories here, and who better to tell them than D... More details on The Book Thief
When the coughing stopped, there was nothing but the nothingness of life moving on with a shuffle, or a near-silent twitch. A suddenness found its way onto his lips then, which were a corroded brown c...
See 3878 Book Recommendations like The Book Thief
What do readers say about Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine?
her solitary life funny and strange dark, dry humor grief, loss, and loneliness#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A Reese Witherspoon Book Club Pick
"Beautifully written and incredibly funny, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is about the importance of friendship and human connection. I fell in love with Eleanor, an eccentric and r... More details on Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
It’s definitely a two-tier system in the office; the creatives are the film stars, the rest of us merely supporting artists. You can tell by looking at us which category we fall into. To be fair, part...
See 1822 Book Recommendations like Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine
What do readers say about Night?
simple, stark prose cut and dried terror simple and spare heart wrenching bookIt is 1944. The Jews of Sighet, Hungary are rounded up and driven into Nazi concentration camps. For the next terrible year, young Elie Wiesel experiences the loss of everything he loves - home, friends, family - in an agonizing journey through Birke... More details on Night
THEY CALLED HIM MOISHE THE BEADLE, as if his entire life he had never had a surname. He was the jack-of-all-trades in a Hasidic house of prayer, a shtibl. The Jews of Sighet—the little town in Transyl...
See 1199 Book Recommendations like Night
Please Help Us Improve