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Any recommendations for dark novels?

36 replies

OhMargaret · 20/10/2023 14:42

Just finished The Handmaid's tale and Platform by the French writer Michel Houellebecq - loved them both. They're both dark and a bit disturbing but seriously make you think.

Anyone got any recommendations for similar?

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BrianBettyGrable · 20/10/2023 14:47

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BrianBettyGrable · 20/10/2023 14:48

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JeanBodel · 20/10/2023 15:01

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman is pretty bleak. Be warned, you will not get any answers. Nothing is explained. It's a good book though.

Iwillnotdancewiththedevil · 20/10/2023 15:07

If you liked Handmaid's Tale, try the School for Good Mothers.

If you want very dark, gruesome crime - Nick Stone, Mr Clarinet. It's quite a few years old now but it's stayed with me vividly!

OhMargaret · 20/10/2023 16:10

@BrianBettyGrable I enoyed the Gone Girl film (more than the book actually, it reminded me of Hitchcock - the dark glamour). Will look up Sharp Objects, thank you

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OhMargaret · 20/10/2023 16:10

@BrianBettyGrable another great film too (Morvern Callar)

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OhMargaret · 20/10/2023 16:12

@JeanBodel I love this kind of existential sci-fi, thank you

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BrianBettyGrable · 20/10/2023 16:13

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OhMargaret · 20/10/2023 16:14

@Iwillnotdancewiththedevil School for Good Mothers sounds interesting (I guess it's along the lines of Never Let Me Go)

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Meniscus · 20/10/2023 16:17

Michel Faber, Under the Skin? Sarah Hall’s The Carhullan Army?

MaudGone · 20/10/2023 16:22

"Hunger" by Knut Hamsun, in the translation by Sverre Lyngstad. About a writer on the edge of starvation.

Bruisername · 20/10/2023 19:55

Out by Kirino
the sailor who fell from Grace by mishima
they by Kay Dick (definitely a thinker)
the unit by ninni holmqvist
it happened in Boston by rh greenan

second I who have never known men

Do88byisfree · 20/10/2023 20:25

The Four Winds by Krston Hannah is pretty depressing
The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donahue is also very bleak

katycantrip · 20/10/2023 22:57

Meniscus · 20/10/2023 16:17

Michel Faber, Under the Skin? Sarah Hall’s The Carhullan Army?

I loved Under the skin. It's very different from the film.

OhMargaret · 23/10/2023 20:38

@Meniscus @katycantrip I loved Under The Skin too, it reminded me of Tim Krabbe's The Vanishing but even weirder

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OhMargaret · 23/10/2023 20:40

@Bruisername Hadn't heard of Kay Dick, sounds good - thank you

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indecisivewoman81 · 23/10/2023 20:41

Try;

Child A by Abigail Dean
The chalk man by c j Tudor
The last thing to burn by Will Dean

Mirabai · 23/10/2023 20:44

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Anne Bronte
The Woman in White Wilkie Collins
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil - John Berendt
Life and Fate - Vassily Grossman
Notes from Underground - Dostoyevsky
Brothers Karamazov - Dostoyevsky
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Solzhenitsyn

OhMargaret · 23/10/2023 20:45

@MaudGone God, I remember reading this as a teenager - the original Scandi noir

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Nitflux · 23/10/2023 20:49

Anything by Liz Nugent. Strange Sally Diamond is her most recent one and it was disturbing / unsettling. Loved it!

musicalfrog · 23/10/2023 20:52

The Secret River

musicalfrog · 23/10/2023 20:56

Laura Blundy

catsnore · 23/10/2023 21:10

The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Possibly the darkest novel ever.

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. Bleak!

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. It's heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time.

StoatofDisarray · 23/10/2023 22:42

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Morvern Callar is great! Good call.

Bruisername · 24/10/2023 08:41

Just reading The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa. Dystopian and dark