Challenging Fiction

[Anonymous]

Usually read history or biography

My few encounters with fiction have been mass-market murder and mayhem

Just finished Umbeto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum and loved it!

Recomendations for fiction at that complexity level?

Any genre

[Anonymous]

Hyperion Cantos by Dan Simmons — dense Keats and Chaucer inspired sci fi

Lymond Chronicles or House of Niccolo by Dorothy Dunnett — historical fiction set in Europe in the 1400s

Possession by AS Byatt — dual story lines of modern academia and Romantic poets

Freedom and Necessary by Steven Burst and Emma Bull — spec fic about the Charist movement in the 1820s

Arcadia by Tom Stoppard — Romantic poetry, the second law of thermodynamics, academia, tortoises (play)

Sandman by Neil Gaimen — medications on the human condition through the lens of horror (graphic novel)

[Anonymous]

Plus a thousand for the Hyperion Cantos.

[Anonymous]

Hilary Mantels books are at that level to me. Especially To a Place of Greater Safety.

[Anonymous]

Second Hilary Mantel.

[Anonymous]

The Overstory.

[Anonymous]

Lymond Chronicles might be the best books I’ve ever read

[Anonymous]

Perhaps Babel would be a good fit?

[Anonymous]

Betty (but many content warnings)

Trust by hernan diaz

[Anonymous]

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

[Anonymous]

Cloud Atlas is probably the most challenging fiction I've ever read--but I thoroughly enjoyed it. (I didn't see the movie, not sure how that might affect the experience of reading the book.)

Infinite Jest was also challenging, and very rewarding. I know lots of people love to hate it, but I found it to be immersive and poignant and stunning.

[Anonymous]

Edith grossman’s translation of Don Quixote

[Anonymous]

Faulkner.

Couldn't get into him the first time I tried, but then it clicked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Plus a thousand for the Hyperion Cantos.

Plus a thousand and one! So challenging, but so rewarding. Brilliant sci-fi.

[Anonymous]

My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk