Books like 'Carpenter's Gothic'
Readers who enjoyed Carpenter's Gothic by William Gaddis also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary 20th century horror literary-fiction classics postmodernism university satire gothic humor
-
Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges
Rated: 4.41 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsJorge Luis Borges has been called the greatest Spanish-language writer of our century. Now for the first time in English, all of Borges' dazzling fictions are gathered into a single volume, brilliantly translated by Andrew Hurley... -
![The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor]()
The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsThe publication of this extraordinary volume firmly established Flannery O'Connor's monumental contribution to American fiction. There are thirty-one stories here in all, including twelve that do not appear in the only two story collections O'Connor put together in her short lifetime--Everything That Rises Must Converge and A Good Man Is Hard to Find... -
![Franz Kafka: The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka, John Updike]()
Franz Kafka: The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka, John Updike
Rated: 4.34 of 5 stars · 38 ratingsThe only available collection that brings together all of Kafka's storiesthose published during his lifetime and those released after his death...Categorized as:
classics humor literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism satire university 20th-century -
![Collected Stories by Roald Dahl]()
Collected Stories by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsThe only hardcover edition of Roald Dahl’s stories for adults, the Collected Stories amply showcases his singular gifts as a fabulist and a born storyteller.Later known for his immortal children’s books, including Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, and The BFG, Dahl also had a genius for adult short fiction, which he wrote throughout his life... -
-
![Everything That Rises Must Converge: Stories by Flannery O'Connor]()
Everything That Rises Must Converge: Stories by Flannery O'Connor
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFlannery O'Connor was working on Everything That Rises Must Converge at the time of her death. This collection is an exquisite legacy from a genius of the American short story, in which she scrutinizes territory familiar to her readers: race, faith, and morality... -
![A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor]()
A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsThis now classic book revealed Flannery O'Connor as one of the most original and provocative writers to emerge from the South... -
![The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies]()
The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies
Rated: 4.32 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsThe complete volume of Robertson Davies's acclaimed trilogy, featuring Fifth Business, The Manticore, and World of Wonders, with a new foreword by Kelly Link Fifth Business Ramsay is a man twice born, a man who has returned from the hell of the battle-grave at Passchendaele in World War I decorated with the Victoria Cross and destined to be caught in a no man's land where memory, history, and...Categorized as:
classics crime humor literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult anthologies -
![I Hate to See That Evening Sun Go Down: Collected Stories by William Gay]()
I Hate to See That Evening Sun Go Down: Collected Stories by William Gay
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsWilliam Gay established himself as "the big new name to include in the storied annals of Southern Lit" (Esquire) with his debut novel, The Long Home, and his highly acclaimed follow-up, Provinces of Night. Like Faulkner's Mississippi and Cormac McCarthy's American West, Gay's Tennessee is redolent of broken souls... -
![The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov by Vladimir Nabokov]()
The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov by Vladimir Nabokov
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsFrom the writer who shocked and delighted the world with his novels Lolita, Pale Fire, and Ada, or Ardor, and so many others, comes a magnificent collection of stories. Written between the 1920s and 1950s, these sixty-five tales—eleven of which have been translated into English for the first time—display all the shades of Nabokov's imagination... -
![The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis by Lydia Davis]()
The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis by Lydia Davis
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsLydia Davis is one of our most original and influential writers. She has been called “an American virtuoso of the short story form” (Salon) and “one of the quiet giants . . . of American fiction” (Los Angeles Times Book Review)...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction university 20th-century 21st-century adult anthologies audiobook -
![Bestiary: The Selected Stories of Julio Cortázar by Julio Cortázar]()
Bestiary: The Selected Stories of Julio Cortázar by Julio Cortázar
Rated: 4.24 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsA collection of masterful short stories in Julio Cortazar's sophistocated, powerful and gripping style.A grieving family home becomes the site of a terrifying invasion. A frustrated love triangle, brought together by a plundered Aztec idol, spills over into brutality. A lodger’s inability to stop vomiting bunny rabbits inspires a personal confession...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction postmodernism university 20th-century adult anthologies contemporary -
![Suttree by Cormac McCarthy]()
Suttree by Cormac McCarthy
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsArguably the masterpiece of a novelist as highly praised and scarcely read as any living writer, the Vintage Contemporaries reprint of Suttree should help to bring McCarthy the readers to match his many awards and voluminous reviews...Categorized as:
classics crime gothic humor literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism 20th-century -
![Brave New World / Brave New World Revisited by Aldous Huxley, Christopher Hitchens]()
Brave New World / Brave New World Revisited by Aldous Huxley, Christopher Hitchens
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 66 ratingsThe astonishing novel Brave New World, originally published in 1932, presents Aldous Huxley's vision of the future--of a world utterly transformed. Through the most efficient scientific and psychological engineering, people are genetically designed to be passive and therefore consistently useful to the ruling class...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical satire university 20th-century audiobook book -
![Ubik by Philip K. Dick]()
Ubik by Philip K. Dick
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 41 ratingsGlen Runciter runs a lucrative business—deploying his teams of anti-psychics to corporate clients who want privacy and security from psychic spies. But when he and his top team are ambushed by a rival, he is gravely injured and placed in “half-life,” a dreamlike state of suspended animation...Categorized as:
classics humor literary-fiction postmodernism satire university 20th-century action-adventure -
-
![The Golden Apple by Robert Shea, Robert Anton Wilson]()
The Golden Apple by Robert Shea, Robert Anton Wilson
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsNausea, then microamnesia, then the laughing jag, then sex. Be patient. The clear light comes next. Then we can discuss Truth. As if we haven't been discussing it all along. -Hagbard Celine, The Golden Apple Illuminatus! Part II, from the original and genuine trilogy of conspiracies, is performed in all its unabridged brilliance by a full ensemble cast... -
![Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk]()
Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 79 ratingsIt follows the experiences of an unnamed protagonist struggling with insomnia. Inspired by his doctor's exasperated remark that insomnia is not suffering, the protagonist finds relief by impersonating a seriously ill person in several support groups. Then he meets a mysterious man named Tyler Durden and establishes an underground fighting club as radical psychotherapy...Categorized as:
classics crime humor literary-fiction postmodernism satire 20th-century action-adventure -
![The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector]()
The Passion According to G.H. by Clarice Lispector
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsAficionados of South American fiction as well as literary critics will welcome this posthumous translation of a nearly plotless novel by one of Brazil's foremost writers. Availing herself of a single character, Lispector transforms a banal situation—a woman at home, alone—into an amphitheater for philosophical investigations...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism 20th-century adult audiobook book -
![Blow-Up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar]()
Blow-Up and Other Stories by Julio Cortázar
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsA young girl spends her summer vacation in a country house where a tiger roams . . . A man reading a mystery finds out too late that he is the murderer's victim . .Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism university 20th-century adult anthologies -
![No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy]()
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 66 ratingsIn his blistering new novel, Cormac McCarthy returns to the Texas-Mexico border, the setting of his famed Border Trilogy. The time is our own, when rustlers have given way to drug-runners and small towns have become free-fire zones. One day, Llewellyn Moss finds a pickup truck surrounded by a bodyguard of dead men. A load of heroin and two million dollars in cash are still in the back...Categorized as:
classics crime gothic literary-fiction postmodernism 20th-century 21st-century action-adventure -
![Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.]()
Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsIt is the year 2081. Because of Amendments 211, 212, and 213 to the Constitution, every American is fully equal, meaning that no one is stupider, uglier, weaker, or slower than anyone else. The Handicapper General and a team of agents ensure that the laws of equality are enforced.One April, fourteen-year-old Harrison Bergeron is taken away from his parents, George and Hazel, by the government... -
![Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh]()
Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 40 ratingsBrace yourself, America, for Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting—the novel and the film that became the cult sensations of Britain. Trainspotting is the novel that first launched Irvine Welsh's spectacular career—an authentic, unrelenting, and strangely exhilarating episodic group portrait of blasted lives. It accomplished for its own time and place what Hubert Selby, Jr...Categorized as:
classics crime humor literary-fiction postmodernism university 20th-century action-adventure -
![Tales of the Unexpected by Roald Dahl]()
Tales of the Unexpected by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsA wine connoisseur with an infallible palate and a sinister taste in wagers. A decrepit old man with a masterpiece tattooed on his back. A voracious adventuress, a gentle cuckold, and a garden sculpture that becomes an instrument of sadistic vengeance. Social climbers who climb a bit too quickly. Philanderers whose deceptions are a trifle too ornate... -
![The Lime Works: A Novel (Vintage International) by Thomas Bernhard]()
The Lime Works: A Novel (Vintage International) by Thomas Bernhard
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFor five years, Konrad has imprisoned himself and his crippled wife in an abandoned lime works where he’s conducted odd auditory experiments and prepared to write his masterwork, The Sense of Hearing. As the story begins, he’s just blown the head off his wife with the Mannlicher carbine she kept strapped to her wheelchair... -
![Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates]()
Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsThe sixties and seventies witnessed the emergence of Joyce Carol Oates as one of America's foremost writers of the short story. In 1962, 'The Fine White Mist of Winter, ' composed when the author was 19 years old, appeared in The Literary Review and was selected for both the O. Henry Awards and Best American Short Stories of that year...Categorized as:
classics gothic literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies coming-of-age -
-
![The Dead Girls by Jorge Ibargüengoitia]()
The Dead Girls by Jorge Ibargüengoitia
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThis is the first appearance in English of a Mexican novelist of enormous talent. His brilliant novel is based on fact: the discovery in the yard of a small-town brothel of the corpses of six prostitutes... -
![Jesus' Son by Denis Johnson]()
Jesus' Son by Denis Johnson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 41 ratingsA collection of linked stories narrated by a recovering alcoholic and heroin addict, Jesus' Son is a disturbing portrayal of loneliness and hope. He travels through an American underworld of burnt-out sports stars, hospital waiting rooms, doomed relationships and senseless violence... -
![Franz Kafka's The Castle (Dramatization) by David Fishelson, Aaron Leichter]()
Franz Kafka's The Castle (Dramatization) by David Fishelson, Aaron Leichter
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsNote - This is not the novel by Franz Kafka! For the novel see The... -
![No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre]()
No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 41 ratingsJean-Paul Sartre, the great French existentialist, displays his mastery of drama in NO EXIT, an unforgettable portrayal of hell.The play is a depiction of the afterlife in which three deceased characters are punished by being locked into a room together for all eternity...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical university 20th-century action-adventure adult afterlife -
![The Obscene Bird of Night by José Donoso]()
The Obscene Bird of Night by José Donoso
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThis haunting jungle of a novel has been hailed as “a masterpiece” by Luis Buñuel and “one of the great novels not only of Spanish America, but of our time” by Carlos Fuentes... -
![Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami]()
Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsIn this propulsive novel by the author of Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World and The Elephant Vanishes, one of the most idiosyncratically brilliant writers at work in any language fuses science fiction, the hard-boiled thriller and white-hot satire into a new element of the literary periodic table... -
![The Book of Sand & Shakespeare's Memory by Jorge Luis Borges]()
The Book of Sand & Shakespeare's Memory by Jorge Luis Borges
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsThe acclaimed translation of Borges's valedictory stories, in its first stand-alone edition Jorge Luis Borges has been called the greatest Spanish-language writer of the twentieth century. Now Borges's remarkable last major story collection, The Book of Sand, is paired with a handful of writings from the very end of his life...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction postmodernism university 20th-century adult anthologies audiobook -
![The Melancholy of Resistance by László Krasznahorkai]()
The Melancholy of Resistance by László Krasznahorkai
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsA powerful, surreal novel, in the tradition of Gogol, about the chaotic events surrounding the arrival of a circus in a small Hungarian town. The Melancholy of Resistance, László Krasznahorkai's magisterial novel, depicts a chain of mysterious events in a small Hungarian town...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism 20th-century 21st-century adult book -
![Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl]()
Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsLamb to the Slaughter is a short, sharp, chilling story from Roald Dahl, the master of the shocking tale.In Lamb to the Slaughter, Roald Dahl, one of the world's favourite authors, tells a twisted story about the darker side of human nature. Here, a wife serves up a dish that utterly baffles the police.. -
![The Tenant by Roland Topor]()
The Tenant by Roland Topor
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe Tenant chronicles a harrowing, fascinating descent into madness as the pathologically alienated Trelkovsky is subsumed into Simone Choule, an enigmatic suicide whose presence saturates his new apartment. More than a tale of possession, the novel probes disturbing depths of guilt, paranoia, and sexual obsession with an unsparing detachment... -
-
![Of Mice and Mooshaber by Ladislav Fuks, Mark Corner]()
Of Mice and Mooshaber by Ladislav Fuks, Mark Corner
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsLadislav Fuks (1923-94) was an outstanding Czech writer whose work, consisting primarily of psychological fiction, explores themes of anxiety and life in totalitarian systems... -
![Night Games: And Other Stories and Novellas by Arthur Schnitzler, John Simon]()
Night Games: And Other Stories and Novellas by Arthur Schnitzler, John Simon
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThese artful new translations of nine of Schnitzler's most important stories and novellas reinforce the Viennese author's remarkable achievement... -
![The Secret of Terror Castle by Robert Arthur]()
The Secret of Terror Castle by Robert Arthur
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFinding a genuine haunted house for a movie set sounds like fun -- and a great way to generate publicity for the Three Investigators' new detective agency... -
![The Violent Bear It Away by Flannery O'Connor]()
The Violent Bear It Away by Flannery O'Connor
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFirst published in 1960, The Violent Bear It Away is now a landmark in American literature. It is a dark and absorbing example of the Gothic sensibility and bracing satirical voice that are united in Flannery O'Conner's work... -
![Pastoralia by George Saunders]()
Pastoralia by George Saunders
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 35 ratingsWith this new collection, George Saunders takes us even further into the shocking, uproarious and oddly familiar landscape of his imagination.The stories in Pastoralia are set in a slightly skewed version of America, where elements of contemporary life have been merged, twisted, and amplified, casting their absurdity-and our humanity-in a startling new light...Categorized as:
classics humor literary-fiction philosophical postmodernism satire university 20th-century -
![The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson]()
The Lottery and Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 58 ratingsThe Lottery, one of the most terrifying stories written in this century, created a sensation when it was first published in The New Yorker. "Power and haunting," and "nights of unrest" were typical reader responses. This collection, the only one to appear during Shirley Jackson's lifetime, unites "The Lottery:" with twenty-four equally unusual stories... -
![No Exit and Three Other Plays by Jean-Paul Sartre]()
No Exit and Three Other Plays by Jean-Paul Sartre
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 39 ratingsIn these four plays, Jean-Paul Sartre, the great existentialist novelist and philosopher, displays his mastery of drama. NO EXIT is an unforgettable portrayal of hell. THE FLIES is a modern reworking of the Electra-Orestes story. DIRTY HANDS is about a young intellectual torn between theory and praxis. THE RESPECTFUL PROSTITUTE is an attack on American racism...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction philosophical satire university 20th-century adult anthologies -
![Kiss Kiss by Roald Dahl]()
Kiss Kiss by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsIn these dark, disturbing stories Roald Dahl explores the sinister side of human nature: the cunning, sly selfish part of each of us that leads into the territory of the unexpected and unsettling.Originally published in 1960, Kiss Kiss brings together 11 of Roald's macabre adult tales... -
![Crow: From the Life and Songs of the Crow by Ted Hughes]()
Crow: From the Life and Songs of the Crow by Ted Hughes
Rated: 4.09 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsCrow was Ted Hughes's fourth book of poems for adults and a pivotal moment in his writing career. In it, he found both a structure and a persona that gave his vision a new power and coherence. A...Categorized as:
classics literary-fiction university 20th-century action-adventure adult animals book -
![The Lottery by Shirley Jackson]()
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
Rated: 4.03 of 5 stars · 55 ratingsIn a small American town, the local residents are abuzz with excitement and nervousness when they wake on the morning of the twenty-seventh of June. Everything has been prepared for the town’s annual tradition—a lottery in which every family must participate, and no one wants to win. “The Lottery” stands out as one of the most famous short stories in American literary history... -
-
![The Collector by John Fowles]()
The Collector by John Fowles
Rated: 3.99 of 5 stars · 35 ratingsWithdrawn, uneducated and unloved, Frederick collects butterflies and takes photographs. He is obsessed with a beautiful stranger, the art student Miranda. When he wins the pools he buys a remote Sussex house and calmly abducts Miranda, believing she will grow to love him in time... -
![A Feast of Snakes by Harry Crews]()
A Feast of Snakes by Harry Crews
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFrom the acclaimed author of such novels as "Blood and Grits" and "Childhood" comes a wildly weird and breathtakingly original visit to the rural South that reveals the exotic subculture that erupts in all its glory at the Rattlesnake Roundup in Mystic, Georgia. "No number of adjectives in the thesaurus can do full justice to the dazzlingly bizarre nature of Crews' creations"... -
![The Umbrella Man and Other Stories by Roald Dahl]()
The Umbrella Man and Other Stories by Roald Dahl
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsIs it really possible to invent a machine that does the job of a writer? What is it about the landlady’s house that makes it so hard for her guests to leave? Does Sir Basil Turton value most his wife or one of his priceless sculptures? These compelling tales are a perfect introduction to the adult writing of a storytelling genius...Categorized as:
classics humor literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure anthologies children children-books -
![The Decapitated Chicken and Other Stories by Horacio Quiroga]()
The Decapitated Chicken and Other Stories by Horacio Quiroga
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsHoracio Quiroga's short stories are infused with the themes of life and death that so obsessed him. They span many fiction genres; jungle tale, Gothic horror story, psychological study, and morality tale- and possess a universality that has made him a classic Latin American writer... -
![Cosmos by Witold Gombrowicz]()
Cosmos by Witold Gombrowicz
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA dark, quasi-detective novel, Cosmos follows the classic noir motif to explore the arbitrariness of language, the joke of human freedom, and man’s attempt to bring order out of chaos in his psychological life.Published in 1965, Cosmos is the last novel by Witold Gombrowicz (1904–1969) and his most somber and multifaceted work... -
![The Birds and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier]()
The Birds and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 33 ratingsHow long he fought with them in the darkness he could not tell, but at last the beating of the wings about him lessened and then withdrew...A classic of alienation and horror, The Birds was immortalised by Hitchcock in his celebrated film. The five other chilling stories in this collection echo a sense of dislocation and mock man's sense of dominance over the natural world...
Or - use our amazing romance book finder to get recommendations based on your favorite content tropes and themes. Mix and match at will.
