Books like 'What's Expected of Us'
Readers who enjoyed What's Expected of Us by Ted Chiang also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
sc-fi psychological philosophical dystopia
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Exhalation by Ted Chiang
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 37 ratingsalternate cover for this ISBN can be found hereThe universe began as an enormous breath being held.From the acclaimed author of Stories of Your Life and Others — the basis for the Academy Award-nominated film Arrival — comes a ground-breaking new collection of short fiction: nine stunningly original, provocative, and poignant stories...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 21st-century action-adventure adult ai aliens alternate-history -
![Animal Farm / 1984 by George Orwell]()
Animal Farm / 1984 by George Orwell
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 72 ratingsThis edition features George Orwell’s best-known novels—1984 and Animal Farm—with an introduction by Christopher Hitchens.In 1984, London is a grim city where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind. Winston Smith joins a secret revolutionary organisation called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century alternate-history animals audiobook book classics -
![Пикник на обочине. Отель «У погибшего альпиниста». Улитка на склоне by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky]()
Пикник на обочине. Отель «У погибшего альпиниста». Улитка на склоне by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsСталкер Рэд Шухарт, несущий смерть в мир, где живут его жена и дочь. Инопланетяне, волей или неволей творящие путчи на Земле, и инспектор Глебски, неспособный решить: боги они или сволочи. Прекрасные жрицы партеногенеза из Леса - не убивающие, нет, но делающие живое мертвым… И люди, вершащие суд над всем странным, необычным, не таким как принято... -
![The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin]()
The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 38 ratingsA classic science fiction novel by one of the greatest writers of the genre, set in a future world where one man's dreams control the fate of humanity. In a future world racked by violence and environmental catastrophes, George Orr wakes up one day to discover that his dreams have the ability to alter reality. He seeks help from Dr...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century adult aliens alternate-history apocalyptic audiobook -
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![Evil Among Us by J.K. Accinni]()
Evil Among Us by J.K. Accinni
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsLorna, Jennifer and Seth struggle to reach the Hive amid the chaos of Armageddon... -
![Sex, Death, and Money: Season 1 by Cebelius]()
Sex, Death, and Money: Season 1 by Cebelius
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThis season, on the most unfiltered reality show in the universe, the one to watch will be human … Succubi treat all other species as livestock. Gene seeds from every corner of the universe are bought and sold for sustenance, for labor … for fun. Yet, for all their advantages over natural breeding programs, gene seeds are not without risk... -
![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... -
![The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse, Theodore Ziolkowski]()
The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse, Theodore Ziolkowski
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsThe final novel of Hermann Hesse, The Glass Bead Game is a fascinating tale of the complexity of modern life as well as a classic of modern literature.Set in the twenty-third century, The Glass Bead Game is the story of Joseph Knecht, who has been raised in Castalia, the remote place his society has provided for the intellectual elite to grow and flourish... -
![Tipping Point by Terry Tyler]()
Tipping Point by Terry Tyler
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratings* TIPPING POINT IS FREE - Jan 2-5 2019 only *'I didn't know danger was floating behind us on the breeze as we walked along the beach, seeping in through the windows of our picture postcard life.'The year is 2024. A new social networking site bursts onto the scene. Private Life promises total privacy, with freebies and financial incentives for all... -
![Ride, Sally, Ride (Or Sex Rules) by Douglas Wilson]()
Ride, Sally, Ride (Or Sex Rules) by Douglas Wilson
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsIt's two decades in the future, and a Christian college student named Ace Hartwick has just destroyed his neighbor's so-called "wife" -- actually a sexbot named Sally -- in a trash compactor. Soon, Ace will be on trial for murder.Unfortunately for Ace, everyone despises his kind of "radical" Christianity, and, in the fragile America of the future, all the juries are fixed... -
![Welcome to the Occupied States of America by Peter Cawdron]()
Welcome to the Occupied States of America by Peter Cawdron
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 11 ratingsAshley Kelly is your typical American teenager—or she would be if it wasn’t for the cluster bomb that crippled her. Seven years after the invasion, over a hundred million Americans have been displaced by the war, with millions more dead. Ash has spent seven years learning to walk again, and she’ll be damned if she’s going to lie down for anyone, human or otherwise... -
![From the Ashes by Angela White]()
From the Ashes by Angela White
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThis Fantasy tale is set at 20 pt font for those who want a large print ebook. Most are published in 12 or 14, meaning this fantasy novel will start out 4-5 times larger than average. Then, it can be increased even further by using your magnifications settings.It’s been 6 months since the end of the world, and Adrian will now discover if the choices he’s made have cost him a son... -
![Torture the Artist by Joey Goebel]()
Torture the Artist by Joey Goebel
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsVincent Spinetti is an archetypal tortured artist ? a sensitive young writer who falls victim to alienation, parental neglect, poverty, depression, alcoholism, illness, nervous breakdowns, and unrequited love... -
![The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin]()
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 71 ratingsA groundbreaking work of science fiction, The Left Hand of Darkness tells the story of a lone human emissary to Winter, an alien world whose inhabitants can choose - and change - their gender. His goal is to facilitate Winter's inclusion in a growing intergalactic civilization... -
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![Limes inferior by Janusz A. Zajdel]()
Limes inferior by Janusz A. Zajdel
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsW absurdalnym, sztucznie wykreowanym świecie Argolandu, nic nie jest tym, czym się na pierwszy rzut oka wydaje. Drobny kombinator dzięki sprytowi i inteligencji odkrywa prawdę o pozornie idealnym porządku społeczno-ekonomicznym.Sztandarowa powieść Janusza A. Zajdla, twórcy nurtu fantastyki socjologicznej w Polsce... -
![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... -
![The Ferryman by Justin Cronin]()
The Ferryman by Justin Cronin
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 9 ratingsFounded by the mysterious genius known as the Designer, the archipelago of Prospera lies hidden from the horrors of a deteriorating outside world. In this island paradise, Prospera's lucky citizens enjoy long, fulfilling lives until the monitors embedded in their forearms, meant to measure their physical health and psychological well-being, fall below 10 percent... -
![Intentional Dissonance by Iain S. Thomas, pleasefindthis]()
Intentional Dissonance by Iain S. Thomas, pleasefindthis
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsNewLand, the last city on Earth after The End. Before The End, the world was on the cusp of widespread adaptation of technologies that should never have been invented. Popular use of teleportation polluted the fabric of time and space. The gifts of a select few meant a whole new world was about to erupt.After The End, Jon Salt is addicted to feeling...Categorized as:
dystopia apocalyptic book contemporary fiction male-author post-apocalyptic psychological -
![Strung III: The Last Drop by Per Jacobsen]()
Strung III: The Last Drop by Per Jacobsen
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIn this third—and final—book in the STRUNG series, Randall Morgan and David Pearson face their biggest challenge yet.In the form of a half-empty IV bag once connected to Randall's son, they have found a means that might be used to fight the evil that has infected the world.The question remains, though, whether they can bring themselves to use it... -
![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:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century 21st-century adult anthologies audiobook classics -
![The Plague by Albert Camus]()
The Plague by Albert Camus
Rated: 4.02 of 5 stars · 43 ratingsA gripping tale of human unrelieved horror, of survival and resilience, and of the ways in which humankind confronts death, The Plague is at once a masterfully crafted novel, eloquently understated and epic in scope, and a parable of ageless moral resonance, profoundly relevant to our times. In Oran, a coastal town in North Africa, the plague begins as a series of portents, unheeded by the people...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century action-adventure adult apocalyptic audiobook book -
![Solaris by Stanisław Lem]()
Solaris by Stanisław Lem
Rated: 4.02 of 5 stars · 40 ratingsA classic work of science fiction by renowned Polish novelist and satirist Stanislaw Lem.When Kris Kelvin arrives at the planet Solaris to study the ocean that covers its surface, he finds a painful, hitherto unconscious memory embodied in the living physical likeness of a long-dead lover... -
![The Plague by Albert Camus]()
The Plague by Albert Camus
Rated: 4.02 of 5 stars · 71 ratingsA gripping tale of human unrelieved horror, of survival and resilience, and of the ways in which humankind confronts death, The Plague is at once a masterfully crafted novel, eloquently understated and epic in scope, and a parable of ageless moral resonance, profoundly relevant to our times. In Oran, a coastal town in North Africa, the plague begins as a series of portents, unheeded by the people... -
![Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman]()
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsA modern classic, Einstein’s Dreams is a fictional collage of stories dreamed by Albert Einstein in 1905, when he worked in a patent office in Switzerland. As the defiant but sensitive young genius is creating his theory of relativity, a new conception of time, he imagines many possible worlds. In one, time is circular, so that people are fated to repeat triumphs and failures over and over...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century action-adventure adult anthologies audiobook classics -
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![Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon]()
Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsStar Maker is a science fiction novel by Olaf Stapledon, published in 1937. The book describes a history of life in the universe, dwarfing in scale Stapledon's previous book, Last and First Men (1930), a history of the human species over two billion years...Categorized as:
dystopia philosophical 20th-century action-adventure adult aliens alternate-history audiobook -
![The Divine Farce by Michael S.A. Graziano]()
The Divine Farce by Michael S.A. Graziano
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratings“A Dante/Beckett reduction of human struggle to its lowest common denominator.”— Michael Mirolla, author of The Formal Logic of Emotion and Berlin“One of the most original and thought-provoking stories I have ever read...true literary art...Not a word is wasted in this masterpiece. Yes, I call it that... -
![Baby X by Kira Peikoff]()
Baby X by Kira Peikoff
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsWhen any biological matter can be used to create life, stolen celebrity DNA sells to the highest bidder–or the craziest stalker–in this propulsive thriller.With a vivid imagining of the future, Gattaca meets Black Mirror in Kira Peikoff’s Baby X... -
![Overdrawn by N.J. Crosskey]()
Overdrawn by N.J. Crosskey
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHenry Morris is watching his wife slip away from him. In an ageist society, where euthanasia is encouraged as a patriotic act, dementia is no longer tolerated.Kaitlyn, a young waitress, is desperate for the funds to keep her brother’s life support machine switched on... -
![Precisely Terminated by Amanda L. Davis]()
Precisely Terminated by Amanda L. Davis
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsWith microchips implanted in their skulls at birth, the slaves of Cantral and Cillineese have labored under the tyrannical rule of the Nobles and their computers for decades. Monica, a Noble who avoided the implanting and escaped a death sentence at the age of four, is now sixteen and is in hiding... -
![Burnout by Sean Platt, Johnny B. Truant]()
Burnout by Sean Platt, Johnny B. Truant
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsCutter Dunn is a ghost. Unchipped and unregistered he exists as a nonperson, living off-the-grid, unrecognized by the facial recognition software built into every smart glass device that provides everyone with everything they want and need. According to the official system, he doesn't even exist... -
![20 Minutes To Go Viral by Daniel Hurst]()
20 Minutes To Go Viral by Daniel Hurst
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsSomething is spreading in the peaceful town of Amberfall. Something that threatens the whole of humanity. Something is going viral. 20 Minutes. 20 People. 20 stories that will make you want to stay inside and never greet another human being again. This is a short novella about a viral outbreak in a small town in the Lake District and shows how quickly disease can spread amongst the population... -
![The Trial by Franz Kafka]()
The Trial by Franz Kafka
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsWritten in 1914 but not published until 1925, a year after Kafka’s death, The Trial is the terrifying tale of Josef K., a respectable bank officer who is suddenly and inexplicably arrested and must defend himself against a charge about which he can get no information... -
![Good Night, Sleep Tight by Brian Evenson]()
Good Night, Sleep Tight by Brian Evenson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratings“PERHAPS TOMORROW I WILL WAKE UP ANOTHER PERSON. PERHAPS TOMORROW I WILL WAKE UP NOT A PERSON AT ALL.”From the “master of literary horror” (GQ) comes a collection of new stories tracing the limits and consequences of artificial intelligence and “post-human” relationships... -
![The Trial by Franz Kafka, Arthur H. Samuelson]()
The Trial by Franz Kafka, Arthur H. Samuelson
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 71 ratingsWritten in 1914 but not published until 1925, a year after Kafka's death, The Trial is one of the most important novels of the twentieth century: the terrifying tale of Josef K., a respectable bank officer who is suddenly and inexplicably arrested and must defend himself against a charge about which he can get no information... -
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![Toward Eternity by Anton Hur]()
Toward Eternity by Anton Hur
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhat does it mean to be human in a world where technology is quickly catching up to biology?In a near-future world, a new technological therapy is quickly eradicating cancer: The body’s cells are entirely replaced with nanites—robot or android cells that not only cure those afflicted but leave them virtually immortal... -
![Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman]()
Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman
Rated: 4.01 of 5 stars · 13 ratingsTedla is young, beautiful and blond but is neither he nor she. On a far-off world, an asexual class of blands exists to serve their fellow humans, protected and isolated from contact with the rest of the universe. But no bland has ever left its sheltered homeworld--until now. Tedla has been found in an alley light-years away from its planet. And it has just tried to commit suicide... -
![A Better World by Sarah Langan]()
A Better World by Sarah Langan
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe author of Good Neighbors , “one of the creepiest, most unnerving deconstructions of American suburbia” (NPR), returns with a provocative and disconcerting novel about a woman questioning her new home in an exclusive company town after a night out goes terribly wrong.Welcome to Plymouth Valley... -
![Neanderthals: The experiment by Serag Monier, سراج منير]()
Neanderthals: The experiment by Serag Monier, سراج منير
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsTwo strangers, a man and a woman, meet on a deserted island, where neither remembers when or how they arrived. Eventually they realize they’re undergoing a deliberate unorthodox experiment.Omar and Shadia are continually exposed to hazards that reveal their true selves... -
![They All Died Screaming by Kristopher Triana]()
They All Died Screaming by Kristopher Triana
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsIt’s called The Scream... Once you get it, you simply cannot stop screaming. You can’t eat or sleep. It drives you more and more insane until you can’t stand to be alive a second longer.When the phenomenon hits Chuck's city, the chronically unemployed pervert joins a band of misfits to make his final stand... -
![The Registration by Madison Lawson]()
The Registration by Madison Lawson
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsYou can’t outrun the RegistrationImagine it’s legal to commit one murder in your lifetime–if you Register the victim and accomplish the kill within fourteen days. So when Lynell Mize stands in line to Register the man who abused her as a child, she’s shocked to hear a stranger Register her to be killed... -
![Brave New World Revisited by Aldous Huxley]()
Brave New World Revisited by Aldous Huxley
Rated: 3.95 of 5 stars · 35 ratingsWhen the novel Brave New World first appeared in 1932, its shocking analysis of a scientific dictatorship seemed a projection into the remote future. Here, in one of the most important and fascinating books of his career, Aldous Huxley uses his tremendous knowledge of human relations to compare the modern-day world with his prophetic fantasy... -
![Thrill Switch by Tim Hawken]()
Thrill Switch by Tim Hawken
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsDetective Ada Byron is pumped to finally be assigned her first murder case... until she sees the crime scene. Someone has been killed exactly the same way as her father was seven years earlier.To see if this is a copycat, or something more sinister, Ada must work with her personal nightmare Jazlin Switch - the programmer who murdered her dad... -
![Don't Worry, Darling by Carey Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke]()
Don't Worry, Darling by Carey Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsDon't Worry, Darling is a psychological thriller about a 1950s housewife whose reality begins to crack, revealing a disturbing truth underneath. This screenplay featured in the 2019 Black List, and is now in development with Olivia Wilde attached as director. Wilde will also appear in the film alongside Florence Pugh, Chris Pine, Shia LaBeouf and Dakota Johnson... -
![A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor]()
A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA creak of the floorboard, a shiver down your spine, the feeling that you're not alone...Join a group of survivors who wash up on a deserted island only to make a horrifying discovery. Meet a cold-hearted killer who befriends a strange young girl at a motorway service station... -
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![Dissipatio H.G.: The Vanishing by Guido Morselli]()
Dissipatio H.G.: The Vanishing by Guido Morselli
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFrom his solitary buen retiro in the mountains, the last man on earth drives to the capital Chrysopolis to see if anyone else has survived the Vanishing. But there’s no one else, living or dead, in that city of “holy plutocracy,” with its fifty-six banks and as many churches... -
![Sleepers by Jacqueline Druga]()
Sleepers by Jacqueline Druga
Rated: 3.80 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA normal spring morning cascades into a nightmare world for Mera Stevens as 1.8 billion children simultaneously fall ill and then vanish from the face of the earth. Her son, Jeremy, is one of them.Increased natural disasters, onslaught of disease and other phenomena throws the world into chaos as it balances on the brink of extinction... -
![Animal Farm by George Orwell]()
Animal Farm by George Orwell
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 96 ratingsLibrarian's note: There is an Alternate Cover Edition for this edition of this book here.A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice, and equality... -
![Stranger by Simon Clark]()
Stranger by Simon Clark
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe small town of Sullivan has barricaded itself against the outside world. It is one of the last enclaves of civilization and the residents are determined that their town remain free from the strange and terrifying plague that is sweeping the land—a plague that transforms ordinary people into murderous, bloodthirsty madmen. But the transformation is only the beginning... -
![Amnesiascope by Steve Erickson]()
Amnesiascope by Steve Erickson
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsErickson's funniest and most intensely confessional novel edges Los Angeles up against the next millennium and into a vortex of fire. The city is a surreal landscape overrun by abducted strippers, nomadic artists, reluctant pornographers, subversive newspaper columnists, alienated movie critics, teenage hookers afraid of the rain, and legendary filmmakers who may or may not exist...Categorized as:
dystopia 20th-century adult book fiction historical literary-fiction post-apocalyptic -
![I'd Really Prefer Not to Be Here with You, and Other Stories by Julianna Baggott]()
I'd Really Prefer Not to Be Here with You, and Other Stories by Julianna Baggott
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 8 ratings“Reading this story collection is like stepping in front of a fun house mirror…Julianna Baggott’s words ground us with the familiar truths that allow us to see the ordinary as something truly extraordinary...Categorized as:
dystopia sci-fi fiction horror literary-fiction anthologies audiobook magical-realism
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