Books like 'Violent Faculties'
Readers who enjoyed Violent Faculties by Charlene Elsby also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary horror psychological transgressive-mc spooky humor satire
-
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... -
![One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey]()
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 88 ratingsBoisterous, ribald, and ultimately shattering, Ken Kesey's 1962 novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest has left an indelible mark on the literature of our time. Here is the unforgettable story of a mental ward and its inhabitants, especially the tyrannical Big Nurse Ratched and Randle Patrick McMurphy, the brawling, fun-loving new inmate who resolves to oppose her... -
![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 Last Party by A.R. Torre]()
The Last Party by A.R. Torre
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA loving mother. A notorious murderer. They both have reasons to hide their secrets in a novel of escalating shock and suspense by New York Times bestselling author A. R. Torre.Perla Wultz lives with her husband, Grant, and their precious daughter, Sophie, in a gated Pasadena community. Affluent, sociable, and accomplished, Perla plays the part of loving wife and mother to perfection... -
-
![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... -
![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... -
![The Zombie Room by R.D. Ronald]()
The Zombie Room by R.D. Ronald
Rated: 4.09 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsA darkly transgressive tale of criminality and sex-trafficking, but overall a coming together of characters from different worlds, uniting against a common enemy, and fighting for survival and what they believe to be right...Categorized as:
spooky transgressive-mc 21st-century action-adventure adult book classics contemporary -
![Ghostwritten by Ronald Malfi]()
Ghostwritten by Ronald Malfi
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFour brand-new horror novellas from “a modern-day Algernon Blackwood” all about books, stories, manuscripts – the written word has never had sharper teeth…From the bestselling author of Come with Me, four standalone horror novellas set in a shared universe! In The Skin of Her Teeth, a cursed novel drives people to their deaths. A delivery job turns deadly in The Dark Brothers’ Last Ride... -
![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...Categorized as:
humor transgressive-mc 20th-century adult anthologies audiobook classics contemporary -
![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... -
![White Russian by J.A. Konrath]()
White Russian by J.A. Konrath
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsJust when you get out...Former Chicago cop Jack Daniels thought she'd left her former life behind. She'd traded her badge for a toddler, and her lifelong pursuit of heinous serial killers for a boring house in the suburbs....they pull you back in.Then Jack sees some pictures. Pictures of men who were supposed to be dead... -
![Evil Eye by Madhuri Shekar, Harsh Nayyar]()
Evil Eye by Madhuri Shekar, Harsh Nayyar
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsPallavi is an aspiring writer living in California. Her mother, Usha, is thousands of miles away in Delhi - and obsessed with finding her daughter a husband... -
![Boy Parts by Eliza Clark]()
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIrina obsessively takes explicit photographs of the average-looking men she persuades to model for her, scouted from the streets of Newcastle.Placed on sabbatical from her dead-end bar job, she is offered an exhibition at a fashionable London gallery, promising to revive her career in the art world and offering an escape from her rut of drugs, alcohol, and extreme cinema... -
![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... -
-
![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... -
![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... -
![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... -
![Sleep With The Lights On by Maggie Shayne]()
Sleep With The Lights On by Maggie Shayne
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsRachel de Luca has found incredible success writing self-help books. But her own blindness and the fact that her troubled brother has gone missing have convinced her that positive thinking is nothing but bull.Her cynicism wavers when a cornea transplant restores her sight... -
![Blister by Jeff Strand]()
Blister by Jeff Strand
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThey call her Blister. She’s a hideously disfigured twenty-three year-old woman, living in a shed next to her father’s house, hidden away from the world.Jason Tray is a successful cartoonist, banished to his agent’s lakeside cabin for a few days of mandatory rest and relaxation... -
![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... -
![A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess]()
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 84 ratingsTold by the central character, Alex, this brilliant, hilarious, and disturbing novel creates an alarming futuristic vision of violence, high technology, and authoritarianism...Categorized as:
satire transgressive-mc 20th-century audiobook book british-isles classics coming-of-age -
![The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane by Laird Koenig]()
The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane by Laird Koenig
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsAlone in the darkened house, with only fire's glow and thirteen flickering candles for illumination, silent except for the mounting chords of a Liszt concerto, Rynn was preparing a solemn celebration. Until a knock at the door shattered sanctuary.Rynn is the little girl who lives in the house at the end of the lane with her father-or so she says... -
![Prey by James Carol]()
Prey by James Carol
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsHAS JEFFERSON WINTER FINALLY MET HIS MATCH?Six years ago a young married couple were found brutally stabbed to death in their home in Upstate New York. Local police arrested a suspect who later committed suicide... -
![The Nightmare Man by J.H. Markert]()
The Nightmare Man by J.H. Markert
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsT. Kingfisher meets Cassandra Khaw in a chilling horror novel that illustrates the fine line between humanity and monstrosity.Blackwood mansion looms, surrounded by nightmare pines, atop the hill over the small town of New Haven. Ben Bookman, bestselling novelist and heir to the Blackwood estate, spent a weekend at the ancestral home to finish writing his latest horror novel, The Scarecrow... -
-
![A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers]()
A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsFood critic Dorothy Daniels loves what she does. Discerning, meticulous, and very, very smart, Dorothy’s clear mastery of the culinary arts make it likely that she could, on any given night, whip up a more inspired dish than any one of the chefs she writes about... -
![Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk]()
Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 66 ratingsShe's a catwalk model who has everything: a boyfriend, a career, a loyal best friend. But when a sudden motor 'accident' leaves her disfigured and incapable of speech, she goes from being the beautiful centre of attention to being an invisible monster, so hideous that no one will acknowledge she exists... -
![There Are Monsters Everywhere by Mercer Mayer]()
There Are Monsters Everywhere by Mercer Mayer
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsWhat kid doesn't suspect that there are monsters lurking under the bed, behind the shower curtain, in the basement, and even outside by the garbage cans? Mercer Mayer brilliantly and hilariously captures this classic childhood fear—and conquers it! Kids will cheer as the young hero of the story takes matters into his own hands by learning karate... -
![V. by Thomas Pynchon]()
V. by Thomas Pynchon
Rated: 3.95 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe wild, macabre tale of the twentieth century and of two men—one looking for something he has lost, the other with nothing much to lose—and "V.," the unknown woman of the title... -
![The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky, Голди Молдавски]()
The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky, Голди Молдавски
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsNew girl Rachel Chavez is eager to make a fresh start at Manchester Prep. But as one of the few scholarship kids, Rachel struggles to fit in, and when she gets caught up in a prank gone awry, she ends up with more enemies than friends... -
![Not a Speck of Light: Stories by Laird Barron]()
Not a Speck of Light: Stories by Laird Barron
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsIt’s about to get very dark. Bram Stoker Award-winning author Laird Barron returns to the dark and dreadful with his fifth horror collection, which weaves sixteen weird tales into a mosaic of the bloody and the macabre. Bring a flashlight and a book of matches. Where we’re going, there’s not a speck of light... -
![Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz]()
Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz
Rated: 3.97 of 5 stars · 73 ratingsThe dead don't talk. I don't know why. But they do try to communicate, with a short-order cook in a small desert town serving as their reluctant confidant. Sometimes the silent souls who seek out Odd want justice. Occasionally their otherworldly tips help him prevent a crime. But this time it’s different... -
![Your Word Or Mine by Lia Middleton]()
Your Word Or Mine by Lia Middleton
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhen 15-year-old Anabelle King was assaulted on her way home, she thought she had done everything right. But a vital piece of evidence meant that the jury let her attacker go.Eighteen years later, Anabelle King is now Ava Knight, a successful barrister who always follows the rules. But that all changes when, one day at court, she reads a familiar name in the Michael Osborne... -
![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... -
![Best Offer Wins by Marisa Kashino]()
Best Offer Wins by Marisa Kashino
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsEighteen months and eleven lost bidding wars into house-hunting in the Washington, D.C. suburbs, 37-year-old publicist Margo Miyake gets a tip about the perfect house, in the perfect neighborhood, slated to come up for sale in one month... -
-
![A Sunny Place for Shady People: Stories by Mariana Enríquez, Megan McDowell]()
A Sunny Place for Shady People: Stories by Mariana Enríquez, Megan McDowell
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA diabolical collection of stories featuring achingly human characters whose lives intertwine with ghosts, the occult, and the macabre. Greetings from Buenos Aires and the fascinating, frightening, fantastical imagination of Mariana Enriquez... -
![Factotum by Charles Bukowski]()
Factotum by Charles Bukowski
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 34 ratingsOne of Bukowski's best, this beer-soaked, deliciously degenerate novel follows the wanderings of aspiring writer Henry Chinaski across World War II-era America. Deferred from military service, Chinaski travels from city to city, moving listlessly from one odd job to another, always needing money but never badly enough to keep a job...Categorized as:
humor satire transgressive-mc 20th-century action-adventure adult anti-hero audiobook -
![The House of Sleep by Jonathan Coe]()
The House of Sleep by Jonathan Coe
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsLike a surreal and highly caffeinated version of The Big Chill, Jonathan Coe's new novel follows four students who knew each other in college in the eighties. Sarah is a narcoleptic who has dreams so vivid she mistakes them for real events. Robert has his life changed forever by the misunderstandings that arise from her condition. Terry spends his wakeful nights fueling his obsession with movies... -
![Observatory Mansions by Edward Carey, محمد غفوری]()
Observatory Mansions by Edward Carey, محمد غفوری
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsOnce the Orme family’s magnificent ancestral estate, Observatory Mansions is now a crumbling apartment complex, home to an eccentric group of misfits. One of them is Francis Orme, who earns his livelihood as a living statue. When not practicing “inner and outer stillness,” Francis steals the cherished possessions of others to add to his private museum... -
![The Long Weekend by Savita Kalhan]()
The Long Weekend by Savita Kalhan
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsSam knows that he and his friend Lloyd made a colossal mistake when they accepted the ride home. They have ended up in a dark mansion in the middle of nowhere with a man who means to harm them. But Sam doesn't know how to get them out. They were trapped, then separated. Now they are alone... -
![Me, Myself and Them by Dan Mooney]()
Me, Myself and Them by Dan Mooney
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA heart-wrenching, funny and fresh debut about human connection and the power of friendshipStruggling to cope with a tragic loss, Denis Murphy has, for the past seven years, learned to live differently. His friends are used to his strict routines, like ironing his socks and lighting his fireplace every Sunday (even in the summer)...Categorized as:
humor fiction mental-illness contemporary realistic audiobook social-commentary crime -
![The Last Days of Jack Sparks by Jason Arnopp, Jesús Cañadas]()
The Last Days of Jack Sparks by Jason Arnopp, Jesús Cañadas
Rated: 3.89 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsJack Sparks died while writing this book.It was no secret that journalist Jack Sparks had been researching the occult for his new book. No stranger to controversy, he'd already triggered a furious Twitter storm by mocking an exorcism he witnessed... -
![Naoko by Keigo Higashino]()
Naoko by Keigo Higashino
Rated: 3.89 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsNaoko, a major bestseller and film in Japan, is a poignant and wily take on gender relations from a master of the detective story. Expertly and seamlessly interweaving the real and the unreal, Naoko involves a regular guy whose world is rocked when his wife dies in a bus accident. His young daughter survives, but seems to be inhabited by her mother’s personality... -
![Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk]()
Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 65 ratingsFrom the author of the underground sensation Fight Club comes this wickedly incisive second novel, a mesmerizing, unnerving, and hilarious vision of cult and post-cult life.Tender Branson—last surviving member of the so-called Creedish Death Cult—is dictating his life story into the flight recorder of Flight 2039, cruising on autopilot at 39,000 feet somewhere over the Pacific Ocean... -
![The Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King]()
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 48 ratingsA master storyteller at his best—the O. Henry Prize winner Stephen King delivers a generous collection of stories, several of them brand-new, featuring revelatory autobiographical comments on when, why, and how he came to write (or rewrite) each story... -
-
![Rock-a-bye Baby by Willow Rose]()
Rock-a-bye Baby by Willow Rose
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsLisa Rasmussen just had a baby and everything in her life seems perfect at this point. Only she wishes that everyone else around her would be as flawless as she is and stop getting in her way. And if they won't listen, then she'll make them.ROCK-A-BYE BABY, is a thriller novella from Willow Rose, author of the International Bestselling horror-series starring the Danish reporter Rebekka Franck... -
![Fake Like Me by Barbara Bourland]()
Fake Like Me by Barbara Bourland
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhat really happened to Carey Logan?After a fire decimates her studio, including the seven billboard-size paintings for her next show, a young, no-name painter is left with an impossible task: recreate her art in three months - or ruin her fledgling career. Homeless and desperate, she flees to an exclusive retreat in upstate New York famous for its outrageous revelries and glamorous artists... -
![You by Caroline Kepnes]()
You by Caroline Kepnes
Rated: 3.91 of 5 stars · 75 ratingsWhen a beautiful aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does what anyone would do: he Googles the name on her credit card.There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City... -
![The Cure Hotel by Ashley S. Clancy]()
The Cure Hotel by Ashley S. Clancy
Rated: 3.80 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThere's no doubt about it, the Cure Hotel situated on the outskirts of Manhattan is one of the most run down establishments in the whole of America. This is a hotel that not only boasts dampness, poor decoration and lighting, but also welcomes the most sinister type of overnight guest... -
![Period by Dennis Cooper]()
Period by Dennis Cooper
Rated: 3.80 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThe stunning conclusion to Dennis Cooper's five-book cycle, Period earned its author the accolade "a disquieting genius" by Vanity Fair and praise for his "elegant prose and literary lawlessness" by The New York Times... -
![Heartbreaker by Maryse Meijer]()
Heartbreaker by Maryse Meijer
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsIn her debut story collection, Heartbreaker, Maryse Meijer, flashlight in hand, goes deep into the darkest rooms of the psyche. With gorgeously restrained and exacting prose that packs a cumulatively devastating punch, she unapologetically unmasks the violence we are willing to perform upon one another in the name of love and loneliness and the unremitting desire to survive...
Or - use our amazing romance book finder to get recommendations based on your favorite content tropes and themes. Mix and match at will.
