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Suggestion Thread
Some of the books I have loved recently include: My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh Milkfed by Melissa Broder Boy Parts by Eliza Clark Earthings and Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka murata Big Swiss by Jen Beagin
Hard to link together all these books concisely but I’d say they all have morally gray, cynical protagonists and a focus on mental illness. Very female-centered perspective in all of them as well especially with some shared themes like body image, sexual trauma and conformity. Dry humor is also a bonus. Anybody have a rec that fits the bill?
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The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath might fit the bill
{{Eileen}} by Ottessa Moshfegh is even better than my year of rest and relaxation
Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh (Matching 100% ☑️)
272 pages | Published: 2015 | 15.0k Goodreads reviews
Feedback | GitHub | "The Bot is Back!?" | v1.5 [Dec 23] |
Luster by Raven Leilani
You might want to check out The Piano Teacher, by Elfriede Jelinek. It's older - published in the early 80s, but there are some similarities between it and the books you've mentioned.
It has a unique writing style, kind of clinially metaphorical, quite sly. Deeply repressed protagonist, obsessed and repulsed by sex, oppressive psychosexual codependant relationship with her mother. It's not a romp, but it's excellent.
And more contemporary, Nightbitch, which came out recently. I found the first half so-so (parenting puts disproportionate expectations onto women even if they had thought themselves to be in an equal relationship with a modern man! Motherhood is incompatible with art! It's haaaaard to make mom-friends!) but thought the second half was superb, it might be the best first novel I've read in ages. (The opposite of Boy Parts, which I thought was really let down by the end)
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead
A bit of a dark read but "My Dark Vanessa" is the story of an adult woman coming (or not) to terms with an inappropriate relationship she had as an early teen with her teacher.
Edit: no humour in this I'm afraid
It’s just badly written, no craft no effort and titillating.
The writer is a PhD in creative writing, don't think I'm in a position to say the book is poorly written.
Doesn’t matter, she is into cheap marketing to push her titillating stuff with agenda sprinkled on it, it does tremendous injustice to the subject.
Sorry do you have any examples? I really don't know what you're referring to
Sorry do you have any example of the book being good ? Idk what you are referring to
Bunny by Mona Awad
Already read it I’m afraid! Amazing book though, I love Mona Awad.
Ive only just started it but have you also read her book, Rouge?
I have not, really liked All’s Well and 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl though and so I’ll add to my list!
Okay- this one is gonna be waaaay outside the norm but:
The Final Girls Support Group by Grady Hendrix posits a world in which the slasher films of the eighties really happened and the fallout from the so called “final girls” after surviving a massacre.
The main character might fit your bill nicely
I love these sorts of books, and can recommend You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine for like a very unhinged take on the theme involving weird commercials and the protag feeling like her best friend is stealing her life.
On the milder end of the spectrum, Conversations With Friends is very well written and shows a young woman who makes a disturbing amount of bad choices because she has no ability to actually express her emotions properly, but she's less "troubled" than my previous example. At least as troubled as the Milkfed girl, though.
I love You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine, absolutely batshit crazy book. I’ll have to check out your other rec.
This may be too intense/dark and not exactly what you were looking for but The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. It’s about a woman who is made to „rest“ as her treatment after giving birth and is being isolated by force. As a result of this she loses her grasp on reality and develops a postpartum psychosis. The story is inspired by the author’s real life experience.
Han Kang: the Vegetarian
Yukio Tsushima might interest you. Writing mostly about young single mothers in post war Japan, alienated by family and society and dealing with many relationship troubles all while trying to raise a child.
Migrations by Charlotte McConaughy
The Damages by Genevieve Scott
Very graphic, but The Wetlands by Charlotte Roche fits the criteria.
Anne Fine’s adult books - Fly In the Ointment, Raking the Ashes
Non fiction, but Three Women by Lisa T-something
I feel like you would like Natsuo Kirino. Grotesque is incredible in particular!
What Was She Thinking: Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller
The Collected Regrets of Clover - Miki Bramner
The Longings of Women by Marge Piercy,
Ashley Hutson - One's Company
The Main Character wins a lot of money in a lottery and decides to recreate the set of her favorite sitcom show.
Anxious/depressed women is my favorite genre too (:
I recommend: -Everyone in this Room will Someday be Dead by Emily Austin -Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin -Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter -Piglet by Lottie Hazel -My Husband by Maud Ventura -The Premonition by Banana Yoshimoto -Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth -New Animal by Halle Butler -Hurricane Girl by Marcy Dermansky -Nevada by Imogen Binnie -Snowflake by Louise Nealon
Most of those authors have other great books (Moshfegh's Death in Her Hands and Eileen both fit the bill, as does Broder's Pisces and Beagin's Pretend I'm Dead).
Other book I've liked that sound up your alley:
No One is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
Any Man by Amber Tamblyn
Beautiful World Where Are You by Sally Rooney
All's Well by Mona Awad
Green Dot by Madeleine Gray
The Guest by Emma Cline
Looker by Laura Sims
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
To flood you with too many suggestions, Goodreads has some nice lists for what you're describing:
Unhinged women genre
List: Female Malaise
List: Catastrofemale
The Inhabited Woman by Gioconda eBelli
My Brilliant Friend (series of four books) by Elena Ferrante
Cantoras by Carolina De Robertis
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
Swing Time by Zadie Smith
A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
Violeta by Isabel Allende
Mrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalls!
Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason. Baby by Annaleese Jochams if you want alienated and very weird.
The World Cannot Give by Tara Isabella Burton
Astrid Sees All by Natalie Standiford
A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan (this splits a pov with the boyfriend)
This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangaremba. It's the third part of a trilogy but can be read as a standalone as well. The descriptions of the protagonists anxiety really got under my skin.
Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth might be up your alley. It was one of my favorite reads last year.
Maeve Fly by CJ Leede and A Certain Hunger by Chelsea Summers are also solid. They’re both about serial killers.