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Recommendations based on The Piano Teacherby Elfriede Jelinek
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The Trial
by Franz Kafka
A man is arrested and put on trial for a crime that remains unclear throughout the novel.
On the morning of his thirtieth birthday, Josef K., the chief cashier of a bank, is unexpectedly arrested by two unidentified agents from an unspecified agency for an unspecified crime. Josef is not ... (Wikipedia)
Disgrace
by J.M. Coetzee
A professor's fall from grace in post-apartheid South Africa, reckoning with the consequences of his actions.
David Lurie is a South African professor of English who loses everything: his reputation, his job, his peace of mind, his dreams of artistic success, and finally even his ability to protect his own ... (Wikipedia)
Doctor Faustus
by Thomas Mann
A man's Faustian bargain for knowledge and power, with unintended consequences.
The origins of the narrator and the protagonist in the fictitious small town of Kaisersaschern on the Saale , the name of Zeitblom's apothecary father, Wohlgemut, and the description of Adrian ... (Wikipedia)
The Master and Margarita
by Mikhail Bulgakov
A fantastical, satirical examination of Soviet life, intersecting with the supernatural.
The novel has two settings. The first is Moscow during the 1930s, where Satan appears at Patriarch's Ponds as Professor Woland . He is accompanied by Koroviev, a grotesquely-dressed valet; Behemoth , ... (Wikipedia)
Nausea
by Jean-Paul Sartre
A philosophical exploration of the nature of existence and human freedom.
Nausea is the story of Antoine Roquentin, a French writer who is horrified at his own existence. In impressionistic, diary form he ruthlessly catalogues his every feeling and sensation about the ... (Goodreads)
Doctor Zhivago
by Boris Pasternak
A love story set against the backdrop of the Russian Revolution, exploring the tragedy of a nation in upheaval.
The plot of Doctor Zhivago is long and intricate. It can be difficult to follow for two reasons. First, Pasternak employs many characters, who interact with each other throughout the book in ... (Wikipedia)
Life & Times of Michael K
by J.M. Coetzee
A man's struggle to survive in a war-torn country, while attempting to fulfill his mother's dying wish.
The novel is split into three parts. The novel begins with Michael K, a poor man with a cleft lip who has spent his childhood in institutions and works as a gardener in Cape Town. Michael tends to ... (Wikipedia)
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
by Patrick Süskind
A murder mystery set in 18th century France, exploring the depths of human obsession.
An acclaimed bestseller and international sensation, Patrick Suskind's classic novel provokes a terrifying examination of what happens when one man's indulgence in his greatest passion—his sense of ... (Goodreads)
Steppenwolf
by Hermann Hesse
The inner struggles of a tortured soul as he searches for redemption.
The book is presented as a manuscript written by its protagonist , a middle-aged man named Harry Haller, who leaves it to a chance acquaintance, the nephew of his landlady. The acquaintance adds a ... (Wikipedia)
Love in the Time of Cholera
by Gabriel García Márquez
An epic love story spanning decades, exploring the power of true love.
The main characters of the novel are Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza. Florentino and Fermina fall in love in their youth. A secret relationship blossoms between the two with the help of Fermina's ... (Wikipedia)
The Magic Mountain
by Thomas Mann
A young man's journey of self-exploration and personal growth during a long stay at a Swiss sanatorium.
The narrative opens in the decade before World War I . It introduces the protagonist, Hans Castorp, the only child of a Hamburg merchant family. Following the early death of his parents, Castorp has ... (Wikipedia)
The Reader
by Bernhard Schlink
A man's journey of understanding, uncovering a dark secret from his past.
Hailed for its coiled eroticism and the moral claims it makes upon the reader, this mesmerizing novel is a story of love and secrets, horror and compassion, unfolding against the haunted landscape of ... (Goodreads)
The Gospel According to Jesus Christ
by José Saramago
A retelling of the life of Jesus Christ, delving into his motivations and emotions.
This is a skeptic' s journey into the meaning of God and of human existence. At once an ironic rendering of the life of Christ and a beautiful novel, Saramago' s tale has sparked intense discussion ... (Goodreads)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
by Milan Kundera
A story of love and loss in a politically turbulent Czechoslovakia.
In The Unbearable Lightness of Being , Milan Kundera tells the story of a young woman in love with a man torn between his love for her and his incorrigible womanizing and one of his mistresses and ... (Goodreads)
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler
by Italo Calvino
An exploration of the nature of storytelling, as two readers attempt to uncover the lost story of the novel's title.
If on a Winter's Night a Traveler is a marvel of ingenuity, an experimental text that looks longingly back to the great age of narration—"when time no longer seemed stopped and did not yet seem to ... (Goodreads)
Les Liaisons dangereuses
by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
An intricate game of love, lust and manipulation as two rival aristocrats scheme to outwit one another.
The Vicomte de Valmont is determined to seduce the virtuous, married, and therefore inaccessible Madame de Tourvel, who is staying with Valmont's aunt while her husband is away on a court case. At ... (Wikipedia)
Swann's Way
by Marcel Proust
Autobiographical novel tracing the narrator's reminiscences of an aristocratic upbringing.
Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is one of the most entertaining reading experiences in any language and arguably the finest novel of the twentieth century. But since its original prewar ... (Goodreads)
City of Glass
by Paul Auster
A detective story that blurs the lines between reality and fiction.
A 2006 reissue by Penguin Books is fronted by new pulp magazine -style covers by comic book illustrator Art Spiegelman . The first story, City of Glass , features an author of detective fiction who ... (Wikipedia)
Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall
by Kazuo Ishiguro
A collection of tales exploring the connections between music, memory, and the night.
One of the most celebrated writers of our time gives us his first cycle of short fiction: five brilliantly etched, interconnected stories in which music is a vivid and essential character. A ... (Goodreads)
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
by Haruki Murakami
A surreal journey of self-discovery, exploring the inner and outer worlds.
The first part, "The Thieving Magpie", begins with the narrator, Toru Okada, a low-key and unemployed lawyer's assistant, being tasked by his wife, Kumiko, to find their missing cat. Kumiko suggests ... (Wikipedia)
Franz Kafka's The Castle
by David Fishelson
A man's struggle against an oppressive bureaucracy in a mysterious castle.
The protagonist, K., arrives in a village governed by a mysterious bureaucracy operating in a nearby castle. When seeking shelter at the town inn, he claims to be a land surveyor summoned by the ... (Wikipedia)
The Book of Illusions
by Paul Auster
A grieving professor is transported on a journey of the past, unlocking secrets of his deceased wife.
Six months after losing his wife and two young sons, Vermont Professor David Zimmer spends his waking hours mired in a blur of alcoholic grief and self-pity. Then one night, he stumbles upon a clip ... (Goodreads)
Platform
by Michel Houellebecq
Satirical exploration of the modern world and its discontents.
The story is the first-person narrative of a fictional character named Michel Renault, a Parisian civil servant who, after the death of his father and thanks to a hefty inheritance, engages in sexual ... (Wikipedia)
The Leopard
by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Epic story of a Sicilian nobleman's struggle to preserve his family and their way of life in a rapidly changing world.
Most of the novel is set during the time of the, Risorgimento, , specifically during the period when Giuseppe Garibaldi , the hero of Italian unification, swept through Sicily with his forces, known ... (Wikipedia)
The Fall
by Albert Camus
A man's journey into alienation and despair, driven by a sense of absurdity in life.
The Fall, ( French :, La Chute, ) is a philosophical novel by Albert Camus . First published in 1956, it is his last complete work of fiction. Set in Amsterdam , The Fall consists of a series of ... (Wikipedia)
The Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen
A family drama exploring the complexities of relationships, aging and life’s choices.
The novel shifts back and forth through the late 20th century, intermittently following spouses Alfred and Enid Lambert as they raise their children Gary, Chip, and Denise in the traditional ... (Wikipedia)
The Idiot
by Fyodor Dostoevsky
A man's struggle to find his place in society, and the moral dilemmas he faces.
Prince Myshkin, a young man in his mid-twenties and a descendant of one of the oldest Russian lines of nobility, is on a train to Saint Petersburg on a cold November morning. He is returning to ... (Wikipedia)
Infinite Jest
by David Foster Wallace
A journey through the absurdist world of entertainment, drugs, addiction & death.
There are four major interwoven narratives: , These narratives are connected via a film, Infinite Jest , also referred to in the novel as "the Entertainment" or "the samizdat ". The film is so ... (Wikipedia)
Memoirs of Hadrian
by Marguerite Yourcenar
Reflections of the Roman Emperor Hadrian on his life, death and the nature of existence.
Both an exploration of character and a reflection on the meaning of history, Memoirs of Hadrian has received international acclaim since its first publication in France in 1951. In it, Marguerite ... (Barnes & Noble)
Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family
by Thomas Mann
A story of a family's decline, tracing four generations of a wealthy German family.
In 1835, the wealthy and respected Buddenbrooks, a family of grain merchants, invite their friends and relatives to dinner in their new home in Lübeck , Germany . The family consists of patriarch ... (Wikipedia)
