Recommendations based on Less Than Zeroby Bret Easton Ellis

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  1. American Psycho

    by Bret Easton Ellis
    A corporate psychopath's descent into homicidal madness, exposing the dark side of 1980s New York.

    Set in Manhattan during the Wall Street boom of the late 1980s, American Psycho follows the life of wealthy young investment banker Patrick Bateman. Bateman, in his mid-20s when the story begins, ... (Wikipedia)

  2. The Rules of Attraction

    by Bret Easton Ellis
    A darkly humorous and nihilistic portrayal of college life, exploring the interconnected relationships of a group of privileged and self-destructive students.

    The novel is written in the first-person, continuing the aesthetic of Ellis' earlier, Less Than Zero, , and is told from the points of view of multiple characters. The main narrators are three ... (Wikipedia)

  3. The Informers

    by Bret Easton Ellis
    A collection of interrelated stories set in 1980s Los Angeles, exploring the dark and depraved lives of the city's elite.

    Set in Los Angeles, in the recent past. The birthplace and graveyard of American myths and dreams, the city harbours a group of people trapped between the beauty of their surroundings and their own ... (Goodreads)

  4. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

    by Hunter S. Thompson
    A wild and hallucinatory journey through the seedy underbelly of Las Vegas.

    The basic synopsis revolves around journalist Raoul Duke ( Hunter S. Thompson ) and his attorney, Dr. Gonzo ( Oscar Zeta Acosta ), as they arrive in Las Vegas in 1971 to report on the Mint 400 ... (Wikipedia)

  5. On the Road

    by Jack Kerouac
    A young man's journey across America, seeking adventure and freedom.

    The two main characters of the book are the narrator, Sal Paradise, and his friend Dean Moriarty, much admired for his carefree attitude and sense of adventure, a free-spirited maverick eager to ... (Wikipedia)

  6. Choke

    by Chuck Palahniuk
    A darkly humorous story of a man's journey to self-awareness through disruption and chaos.

    Choke follows Victor Mancini and his friend Denny through a few months of their lives with frequent flashbacks to the days when Victor was a child. , Victor had grown up moving from one foster home ... (Wikipedia)

  7. Bright Lights, Big City

    by Jay McInerney
    A young man's journey of personal growth, navigating the chaos of New York City.

    The story's narrator is a 24-year-old writer who works as a fact checker for a highbrow magazine for which he had once hoped to write. By night, he is a cocaine -using party-goer seeking to lose ... (Wikipedia)

  8. The Virgin Suicides

    by Jeffrey Eugenides
    A dark and mysterious tale about the mysterious suicides of five teenage sisters in a suburban town.

    As an ambulance arrives for the body of Cecilia Lisbon, a group of anonymous adolescent neighborhood boys recalls the events leading up to her death. The Lisbons are a Catholic family living in the ... (Wikipedia)

  9. The Big Sleep

    by Raymond Chandler
    Private eye investigates a complex case involving a wealthy family and blackmail.

    Private investigator Philip Marlowe is called to the home of the wealthy and elderly General Sternwood, in the month of October. He wants Marlowe to deal with an attempt by a bookseller named Arthur ... (Wikipedia)

  10. Invisible Monsters

    by Chuck Palahniuk
    A woman's journey to re-establish her identity and find her place in the world.

    The narrator of the story is an unnamed disfigured woman who goes by multiple pseudonyms, notably Daisy St. Patience and Bubba Joan—identities given to her by Brandy Alexander, with whom she spends ... (Wikipedia)

  11. The Secret History

    by Donna Tartt
    A small group of misfit college students uncover a sinister secret and their lives become entangled with dangerous consequences.

    Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at an elite New England college discover a way of thinking and living that is a world away from the ... (Goodreads)

  12. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

    by Dave Eggers
    An autobiographical account of a young man dealing with grief and responsibility.

    'When you read his extraordinary memoir you don't laugh, then cry, then laugh again; you somehow experience these emotions all at once.' "Well, this was when Bill was sighing a lot. He had decided ... (Goodreads)

  13. Cat's Cradle

    by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
    A satirical exploration of human folly, exposing the dangers of unchecked science and technology.

    Told with deadpan humour and bitter irony, Kurt Vonnegut's cult tale of global destruction preys on our deepest fears of witnessing Armageddon and, worse still, surviving it ... Dr Felix Hoenikker, ... (Goodreads)

  14. 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)

  15. Ham on Rye

    by Charles Bukowski
    A semi-autobiographical novel following a young man's struggles with poverty, violence and mental illness.

    The novel focuses on the protagonist, Henry Chinaski, between the years of 1920 and 1941. , It begins with Chinaski's early memories. As the story progresses the reader follows his life through the ... (Wikipedia)

  16. Factotum

    by Charles Bukowski
    A portrait of a struggling writer, seeking solace in alcohol and women.

    Set in the 1940s, the plot follows Henry Chinaski , Bukowski's perpetually unemployed, alcoholic alter ego , who has been rejected from the World War II draft and makes his way from one menial job to ... (Wikipedia)

  17. The Dharma Bums

    by Jack Kerouac
    A journey of self-discovery, fueled by a passion for Buddhism and nature.

    The character Japhy drives Ray Smith's story, whose penchant for simplicity and Zen Buddhism influenced Kerouac on the eve of the sudden and unpredicted success of, On the Road, . The action shifts ... (Wikipedia)

  18. Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West

    by Cormac McCarthy
    A violent and bloody western epic, exploring the depths of human depravity.

    An epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America's westward expansion, Blood Meridian brilliantly subverts the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the "wild west." ... (Barnes & Noble)

  19. This Side of Paradise

    by F. Scott Fitzgerald
    A young man's quest to find purpose and meaning in a turbulent post-war world.

    The book is written in three parts. Amory Blaine, a young Midwesterner, is convinced that he has an exceptionally promising future. He attends boarding school and later Princeton University. He ... (Wikipedia)

  20. The Sun Also Rises

    by Ernest Hemingway
    A group of expatriates in 1920s Europe, struggling to come to terms with the aftermath of WWI.

    On the surface, the novel is a love story between the protagonist Jake Barnes—a man whose war wound has made him unable to have sex—and the promiscuous divorcée usually identified as Lady Brett ... (Wikipedia)

  21. Junky

    by William S. Burroughs
    A gritty, autobiographical account of a man's descent into the underworld of addiction.

    Before his 1959 breakthrough, Naked Lunch , an unknown William S. Burroughs wrote Junky , his first novel. It is a candid eye-witness account of times and places that are now long gone, an ... (Goodreads)

  22. For Whom the Bell Tolls

    by Ernest Hemingway
    A soldier's story of courage and survival in the Spanish Civil War.

    The novel graphically describes the brutality of the Spanish Civil War. It is told primarily through the thoughts and experiences of the protagonist, Robert Jordan. It draws on Hemingway's own ... (Wikipedia)

  23. The Rum Diary

    by Hunter S. Thompson
    A man's journey to find himself and meaningful work, set in a tropical paradise.

    Begun in 1959 by a twenty-two-year-old Hunter S. Thompson, The Rum Diary is a tangled love story of jealousy, treachery, and violent alcoholic lust in the Caribbean boomtown that was San Juan, Puerto ... (Goodreads)

  24. 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)

  25. Valley of the Dolls

    by Jacqueline Susann
    Three women's pursuit of fame and fortune, their struggles with addiction and ambition.

    In 1945, beautiful ingenue Anne Welles moves to New York to start a new life, seeking to escape the ennui of her hometown of Lawrenceville, Massachusetts . She quickly finds employment as a secretary ... (Wikipedia)

  26. The Fortress of Solitude

    by Jonathan Lethem
    A young man's exploration of friendship, identity and belonging in a rapidly changing world.

    From the prize-winning author of Motherless Brooklyn , a daring, riotous, sweeping novel that spins the tale of two friends and their adventures in late 20th-century America. This is the story of two ... (Goodreads)

  27. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh

    by Michael Chabon
    A young man's journey of exploration and self-discovery, discovering a world of crime and excitement in his hometown.

    Art Bechstein is the son of a mob money launderer , who wants him to succeed in a legitimate career (He has even set up a job for him at the end of the summer in Baltimore at a financial firm managed ... (Wikipedia)

  28. 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)

  29. Nine Stories

    by J.D. Salinger
    Nine short stories of insight into the human condition and its mysteries.

    Nine Stories (1953) is a collection of short stories by American fiction writer J. D. Salinger published in April 1953. It includes two of his most famous short stories, "A Perfect Day for ... (Goodreads)

  30. Everything Is Illuminated

    by Jonathan Safran Foer
    A young man's journey to trace his family's past, uncovering the secrets of the Holocaust.

    Jonathan Safran Foer (the author), a young American Jew, who is vegetarian and an avid collector of his family's heritage, journeys to Ukraine in search of Augustine, the woman who saved his ... (Wikipedia)