Recommendations based on La liste de mes enviesby Grégoire Delacourt

* statistically, based on millions of data-points provided by fellow humans

  1. Delicacy

    by David Foenkinos
    A young widow navigates the complexities of love and loss, finding solace in unexpected places.

    Nathalie, a young attractive woman is in love with a young attractive man, François. He proposes and they marry (portrayed in something resembling a ‘dream’ sequence), honeymoon, and are immediately ... (Wikipedia)

  2. Hunting and Gathering

    by Anna Gavalda
    A story of four friends who form an unlikely family and learn to take comfort in one another.

    Camille is doing her best to disappear. She barely eats, works at night as a cleaner and lives in a tiny attic room. Downstairs in a beautiful, ornate apartment, lives Philibert Marquet de la ... (Goodreads)

  3. The End of Eddy

    by Édouard Louis
    Autobiographical novel revealing the oppression and social exclusion experienced by an impoverished rural French family.

    The most talked-about European novel since My Struggle —a sexually frank, brutally honest coming-of-age story “Every morning in the bathroom I would repeat the same phrase to myself over and over ... (Goodreads)

  4. The Prisoner of Heaven

    by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
    A man's mysterious past entangles him in a web of secrets, love and revenge.

    Daniel Sempere has settled into married life well and his son is shortly turning one year old. He is living above the family bookshop, Sempere & Sons with his elderly father, his wife Beatriz and son ... (Wikipedia)

  5. The Overcoat

    by Nikolai Gogol
    A tale of a lowly bureaucrat's journey to reclaim his sense of self-worth.

    The story narrates the life and death of titular councillor Akaky Akakievich Bashmachkin (Russian: Акакий Акакиевич Башмачкин), an impoverished government clerk and copyist in the Russian capital of ... (Wikipedia)

  6. Burial Rites

    by Hannah Kent
    A woman awaits her execution in 19th-century Iceland, reliving her story of hardship, loss and faith.

    Burial Rites tells the story of Agnes Magnúsdóttir, a servant in northern Iceland who was condemned to death after the murder of two men, one of whom was her employer, and became the last woman put ... (Wikipedia)

  7. Lie With Me

    by Philippe Besson
    A poignant tale of a secret love affair between two teenage boys in rural France, and the impact it has on their lives.

    “I remember the movement of his hips pressing against the pinball machine. This one sentence had me in its grip until the end. Two young men find each other, always fearing that life itself might be ... (Barnes & Noble)

  8. Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay

    by Elena Ferrante
    Two friends navigate the changing relationships of their youth and adulthood, and the consequences of their choices.

    In this third Neapolitan novel, Elena and Lila, the two girls whom readers first met in My Brilliant Friend, have become women. Lila married at sixteen and has a young son; she has left her abusive ... (Goodreads)

  9. Sister

    by Rosamund Lupton
    A suspenseful tale of a woman's mission to find her missing sister, unearthing secrets along the way.

    Nothing can break the bond between sisters ...When Beatrice gets a frantic call in the middle of Sunday lunch to say that her younger sister, Tess, is missing, she boards the first flight home to ... (Goodreads)

  10. Ford County

    by John Grisham
    A collection of short stories set in the fictional Ford County, Mississippi, exploring the lives of its inhabitants and their struggles.

    In his first collection of short stories John Grisham takes us back to Ford County, Mississippi, the setting of his first novel, A Time to Kill . Wheelchair-bound Inez Graney and her two older sons, ... (Goodreads)

  11. The Art of Hearing Heartbeats

    by Jan-Philipp Sendker
    An epic search for the truth, discovering the power of love and the beauty of forgiveness.

    A poignant and inspirational love story set in Burma, The Art of Hearing Heartbeats spans the decades between the 1950s and the present. When a successful New York lawyer suddenly disappears without ... (Goodreads)

  12. Flights

    by Olga Tokarczuk
    A collection of interconnected stories exploring the human experience of travel and movement.

    From the incomparably original Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk, Flights interweaves reflections on travel with an in-depth exploration of the human body, broaching life, death, motion, and migration. ... (Goodreads)

  13. The Story of a New Name

    by Elena Ferrante
    Two young women's search for identity and independence in a patriarchal society.

    In 2012, Elena Ferrante's My Brilliant Friend introduced readers to the unforgettable Elena and Lila, whose lifelong friendship provides the backbone for the Neapolitan Novels. The Story of a New ... (Goodreads)

  14. The Pearl That Broke Its Shell

    by Nadia Hashimi
    A young Afghan girl's struggle to break free from oppressive traditions and find her own path.

    Afghan-American Nadia Hashimi's literary debut novel, The Pearl that Broke Its Shell is a searing tale of powerlessness, fate, and the freedom to control one's own fate that combines the cultural ... (Goodreads)

  15. Sidetracked

    by Henning Mankell
    A police detective's investigation into a mysterious murder, uncovering a dark conspiracy.

    In the award-winning Sidetracked , Kurt Wallander is called to a nearby rapeseed field where a teenage girl has been loitering all day long. He arrives just in time to watch her douse herself in ... (Goodreads)

  16. The Ice Princess

    by Camilla Läckberg
    Detective fiction set in a small Swedish village, uncovering secrets and solving a murder.

    Erica Falck has returned to her family home in Fjällbacka after her parents died. While coping with the death of her parents, she is trying to work on a biography of Selma Lagerlöf , a Swedish author ... (Wikipedia)

  17. Mr. Mercedes

    by Stephen King
    Detective investigates a series of murders by a maniacal driver in a stolen Mercedes.

    Many jobless people are standing in line for a job fair , but then a Mercedes plows into the crowd, killing sixteen and severely injuring many. Bill Hodges, a recently retired detective from the ... (Wikipedia)

  18. The Forty Rules of Love

    by Elif Shafak
    A story of romance and spiritual enlightenment, exploring the teachings of a Sufi master.

    Ella Rubenstein is forty years old and unhappily married when she takes a job as a reader for a literary agent. Her first assignment is to read and report on Sweet Blasphemy , a novel written by a ... (Goodreads)

  19. 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)

  20. Us

    by David Nicholls
    A couple's marriage is tested during a summer trip across Europe, forcing them to confront their past and future together.

    Douglas Petersen may be mild-mannered, but behind his reserve lies a sense of humor that, against all odds, seduces beautiful Connie into a second date and eventually into marriage. Now, almost three ... (Goodreads)

  21. The Elegance of the Hedgehog

    by Muriel Barbery
    A story of two unlikely outcasts who find solace and comfort in each other's company.

    The story revolves mainly around the characters of Renée Michel and Paloma Josse, residents of an upper-middle class Left Bank apartment building at 7 Rue de Grenelle – one of the most elegant ... (Wikipedia)

  22. Leo Africanus

    by Amin Maalouf
    An epic historical novel, tracing the journey of a North African explorer and diplomat in the 16th century.

    "I, Hasan the son of Muhammad the weigh-master, I, Jean-Leon de Medici, circumcised at the hand of a barber and baptized at the hand of a pope, I am now called the African, but I am not from Africa, ... (Goodreads)

  23. 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)

  24. Chronicle of a Death Foretold

    by Gabriel García Márquez
    A murder mystery narrated by the townspeople and tracing the events leading up to the crime.

    The non-linear story, told by an anonymous narrator, begins with the morning of Santiago Nasar's death. The reader learns that Santiago lives with his mother, Placida Linero; the cook, Victoria ... (Wikipedia)

  25. Wonderstruck

    by Brian Selznick
    Two stories from different eras intertwine, revealing hidden connections between a deaf girl and a runaway boy.

    Ben’s story starts in Gunflint Lake, Minnesota in June 1977. He was born deaf in his left ear. Ben’s mom, Elaine, was the town librarian, but died in a car crash. He now lives with his aunt and uncle ... (Wikipedia)

  26. I've Got Your Number

    by Sophie Kinsella
    A young woman's chaotic life is turned upside-down when she finds a stranger's lost phone.

    Poppy Wyatt loses her engagement ring, which has been in her fiancé's family for three generations, on the day that his parents arrive from the US and in the following panic, she also ends up losing ... (Wikipedia)

  27. The Secret Keeper

    by Kate Morton
    A woman unravels her family's past, uncovering secrets and lies that span generations.

    During a summer party at the family farm in the English countryside, sixteen-year-old Laurel Nicolson has escaped to her childhood tree house and is happily dreaming of the future. She spies a ... (Goodreads)

  28. The Uncommon Reader

    by Alan Bennett
    A humorous look at the journey of a monarch who discovers the joy of reading.

    The title's "uncommon reader" ( Queen Elizabeth II ) becomes obsessed with books after a chance encounter with a mobile library . The story follows the consequences of this obsession for the Queen, ... (Wikipedia)

  29. The Tobacconist

    by Robert Seethaler
    A young man's coming-of-age story set in pre-WWII Vienna, where he works at a tobacconist and befriends Sigmund Freud.

    When seventeen-year-old Franz exchanges his home in the idyllic beauty of the Austrian lake district for the bustle of Vienna, his homesickness quickly dissolves amidst the thrum of the city. In his ... (Goodreads)

  30. The Story of the Lost Child

    by Elena Ferrante
    An exploration of the complexities of motherhood and female friendship, spanning four decades.

    "Nothing quite like this has ever been published before," proclaimed The Guardian about the Neapolitan novels in 2014. Against the backdrop of a Naples that is as seductive as it is perilous and a ... (Goodreads)