Books like Lost Illusions
12 books with a reading profile close to Lost Illusions by Honoré de Balzac. Deep, inward-looking, contemplative and thought-provoking; a demanding read.
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1
Middlemarch
by George Eliot
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
Set in a fictional Midlands town during the 1830s, the narrative tracks the interconnected lives of Dorothea Brooke and Tertius Lydgate.
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2
Doctor Zhivago
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
Set against the backdrop of the Russian Revolution and the subsequent Civil War, the narrative follows Yuri Zhivago, a physician and poet who struggles to maintain his medical ethics and artistic integrity amidst social…
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3
Song of Solomon
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
Macon "Milkman" Dead III grows up in a wealthy but emotionally stifled Black household in Michigan, isolated from the struggles of his community and the history of his ancestors.
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4
The God of Small Things
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
Set in Ayemenem, Kerala, during the late 1960s, the story follows fraternal twins Rahel and Estha as they navigate a rigid social hierarchy.
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5
Bleak House
Also deep and thought-provoking · dense, narrative
In nineteenth-century London, the protracted legal battle of Jarndyce and Jarndyce drags through the Court of Chancery, eroding the inheritance and sanity of those caught in its wake.
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6
American Pastoral
by Philip Roth
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
Seymour "Swede" Levov represents the fulfillment of the mid-century American dream as a successful Newark businessman, star athlete, and family man.
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7
The Complete Stories
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
This 1971 collection brings together thirty-one stories set largely in the rural American South.
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8
The Odyssey of Homer
by Homer
Also deep and contemplative · dense, narrative
Following the conclusion of the Trojan War, Odysseus, the King of Ithaca, begins a decade-long struggle to reach his home.
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9
Vanity Fair
by William Makepeace Thackeray
Also deep and thought-provoking · dense, narrative
Set during the Napoleonic Wars, the narrative follows Becky Sharp and Amelia Sedley as they navigate British high society.
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10
The Aeneid
by Virgil
Also deep and contemplative · dense, narrative
Virgil’s epic poem follows Aeneas, a Trojan prince who escapes the ruins of Troy to establish a new lineage in Italy.
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11
Sula
Also deep and inward-looking · dense, narrative
In the segregated neighborhood of Medallion, Ohio, Nel Wright and Sula Peace share a girlhood bond that fractures as they enter adulthood.
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12
Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family
by Thomas Mann
Also deep and contemplative · dense, literary
Set in nineteenth-century Lübeck, the narrative chronicles four generations of the Buddenbrook family as they transition from prosperous grain merchants to financial and physical decay.
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