Books like

Books like The Diary of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait

12 books with a reading profile close to The Diary of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait by Frida Kahlo. Inward-looking, contemplative and open-ended; a moderate read.

1

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

by Dave Eggers

Also inward-looking · memoir, narrative

Dave Eggers recounts the period following the rapid deaths of both his parents from cancer, leaving him as the primary guardian of his eight-year-old brother, Toph.
2

Stay True

by Hua Hsu

Also inward-looking and contemplative · memoir, narrative

Hua Hsu recounts his undergraduate years at Berkeley in the mid-1990s, focusing on his complex friendship with Ken, a Japanese American peer whose mainstream tastes Hsu initially judged as conventional.
3

The Emperor of Gladness

by Ocean Vuong

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

In this debut for young readers, the narrative combines structured verse and prose to follow a young protagonist navigating the quiet landscapes of suburban New England.
4

Men Without Women

by Haruki Murakami

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

Across seven short stories, various men cope with the physical or emotional absence of women in their lives.
5

Blue Nights

by Joan Didion

Also inward-looking and contemplative · memoir, narrative

Joan Didion examines the illness and 2005 death of her daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne, while confronting her own physical decline.
6

Jesus’ Son

by Denis Johnson

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

Eleven linked stories follow a drifting narrator through the drug-addled margins of the American Midwest and Pacific Northwest in the 1970s.
7

After the Quake

by Haruki Murakami

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

Six stories by Murakami are set in the weeks after the 1995 Kobe earthquake, though the quake itself happens off-stage.
8

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

by Raymond Carver

Also inward-looking and open-ended · narrative, literary

This collection of short stories presents the domestic lives of working-class people living in the Pacific Northwest and American West.
9

Shark Heart

by Emily Habeck

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

Newlyweds Wren and Lewis face a physiological crisis when Lewis is diagnosed with a rare genetic mutation that will gradually transform him into a great white shark.
10

No One Belongs Here More Than You

by Miranda July

Also inward-looking · narrative, literary

Miranda July's debut collection brings together sixteen stories about lonely, odd and hopeful people.
11

Bridge of Clay

by Markus Zusak

Also inward-looking · narrative, literary

Matthew Dunbar, the eldest of five brothers, tells how the boys were raised alone in a Sydney house after their mother's death and their father's disappearance.
12

Everything is Illuminated

by Jonathan Safran Foer

Also inward-looking and contemplative · narrative, literary

A young American named Jonathan Safran Foer travels to post-Soviet Ukraine to locate Augustine, a woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis.

Get picks matched to your own reading on papr.

Get papr

Your library, beautifully understood.