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Recommendations based on Mister Pipby Lloyd Jones
* statistically, based on millions of data-points provided by fellow humans
We Need to Talk About Kevin
by Lionel Shriver
A mother's struggle to come to terms with the monstrous acts of her disturbed son.
In the wake of a school massacre conducted by Kevin Khatchadourian, the 15-year-old son of Franklin Plaskett and Eva Khatchadourian, Eva begins writing letters to Franklin in November 2000. She ... (Wikipedia)
The White Tiger
by Aravind Adiga
An exploration of the Indian class system, told from the perspective of a lower-caste man.
The entire novel is narrated through letters by Balram Halwai to the Premier of China, who will soon be visiting India. Balram is an Indian man from an impoverished background, born in the village of ... (Wikipedia)
The Shipping News
by Annie Proulx
A man's attempt to rebuild his life in a small Newfoundland town, discovering compassion and joy.
The story centers around Quoyle, a newspaper reporter from upstate New York , whose father had emigrated from Newfoundland . Shortly after his parents' joint suicide, Quoyle's unfaithful and abusive ... (Wikipedia)
The Secret River
by Kate Grenville
A convict’s journey for redemption and a new life in the Australian Outback.
The early life of William Thornhill is one of Dickensian poverty, depredation and criminality. , After a childhood of poverty and petty crime in the slums of London, William Thornhill is sentenced to ... (Wikipedia)
And the Mountains Echoed
by Khaled Hosseini
Interconnected stories of family and love, tracing the consequences of decisions made throughout life.
The novel opens in the year 1952. Saboor, an impoverished farmer from the fictional village of Shadbagh, decides to sell his three-year-old daughter Pari to a wealthy, childless couple in Kabul. ... (Wikipedia)
When the Emperor Was Divine
by Julie Otsuka
A Japanese-American family's struggle of survival in the face of wartime discrimination.
In "When the Emperor was Divine," Author Julie Otsuka gives a fictional retelling of the Japanese American experience during the Internment period of WWII. The story follows a Japanese American ... (Wikipedia)
Half of a Yellow Sun
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Story of two sisters navigating a civil war in Nigeria, and the effects of colonialism.
The novel takes place in Nigeria prior to and during the Nigerian Civil War (1967–70). The effect of the war is shown through the relationships of five people's lives including the twin daughters of ... (Wikipedia)
The God of Small Things
by Arundhati Roy
A moving story of two siblings growing up in India, exploring love, politics, and class.
The year is 1969. In the state of Kerala, on the southernmost tip of India, a skyblue Plymouth with chrome tailfins is stranded on the highway amid a Marxist workers' demonstration. Inside the car ... (Goodreads)
The Best Kind of People
by Zoe Whittall
A respected teacher is accused of sexual misconduct, and his family must confront the accusations and their own secrets.
What if someone you trusted was accused of the unthinkable? George Woodbury, an affable teacher and beloved husband and father, is arrested for sexual impropriety at a prestigious prep school. His ... (Goodreads)
Songs of Willow Frost
by Jamie Ford
A young Chinese-American boy searches for his mother in Depression-era Seattle. A tale of love, loss, and hope.
Twelve-year-old William Eng, a Chinese-American boy, has lived at Seattle’s Sacred Heart Orphanage ever since his mother’s listless body was carried away from their small apartment five years ago. On ... (Goodreads)
The Collector
by John Fowles
A man's obsession with a young woman leads to a deadly game of cat-and-mouse.
The novel is about a lonely young man, Frederick Clegg, who works as a clerk in a city hall and collects butterflies in his spare time. The first part of the novel tells the story from his point of ... (Wikipedia)
Wolf Hall
by Hilary Mantel
A historical fiction about the rise of Thomas Cromwell in the court of Henry VIII.
England in the 1520s is a heartbeat from disaster. If the king dies without a male heir, the country could be destroyed by civil war. Henry VIII wants to annul his marriage of twenty years and marry ... (Goodreads)
High Fidelity
by Nick Hornby
A man reflects on his past relationships while trying to understand the nature of love.
Rob Fleming is a 35-year-old man who owns a record shop in London called Championship Vinyl. His lawyer girlfriend, Laura, has just left him and now he's going through a crisis. At his record shop, ... (Wikipedia)
White Teeth
by Zadie Smith
A multi-generational saga exploring identity, race, and culture in modern-day London.
On New Year's Day 1975, Archie Jones, a 47-year-old Englishman whose disturbed Italian wife has just walked out on him, is attempting to take his own life by gassing himself in his car when a chance ... (Wikipedia)
Back When We Were Grownups
by Anne Tyler
A middle-aged woman questions her life choices and identity after inheriting her deceased husband's family business.
Tyler's 15th novel, like most of her work, is set in Baltimore, Maryland . It opens with the sentence, "Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person." The ... (Wikipedia)
State of Wonder
by Ann Patchett
A journey in the Amazon rainforest to find a missing colleague and unlock the secrets of a mysterious drug.
In a narrative replete with poison arrows, devouring snakes, scientific miracles, and spiritual transformations, "State of Wonder" presents a world of stunning surprise and danger, rich in emotional ... (Goodreads)
Breath
by Tim Winton
A sea-faring epic about the power of love and courage in the face of adversity.
The novel is set in a small Western Australian logging village named Sawyer, near the fictional coastal town of Angelus, which has featured in several of Winton's works, including Shallows and The ... (Wikipedia)
My Name Is Memory
by Ann Brashares
A romantic story of two star-crossed lovers, connected through past lives.
Daniel can remember things from his past lives going back to a life that started near Antioch in 520 A.D. In that early life he joins his brother to raid a village in North Africa. During the raid ... (Wikipedia)
I Am Pilgrim
by Terry Hayes
A former operative is called back into action to track down a terrorist plotting a global attack.
A breakneck race against time...and an implacable enemy. An anonymous young woman murdered in a run-down hotel, all identifying characteristics dissolved by acid. A father publicly beheaded in the ... (Goodreads)
Jasper Jones
by Craig Silvey
An Australian coming-of-age story, exploring racial prejudice and the power of friendship.
The protagonist Charlie Bucktin is a quiet, book loving, 13-year-old boy who lives in the fictitious rural town of Corrigan, Western Australia. On a summer evening in 1965, Charlie receives an ... (Wikipedia)
The Hours
by Michael Cunningham
Interwoven stories of three women and the impact of Virginia Woolf's novel, Mrs. Dalloway.
Note: This Summary does not contain the whole book, nor end at the ending. The stream-of-consciousness style being so prominent in this work, a summary of the plot based on physical action does not ... (Wikipedia)
Silk
by Alessandro Baricco
Adventure of a 19th century French trader who travels to Japan to find rare silkworm eggs.
The novel tells the story of a French silkworm merchant-turned-smuggler named Hervé Joncour in 19th century France who travels to Japan for his town's supply of silkworms after a disease wipes out ... (Wikipedia)
The Knife of Never Letting Go
by Patrick Ness
A young boy's struggle to discover the truth of a hidden world and his own special place in it.
Todd Hewitt is the only boy left in Prentisstown, a small settlement on 'New World' – an alien planet only recently colonized by humanity. Todd is within days of his thirteenth birthday, the age in ... (Wikipedia)
Heart of Darkness
by Joseph Conrad
A journey into the depths of the human psyche, exploring the darkness of colonialism.
Aboard the Nellie , anchored in the River Thames near Gravesend , Charles Marlow tells his fellow sailors how he became captain of a river steamboat for an ivory trading company. As a child, Marlow ... (Wikipedia)
The Amateur Marriage
by Anne Tyler
An exploration of a failed marriage and its consequences across generations.
The plot concerns the marriage of Michael Anton and Pauline Barclay, who meet when he tends to her bloodied brow in his family's grocery store, located in a primarily Eastern European enclave in ... (Wikipedia)
Brideshead Revisited
by Evelyn Waugh
A nostalgic reflection on a wealthy family and the enduring power of love.
The novel is divided into three parts, framed by a prologue and epilogue. The prologue takes place during the final years of the Second World War . Charles Ryder and his battalion are sent to a ... (Wikipedia)
Atonement
by Ian McEwan
A tale of the consequences of a child's mistake, and how its effects ripple through generations.
Briony Tallis, a 13-year-old English girl with a talent for writing, lives at her family's country estate with her parents Jack and Emily Tallis. Her older sister Cecilia has recently graduated from ... (Wikipedia)
Last Night at the Lobster
by Stewart O'Nan
A poignant story of a restaurant manager's last night at work, as he reflects on his present & past life decisions.
The Red Lobster perched in the far corner of a run-down New England mall hasn't been making its numbers and headquarters has pulled the plug. But manager Manny DeLeon still needs to navigate a tricky ... (Goodreads)
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry
by Rachel Joyce
An elderly man's unexpected quest of faith, discovering the power of hope and love.
Harold Fry, 65, has cut the lawn outside his home at Kingsbridge on the south coast of Devon when he receives a letter. A colleague of twenty years ago, Queenie Hennessy, has cancer and is in a ... (Wikipedia)
Kafka on the Shore
by Haruki Murakami
A surreal journey of self-discovery, exploring the boundaries between the real and surreal.
Comprising two distinct but interrelated plots, the narrative runs back and forth between both plots, taking up each plotline in alternating chapters. The odd-numbered chapters tell the 15-year-old ... (Wikipedia)
