George Orwell’s 1984 looms over the terrain of dystopian fiction as a kind of template
for the idiom, the masterpiece that did more than any other work to pave the way for
the current obsession with sociopolitical commentary in the guise of dark futuristic fable.
Without Orwell as the role model—or perhaps 'big brother' is a better label?—we would
never have Fahrenheit 451, The Handmaid’s Tale, A Clockwork Orange, The Road,
Never Let Me Go and so many other seminal works of fiction with their own twist on
the Orwellian narrative.
But let’s not forget that Orwell wrote another dystopian
novel, Animal Farm, which was drew on the techniques
of satire and absurdism to makes it points. This book
also has a legacy, less pervasive yet just as significant.
The comic dystopian tale is less common than its dark
twin, but can be just as thought-provoking. In fact, the
attempt to reframe political debate as a series of comic
observations on an apocalyptic future-in-the-making
might even be considered as the de facto tone of in-the-
moment media. If you doubt it, just spend a few moments
measuring the mood of Twitter and social media, or late
night monologues and Saturday Night Live, or even the
pronouncements emanating from the centers of political
power. Absurdism was once a literary style; nowadays
it’s a way of coping.
This is the context in which we are invited to make sense
of Gary Shteyngart’s novel Super Sad True Love Story
(2010). At first glance, that might seem an admonishment
to make sense of nonsense, but we are all getting quite
skilled at just that, aren’t we? Shteyngart is operating in
the thick of the comic dystopian tradition, a subgenre that has not only proven its power
on the printed page (Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, John Barth’s Giles Goat-Boy,
Michel Houellebecq’s Submission), but also on the cinema screen, as demonstrated
by some of the most peculiar and prescient political films ever made, such as Brazil,
The Truman Show and Idiocracy.
The hero of Super Sad True Love Story, Lenny Abramov, is out-of-touch with his
futuristic society, which often resembles an exaggeration of the worst aspects of our
current-day media-saturated culture. Abramov still reads books—rejected by most of
his contemporaries as stinky, dusty relics of an antiquated pre-digital age. People have
embraced ‘Media’ (with a capital M) instead but, as we gradually discover over the
course of the novel, this is not a real vocation anymore. Professional journalism doesn’t
exist; instead young wannabes stream their own speculations and commentaries on
the state of the world.
And it’s a sad state, especially in the United States
where an authoritarian government rules in the name
of “bipartisanship.” Orwellian abuses of language are
the calling card of the new administration, which
disseminates its harsh policies via slogans, signs,
logos and cartoon characters. The nation’s latest
marketing campaign is built on the catch phrase:
Together We’ll Surprise the World! That sounds
ominously appropriate for our current day political
branding—and it’s even short enough to fit in a tweet!
But this government constantly needs new slogans. In the dystopian world of Super Sad
True Love Story, the United States has fallen far behind the rest of the world, and China
has emerged as the lender of last resort for Americans. The failing Bipartisans are
constantly seeking for some new policy to turn things around. Sometimes they
promote consumer spending. But in other instances, they push for more savings. As a
last resort, they even launch a war against Venezuela. The policies are different, but they
have one thing in common: they always fail and produce unintended bad consequences
along the way.
It’s an ugly world. But Abramov has one advantage. He has a job with a successful high
tech company that offers HNWI (that stands for High New Worth Individuals) a chance to
live forever. The price tag is high, but those who sign up get access to a range of
advanced medical techniques that reverse the course of aging. Lenny’s boss Joshua
is not just CEO of the company, but also a flesh-and-blood example of its services. He
is 70 years old, but looks younger than 39-year-old Abramov. The latter would like to
participate in the rejuvenation processes, but he needs to make a few million yuan-
pegged dollars if he hopes to take advantage of this biotech fountain of youth.
Abramov shares the narrating responsibilities of this story with his love interest Eunice
Park. Lenny and Eunice share a similar background: they are both children of over-
bearing immigrants (Russian Jews and Korean Christians respectively) who are
torn between a desire to assimilate to American ways and a need to hold on to family
roots and traditions. Lenny is considerably older than Eunice, but ironically has an
even older competitor for her affections, namely his boss Josh, who feels that his
juiced-up body is ready for romance.
This thumbnail description of the plot does not do justice to Shteyngart’s richly comic
storytelling. The chapters related by Eunice are presented in the form of emails and
texts to her family and friends. While reading them, I couldn’t help but be reminded of
Frank Zappa’s classic satire song “Valley Girl.” Shteyngart, like Zappa, has great skill
in capturing the shallow jargon and mind-numbing consumerism of modern times.
Abramov’s chapters, in contrast, are presented as more sober diary entries, filled
with self doubts, motivational musings and existential angst. The contrast between
the two prose styles could hardly be more pronounced, and the budding romance
between these two individuals, with their incompatible worldviews, provides ample
momentum for both humor and narrative surprises.
The collapse of society is almost a sub-plot in the context of this book. But that merely
adds to the opportunities for satire in Shteyngart's engaging novel. There’s a reason
why absurdist stories about politics are usually written from the perspective of the
outsider or subaltern—think, for example, of Kafka's The Trial or Heller’s Catch-22.
You need to get outside the groupthink in order to appreciate it in all its idiocy. The
insiders are just cogs, each turning in their prescribed direction. Only the uninitiated
trying to make sense of the whole machine can savor its dysfunction.
Shteyngart closes the book with a surprising coda, which turns the satire around and
focuses it on the literary world. Our author shows he can even laugh at himself, and
at the pretensions of highbrow writers. That capability—to laugh at ourselves—may
even be a corrective to some of our real world political woes, and not just inside
books of fiction. There are two types of comedy: one invites people to laugh at us,
and the other demands that we only laugh at people different from us. The first is
gentle and disarming, the second is cruel and corrosive. Even though we live in a
culture that puts great stock in comedy, there’s a great shortage of that self-directed
laughter. It’s not the least virtue of Super Sad True Love Story that Shteyngart does
what he can to fill the gap.
Ted Gioia writes on music, literature and popular culture. He is the author of ten books.
His most recent book is How to Listen to Jazz (Basic Books).
Publication date: July 10, 2018
for the idiom, the masterpiece that did more than any other work to pave the way for
the current obsession with sociopolitical commentary in the guise of dark futuristic fable.
Without Orwell as the role model—or perhaps 'big brother' is a better label?—we would
never have Fahrenheit 451, The Handmaid’s Tale, A Clockwork Orange, The Road,
Never Let Me Go and so many other seminal works of fiction with their own twist on
the Orwellian narrative.
But let’s not forget that Orwell wrote another dystopian
novel, Animal Farm, which was drew on the techniques
of satire and absurdism to makes it points. This book
also has a legacy, less pervasive yet just as significant.
The comic dystopian tale is less common than its dark
twin, but can be just as thought-provoking. In fact, the
attempt to reframe political debate as a series of comic
observations on an apocalyptic future-in-the-making
might even be considered as the de facto tone of in-the-
moment media. If you doubt it, just spend a few moments
measuring the mood of Twitter and social media, or late
night monologues and Saturday Night Live, or even the
pronouncements emanating from the centers of political
power. Absurdism was once a literary style; nowadays
it’s a way of coping.
This is the context in which we are invited to make sense
of Gary Shteyngart’s novel Super Sad True Love Story
(2010). At first glance, that might seem an admonishment
to make sense of nonsense, but we are all getting quite
skilled at just that, aren’t we? Shteyngart is operating in
the thick of the comic dystopian tradition, a subgenre that has not only proven its power
on the printed page (Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, John Barth’s Giles Goat-Boy,
Michel Houellebecq’s Submission), but also on the cinema screen, as demonstrated
by some of the most peculiar and prescient political films ever made, such as Brazil,
The Truman Show and Idiocracy.
The hero of Super Sad True Love Story, Lenny Abramov, is out-of-touch with his
futuristic society, which often resembles an exaggeration of the worst aspects of our
current-day media-saturated culture. Abramov still reads books—rejected by most of
his contemporaries as stinky, dusty relics of an antiquated pre-digital age. People have
embraced ‘Media’ (with a capital M) instead but, as we gradually discover over the
course of the novel, this is not a real vocation anymore. Professional journalism doesn’t
exist; instead young wannabes stream their own speculations and commentaries on
the state of the world.
And it’s a sad state, especially in the United States
where an authoritarian government rules in the name
of “bipartisanship.” Orwellian abuses of language are
the calling card of the new administration, which
disseminates its harsh policies via slogans, signs,
logos and cartoon characters. The nation’s latest
marketing campaign is built on the catch phrase:
Together We’ll Surprise the World! That sounds
ominously appropriate for our current day political
branding—and it’s even short enough to fit in a tweet!
But this government constantly needs new slogans. In the dystopian world of Super Sad
True Love Story, the United States has fallen far behind the rest of the world, and China
has emerged as the lender of last resort for Americans. The failing Bipartisans are
constantly seeking for some new policy to turn things around. Sometimes they
promote consumer spending. But in other instances, they push for more savings. As a
last resort, they even launch a war against Venezuela. The policies are different, but they
have one thing in common: they always fail and produce unintended bad consequences
along the way.
It’s an ugly world. But Abramov has one advantage. He has a job with a successful high
tech company that offers HNWI (that stands for High New Worth Individuals) a chance to
live forever. The price tag is high, but those who sign up get access to a range of
advanced medical techniques that reverse the course of aging. Lenny’s boss Joshua
is not just CEO of the company, but also a flesh-and-blood example of its services. He
is 70 years old, but looks younger than 39-year-old Abramov. The latter would like to
participate in the rejuvenation processes, but he needs to make a few million yuan-
pegged dollars if he hopes to take advantage of this biotech fountain of youth.
Abramov shares the narrating responsibilities of this story with his love interest Eunice
Park. Lenny and Eunice share a similar background: they are both children of over-
bearing immigrants (Russian Jews and Korean Christians respectively) who are
torn between a desire to assimilate to American ways and a need to hold on to family
roots and traditions. Lenny is considerably older than Eunice, but ironically has an
even older competitor for her affections, namely his boss Josh, who feels that his
juiced-up body is ready for romance.
This thumbnail description of the plot does not do justice to Shteyngart’s richly comic
storytelling. The chapters related by Eunice are presented in the form of emails and
texts to her family and friends. While reading them, I couldn’t help but be reminded of
Frank Zappa’s classic satire song “Valley Girl.” Shteyngart, like Zappa, has great skill
in capturing the shallow jargon and mind-numbing consumerism of modern times.
Abramov’s chapters, in contrast, are presented as more sober diary entries, filled
with self doubts, motivational musings and existential angst. The contrast between
the two prose styles could hardly be more pronounced, and the budding romance
between these two individuals, with their incompatible worldviews, provides ample
momentum for both humor and narrative surprises.
The collapse of society is almost a sub-plot in the context of this book. But that merely
adds to the opportunities for satire in Shteyngart's engaging novel. There’s a reason
why absurdist stories about politics are usually written from the perspective of the
outsider or subaltern—think, for example, of Kafka's The Trial or Heller’s Catch-22.
You need to get outside the groupthink in order to appreciate it in all its idiocy. The
insiders are just cogs, each turning in their prescribed direction. Only the uninitiated
trying to make sense of the whole machine can savor its dysfunction.
Shteyngart closes the book with a surprising coda, which turns the satire around and
focuses it on the literary world. Our author shows he can even laugh at himself, and
at the pretensions of highbrow writers. That capability—to laugh at ourselves—may
even be a corrective to some of our real world political woes, and not just inside
books of fiction. There are two types of comedy: one invites people to laugh at us,
and the other demands that we only laugh at people different from us. The first is
gentle and disarming, the second is cruel and corrosive. Even though we live in a
culture that puts great stock in comedy, there’s a great shortage of that self-directed
laughter. It’s not the least virtue of Super Sad True Love Story that Shteyngart does
what he can to fill the gap.
Ted Gioia writes on music, literature and popular culture. He is the author of ten books.
His most recent book is How to Listen to Jazz (Basic Books).
Publication date: July 10, 2018
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Radical, unconventional and
experimental fiction
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Great literary works
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Radical, unconventional and
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| Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart |
Essay by Ted Gioia
Ted Gioia is publishing essays on his
50 favorite works of non-realist fiction
released since 2000. Featured books
will include works of magical realism,
alternative history, sci-fi, horror, and
fantasy, as well as mainstream literary
fiction that pushes boundaries and
challenges conventional notions of
verisimilitude.
Click here for the other titles
50 favorite works of non-realist fiction
released since 2000. Featured books
will include works of magical realism,
alternative history, sci-fi, horror, and
fantasy, as well as mainstream literary
fiction that pushes boundaries and
challenges conventional notions of
verisimilitude.
Click here for the other titles
| conceptual fiction Exploring the Non-Realist Tradition in Fiction |
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Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
(with links to essays on each work)
Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Aldiss, Brian
Barefoot in the Head
Aldiss, Brian
Hothouse
Aldiss, Brian
Report on Probability A
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amado, Jorge
Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Blind Assassin
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Bacigalupi, Paolo
The Windup Girl
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
The Atrocity Exhibition
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Ballard, J.G.
The Drowned World
Barker, Clive
Books of Blood, Vols. 1-3
Barth, John
Giles Goat-Boy
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Bierce, Ambrose
The Complete Short Stories
Blackwood, Algernon
The Complete John Silence Stories
Blish, James
A Case of Conscience
Borges, Jorge Luis
Ficciones
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Brockmeier, Kevin
The View from the Seventh Layer
Brooks, Max
World War Z
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
Bunch, David R.
Moderan
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Butler, Octavia E.
Fledgling
Campbell, Ramsey
Demons by Daylight
Campbell, Ramsey
The Nameless
Card, Orson Scott
Ender's Game
Carpentier, Alejo
The Kingdom of This World
Carroll, Lewis
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Chabon, Michael
The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Chambers, Robert W.
The King in Yellow
Chiang, Ted
Stories of Your Life and Others
Clarke, Arthur C.
Childhood's End
Clarke, Arthur C.
A Fall of Moondust
Clarke, Arthur C.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Clarke, Susanna
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Cline, Ernest
Ready Player One
Crichton, Michael
Jurassic Park
Crowley, John
Little, Big
Danielewski, Mark Z.
The Fifty Year Sword
Danielewski, Mark Z.
House of Leaves
Davies, Robertson
Fifth Business
Delany, Samuel R.
Babel-17
Delany, Samuel R.
Dhalgren
Delany, Samuel R.
The Einstein Intersection
Delany, Samuel R.
Nova
Dick, Philip K.
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Dick, Philip K.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
Dick, Philip K.
The Man in the High Castle
Dick, Philip K.
Ubik
Dick, Philip K.
VALIS
Dickens, Charles
A Christmas Carol
Disch, Thomas M.
Camp Concentration
Disch, Thomas M.
The Genocides
Doctorow, Cory
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Donoso, José
The Obscene Bird of Night
Egan, Jennifer
A Visit from the Goon Squad
Ellison, Harlan (editor)
Dangerous Visions
Ellison, Harlan
I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream
Esquivel, Laura
Like Water for Chocolate
Farmer, Philip José
To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Fowles, John
A Maggot
Fuentes, Carlos
Aura
Gaiman, Neil
American Gods
Gaiman, Neil
Neverwhere
Gardner, John
Grendel
Gibson, William
Burning Chrome
Gibson, William
Neuromancer
Grass, Günter
The Tin Drum
Greene, Graham
The End of the Affair
Grossman, Lev
The Magicians
Haig, Matt
The Humans
Haldeman, Joe
The Forever War
Hall, Steven
The Raw Shark Texts
Harrison, M. John
The Centauri Device
Harrison, M. John
Light
Heinlein, Robert
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Heinlein, Robert:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Heinlein, Robert
Time Enough for Love
Helprin, Mark
Winter's Tale
Hendrix, Grady
Horrorstör
Herbert, Frank
Dune
Joe Hill
Heart-Shaped Box
Hill, Susan
The Woman in Black
Hoffman, Alice
Practical Magic
Houellebecq, Michel
Submission
Huxley, Aldous
Brave New World
Ishiguro, Kazuo
Never Let Me Go
Jackson, Shirley
The Haunting of Hill House
James, Henry
The Turn of the Screw
James, M.R.
Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
Keret, Etgar
Suddenly, A Knock at the Door
Ketchum, Jack
Off Season
Keyes, Daniel
Flowers for Algernon
King, Stephen
Carrie
King, Stephen
Pet Sematary
Koja, Kathe
The Cipher
Krilanovich, Grace
The Orange Eats Creeps
Kundera, Milan
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Kunzru, Hari
Gods Without Men
Lafferty, R.A.
Nine Hundred Grandmothers
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Dispossessed
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Lathe of Heaven
Le Guin, Ursula K.
The Left Hand of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
The Big Time
Leiber, Fritz
Conjure Wife
Leiber, Fritz
Our Lady of Darkness
Leiber, Fritz
Swords & Deviltry
Leiber, Fritz
The Wanderer
Lem, Stanislaw
His Master's Voice
Lem, Stanislaw
Solaris
Lethem, Jonathan
The Fortress of Solitude
Levin, Ira
Rosemary's Baby
Lewis, C. S.
The Chronicles of Narnia
Lindqvist, John Ajvide
Let the Right One In
Link, Kelly
Magic for Beginners
Lovecraft, H.P.
Tales
Machen, Arthur
The Great God Pan
Malzberg, Barry N.
Herovit's World
Mandel, Emily St. John
Station Eleven
Mann, Thomas
Doctor Faustus
Márquez, Gabriel García
100 Years of Solitude
Markson, David
Wittgenstein's Mistress
Matheson, Richard
Hell House
Matheson, Richard
I Am Legend
Matheson, Richard
What Dreams May Come
McCarthy, Cormac
The Road
Miéville, China
Embassytown
Miéville, China
Perdido Street Station
Miller, Jr., Walter M.
A Canticle for Leibowitz
Millhauser, Steven
Dangerous Laughter
Mitchell, David
Cloud Atlas
Moorcock, Michael
Behold the Man
Moorcock, Michael
The Final Programme
Morris, Jan
Hav
Morrison, Toni
Beloved
Murakami, Haruki
1Q84
Murakami, Haruki
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the
End of the World
Nabokov, Vladimir
Ada, or Ardor
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o
Wizard of the Crow
Niffenegger, Audrey
The Time Traveler's Wife
Niven, Larry
Ringworld
Noon, Jeff
Vurt
North, Claire
The First 15 Lives of Harry August
Obreht, Téa
The Tiger's Wife
O'Brien, Flann
At Swim-Two-Birds
Okri, Ben
The Famished Road
Oyeyemi, Helen
White is for Witching
Percy, Walker
Love in the Ruins
Poe, Edgar Allan
Tales of Mystery & Imagination
Pohl, Frederik
Gateway
Pratchett, Terry
The Color of Magic
Pynchon, Thomas
Gravity's Rainbow
Rabelais, François
Gargantua and Pantagruel
Rice, Anne
Interview with the Vampire
Robinson, Kim Stanley
Red Mars
Roth, Philip
The Plot Against America
Rowling, J.K.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone
Rushdie, Salman
Midnight's Children
Russ, Joanna
The Female Man
Saramago, José
Blindness
Sheckley, Robert
Dimension of Miracles
Sheckley, Robert
Mindswap
Sheckley, Robert
Store of the Worlds
Shelley, Mary
Frankenstein
Silverberg, Robert
Dying Inside
Silverberg, Robert
Nightwings
Silverberg, Robert
The World Inside
Simak, Clifford
City
Simak, Clifford
The Trouble with Tycho
Smith, Clark Ashton
The Dark Eidolon
Smith, Cordwainer
Norstrilia
Smith, Cordwainer
The Rediscovery of Man
Stephenson, Neal
Snow Crash
Straub, Peter
Ghost Story
Spinrad, Norman
Bug Jack Barron
Stevenson, Robert Louis
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde
Stoker, Bram
Dracula
Stross, Charles
Glasshouse
Sturgeon, Theodore
More Than Human
Sturgeon, Theodore
Some of Your Blood
Swift, Jonathan
Gulliver's Travels
Thomas, D.M.
The White Hotel
Tiptree, Jr., James
Warm Worlds and Otherwise
Tolkien, J.R.R.
The Hobbit
Tryon, Thomas
The Other
Updike, John
The Witches of Eastwick
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Mixed Men
Van Vogt, A.E.
Slan
Van Vogt, A.E.
The Voyage of the Space Beagle
Van Vogt, A.E.
The World of Null A
Vance, Jack
The Dragon Masters
Vance, Jack
Emphyrio
Vance, Jack
The Languages of Pao
Verne, Jules
Around the Moon
Verne, Jules
From the Earth to the Moon
Verne, Jules:
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Vollmann, William T
Last Stories and Other Stories
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat's Cradle
Vonnegut, Kurt
The Sirens of Titan
Vonnegut, Kurt
Slaughterhouse-Five
Wallace, David Foster
Infinite Jest
Wallace, Edgar
King Kong
Walpole, Horace
The Castle of Otranto
Walpole, Horace
Hieroglyphic Tales
Weir, Andy
The Martian
Wells, H.G.
The First Men in the Moon
Wells, H.G.
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Wells, H.G.
The Time Machine
Wilson, Robert Anton & Robert Shea
The Illuminatus! Trilogy
Winton, Tim
Cloudstreet
Wong, David
John Dies at the End
Woolf, Virginia
Orlando
Yamada, Taichi
Strangers
Zabor, Rafi
The Bear Comes Home
Zelazny, Roger
Lord of Light
Zelazny, Roger
This Immortal
Special Features
Notes on Conceptual Fiction
My Year of Horrible Reading
When Science Fiction Grew Up
Ray Bradbury: A Tribute
The Year of Magical Reading
Remembering Fritz Leiber
A Tribute to Richard Matheson
Samuel Delany's 70th birthday
The Sci-Fi of Kurt Vonnegut
The Most Secretive Sci-Fi Author
Curse You, Neil Armstrong!
Robert Heinlein at 100
A.E, van Vogt Tribute
The Puzzling Case of Robert Sheckley
The Avant-Garde Sci-Fi of Brian Aldiss
Science Fiction 1958-1975: A Reading List
Links to related sites
The New Canon
Great Books Guide
Postmodern Mystery
Fractious Fiction
Ted Gioia's web site
Ted Gioia on Twitter
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Los Angeles Review of Books
The Millions
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copies and promotional materials from
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Conceptual Fiction:
A Reading List
(with links to essays on each work)
Home Page
Abbott, Edwin A.
Flatland
Adams, Douglas
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Aldiss, Brian
Barefoot in the Head
Aldiss, Brian
Hothouse
Aldiss, Brian
Report on Probability A
Allende, Isabel
The House of the Spirits
Amado, Jorge
Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands
Amis, Martin
Time's Arrow
Apuleius
The Golden Ass
Asimov, Isaac
The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac
I, Robot
Atwood, Margaret
The Blind Assassin
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid's Tale
Bacigalupi, Paolo
The Windup Girl
Banks, Iain M.
The State of the Art
Ballard, J.G.
The Atrocity Exhibition
Ballard, J.G.
Crash
Ballard, J.G.
The Crystal World
Ballard, J.G.
The Drowned World
Barker, Clive
Books of Blood, Vols. 1-3
Barth, John
Giles Goat-Boy
Bester, Alfred
The Demolished Man
Bierce, Ambrose
The Complete Short Stories
Blackwood, Algernon
The Complete John Silence Stories
Blish, James
A Case of Conscience
Borges, Jorge Luis
Ficciones
Bradbury, Ray
Dandelion Wine
Bradbury, Ray
Fahrenheit 451
Bradbury, Ray
The Illustrated Man
Bradbury, Ray
The Martian Chronicles
Bradbury, Ray
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Brockmeier, Kevin
The View from the Seventh Layer
Brooks, Max
World War Z
Bulgakov, Mikhail
The Master and Margarita
Bunch, David R.
Moderan
Burgess, Anthony
A Clockwork Orange
Butler, Octavia E.
Fledgling
Campbell, Ramsey
Demons by Daylight
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Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
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Ready Player One
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House of Leaves
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Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
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Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
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A Visit from the Goon Squad
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I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream
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Like Water for Chocolate
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To Your Scattered Bodies Go
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A Maggot
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Time Enough for Love
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Gods Without Men
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His Master's Voice
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Magic for Beginners
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Station Eleven
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Doctor Faustus
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100 Years of Solitude
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Wittgenstein's Mistress
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Hell House
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I Am Legend
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What Dreams May Come
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A Canticle for Leibowitz
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John Dies at the End
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The Bear Comes Home
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Lord of Light
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This Immortal
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