Books like 'The Butterfly Lampshade'
Readers who enjoyed The Butterfly Lampshade by Aimee Bender also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary fantasy psychological magical-realism literary-fiction family epic
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Franz Kafka: The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka, John Updike
26 ratingsThe only available collection that brings together all of Kafka's storiesthose published during his lifetime and those released after his death...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century adult anthologies classics contemporary drama -
![Dark Mother Earth by Kristian Novak]()
Dark Mother Earth by Kristian Novak
14 ratingsAn amnesiac writer’s life of lies and false memories reaches a breaking point in this stunning English-language debut from an award-winning Croatian author.As a novelist, Matija makes things up for a living. Not yet thirty, he’s written two well-received books. It’s his third that is as big a failure as his private life...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century adult book coming-of-age contemporary crime -
![Iliad, Books 1–12 by Homer]()
Iliad, Books 1–12 by Homer
12 ratingsHere is a new Loeb Classical Library edition of Homer's stirring heroic account of the Trojan war and its passions...Categorized as:
epic literary-fiction adult ancient-civilization audiobook book classics contemporary -
![The Next Person You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom]()
The Next Person You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
28 ratingsThe Next Person You Meet in Heaven: (B&N Exclusive Edition) The Sequel to The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch AlbomThis special edition contains an extra chapter and is available exclusively at Barnes & Noble...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism audiobook book christian classics contemporary -
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![A Day Like This by Kelley McNeil]()
A Day Like This by Kelley McNeil
26 ratingsWhat if everything you’ve ever loved, ever known, ever believed to be true…just disappeared?Annie Beyers has everything—a beautiful house, a loving husband, and an adorable daughter. It’s a day like any other when she takes Hannah to the pediatrician…until she wakes hours later from a car accident. When she asks for her daughter, confused doctors tell Annie that Hannah never existed... -
![Burning Your Boats: The Collected Short Stories by Angela Carter, Salman Rushdie]()
Burning Your Boats: The Collected Short Stories by Angela Carter, Salman Rushdie
16 ratingsOne of our most imaginative and accomplished writers, Angela Carter left behind a dazzling array of work: essays, citicism, and fiction. But it is in her short stories that her extraordinary talents—as a fabulist, feminist, social critic, and weaver of tales—are most penetratingly evident...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century adult anthologies classics contemporary fairy-tale -
![The Loft by Bette Lee Crosby]()
The Loft by Bette Lee Crosby
8 ratings50 YEARS OF MEMORIES ARE HIDDEN IN THE WALLS OF THE LOFT... Annie only needs to find one... the one that will save Oliver's life. On the day of their wedding, Annie saw nothing but happiness ahead, but when an accident calls her back to Memory House, her world is changed forever... -
![Sebastian and the Troll by Fredrik Backman]()
Sebastian and the Troll by Fredrik Backman
12 ratingsThis is a short story I wrote in December 2017. It’s about pain. It’s been translated by my friend Vanja Vinter and is published here on my blog for now because I’m not really sure where else to put it yet. If you read it and find something you like with it you’re welcome to donate whatever you think it’s worth to a charity of your choice...Categorized as:
magical-realism fiction mental-illness contemporary fantasy psychological young-adult low-fantasy -
![The Midnight Library by Matt Haig]()
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
52 ratingsBetween life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices . .Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century action-adventure audiobook book contemporary -
![For One More Day by Mitch Albom]()
For One More Day by Mitch Albom
41 ratings"Every family is a ghost story..."Mitch Albom mesmerized readers around the world with his number one New York Times bestsellers, The Five People You Meet in Heaven and Tuesdays with Morrie. Now he returns with a beautiful, haunting novel about the family we love and the chances we miss.For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century afterlife audiobook book christian -
![Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend by Matthew Dicks]()
Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend by Matthew Dicks
28 ratingsImaginary friend Budo narrates this heartwarming story of love, loyalty, and the power of the imagination—the perfect read for anyone who has ever had a friend . . . real or otherwise.Budo is lucky as imaginary friends go. He's been alive for more than five years, which is positively ancient in the world of imaginary friends...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century action-adventure audiobook book children -
![A Spell of Rowans by Byrd Nash]()
A Spell of Rowans by Byrd Nash
6 ratingsRaised by a narcissistic mother, the Rowan children’s magical talents were twisted to fit her needs. When Rachel dies, her children must confront the past to have a future.Rachel Rowan could sniff out secrets and her antique shop, Rosemary Thyme, was a front to torment the residents of Grimsby. When she dies, her children are faced with the deadly fallout of blackmail, murder, and magic...Categorized as:
magical-realism family literary-fiction romance fantasy mystery fiction contemporary -
![What Lies Beyond The Stars by Michael Goorjian]()
What Lies Beyond The Stars by Michael Goorjian
10 ratings“Something in me knows of a life I was meant to live but for whatever reason, I have not . . . ”Words that ring painfully true for Adam Sheppard, a San Francisco programmer who has spent the vast majority of his 30-something years lost in the dim glow of a computer screen...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure adult book contemporary fiction humor -
![The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino, Jefferson Mays]()
The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino, Jefferson Mays
16 ratingsThe definitive edition of Calvino’s cosmicomics, bringing together all of these enchanting stories—including some never before translated—in one volume for the first timeIn Italo Calvino’s cosmicomics, primordial beings cavort on the nearby surface of the moon, play marbles with atoms, and bear ecstatic witness to Earth’s first dawn...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century action-adventure adult anthologies audiobook classics -
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![The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki]()
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki
18 ratingsAfter the tragic death of his beloved musician father, fourteen-year-old Benny Oh begins to hear voices. The voices belong to the things in his house - a sneaker, a broken Christmas ornament, a piece of wilted lettuce...Categorized as:
epic family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century audiobook book coming-of-age -
![Catastrophe: And Other Stories by Dino Buzzati]()
Catastrophe: And Other Stories by Dino Buzzati
6 ratingsIn Catastrophe, the renowned Italian short story writer Dino Buzzati brings vividly to life the slow and quietly terrifying collapse of our known, everyday world. In stories touched by the fantastical and the strange, and filled with humor, irony, and menace, Buzzati illuminates the nightmarish side of our ordinary existence...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century adult anthologies classics contemporary fiction -
![Mystic Tea by Rea Nolan Martin]()
Mystic Tea by Rea Nolan Martin
10 ratingsA community of quirky, mismatched, and endearing women struggle to find meaning and purpose on a ramshackle monastery in upstate New York. Having spent their lives in service to a church that seems to no longer serve them, they are confused about their own futures and the future of the entire monastery...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction action-adventure adult book christian contemporary female-author -
![The Force of Such Beauty: A Novel by Barbara Bourland]()
The Force of Such Beauty: A Novel by Barbara Bourland
10 ratingsAfter a failed escape attempt, the princess of a tiny kingdom begins to reevaluate her life. Caroline, a former marathon runner who dropped out of school at fourteen to pursue an Olympic medal, was the perfect candidate for a tiara: shapely, disciplined, accustomed to public attention, and utterly uneducated. When she meets Finn, the handsome prince of a small European kingdom, her fate is sealed...Categorized as:
literary-fiction family romance fiction contemporary fantasy historical-fiction audiobook -
![World of Wonders by Robertson Davies]()
World of Wonders by Robertson Davies
18 ratingsHailed by the Washington Post Book World as "a modern classic," Robertson Davies’s acclaimed Deptford Trilogy is a glittering, fantastical, cunningly contrived series of novels, around which a mysterious death is woven...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century adult book classics coming-of-age contemporary -
![The People of Paper by Salvador Plascencia]()
The People of Paper by Salvador Plascencia
18 ratingsThe People of Paper reveals the ever-elusive prophesies of the Shandean Baby Nostradamus and the approximate temperature and incendiary potential of halos. Herein disillusioned and AWOL saints reclaim their crowns and fight purses, while a gang of flower pickers go off to war, led by a lonely man who can not help but wet his bed in sadness... -
![Man Tiger by Eka Kurniawan]()
Man Tiger by Eka Kurniawan
18 ratingsA wry, affecting tale set in a small town on the Indonesian coast, Man Tiger tells the story of two interlinked and tormented families and of Margio, a young man ordinary in all particulars except that he conceals within himself a supernatural female white tiger. The inequities and betrayals of family life coalesce around and torment this magical being...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure adult book contemporary crime -
![Teatro Grottesco by Thomas Ligotti]()
Teatro Grottesco by Thomas Ligotti
18 ratingsThis collection features tormented individuals who play out their doom in various odd little towns, as well as in dark sectors frequented by sinister and often blackly comical eccentrics. The cycle of narratives that includes the title work of this collection, for instance, introduces readers to a freakish community of artists who encounter demonic perils that ultimately engulf their lives... -
![My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn]()
My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn
21 ratingsAn extraordinary and startlingly original sequel to Ishmael "Enthralling, shocking, hope-filled, and utterly fearless, Daniel Quinn leads us deeper and deeper into the human heart, history, and spirit. In My Ishmael, Quinn strikes out into entirely new territory, posing questions that will rock you on your heels, and providing tantalizing possibilities for a truly new world vision...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure adult animals anthologies classics contemporary -
![Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi]()
Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi
26 ratingsAn extraordinary debut novel, Freshwater explores the surreal experience of having a fractured self. It centers around a young Nigerian woman, Ada, who develops separate selves within her as a result of being born "with one foot on the other side...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century action-adventure audiobook book coming-of-age -
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![The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud by Ben Sherwood]()
The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud by Ben Sherwood
33 ratingsThe Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud tells the haunting story of a young man who narrowly survives a terrible car wreck that kills his little brother. Years later, the brothers’ bond remains so strong that it transcends the normal boundaries separating life and death. Charlie St. Cloud lives in a snug New England fishing village...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure afterlife audiobook book coming-of-age -
![A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw]()
A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw
26 ratingsTravis Wren has an unusual talent for locating missing people. Hired by families as a last resort, he requires only a single object to find the person who has vanished. When he takes on the case of Maggie St. James—a well-known author of dark, macabre children’s books—he’s led to a place many believed to be only a legend... -
![A Severed Wasp by Madeleine L'Engle]()
A Severed Wasp by Madeleine L'Engle
16 ratingsKatherine Forrester Vigneras, in a continuation of her story from The Small Rain, returns to New York City from Europe to retire. Now in her seventies, she encounters an old friend from her Greenwich Village days who, it turns out, is the former Bishop of New York. He asks Katherine to give a benefit concert at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction book children children-books classics contemporary female-author -
![Beyond Redemption by Michael R. Fletcher]()
Beyond Redemption by Michael R. Fletcher
14 ratingsFaith shapes the landscape, defines the laws of physics, and makes a mockery of truth. Common knowledge isn't an axiom, it's a force of nature. What the masses believe is. But insanity is a weapon, conviction a shield. Delusions give birth to foul new gods.Violent and dark, the world is filled with the Geisteskranken—men and women whose delusions manifest, twisting reality... -
![The Whalestoe Letters by Mark Z. Danielewski]()
The Whalestoe Letters by Mark Z. Danielewski
14 ratingsBetween 1982 and 1989, Pelafina H. Lièvre sent her son, Johnny Truant, a series of letters from The Three Attic Whalestoe Institute, a psychiatric facility in Ohio where she spent the final years of her life... -
![Windeye by Brian Evenson]()
Windeye by Brian Evenson
10 ratingsA woman falling out of sync with the world; a king's servant hypnotized by his murderous horse; a transplanted ear with a mind of its own. The characters in these stories live as interlopers in a world shaped by mysterious disappearances and unfathomable discrepancies between the real and imagined... -
![The Assembler of Parts by Raoul Wientzen]()
The Assembler of Parts by Raoul Wientzen
10 ratingsFrom the start of this extraordinary first novel, eight-year-old Jess finds herself in heaven reviewing her short life. She is guided in this by a being she calls the Assembler of Parts, and her task, as she understands it, is to glean her life's meaning. From birth, it was obvious that she was unlike other children: she was born without thumbs...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism audiobook book coming-of-age contemporary death -
![Séances are for Suckers by Tamara Berry]()
Séances are for Suckers by Tamara Berry
10 ratingsWhen something goes bump in the night . . . it’s most likely a plumbing problem, or something equally mundane. But fake medium Eleanor Wilde is happy to investigate and cleanse your home of spectral presences—for a fee. Hey, it’s a living . . . Ellie has an ailing sister to care for, and working as a ghost hunter who doesn’t believe in ghosts helps cover the bills for both of them... -
![The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak]()
The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak
8 ratingsOn a train filled with quietly sleeping passengers, a young man’s life is forever altered when he is miraculously seen by a blind man. In a quiet town an American teacher who has lost her Japanese lover to death begins to lose her own self. On a remote road amid fallow rice fields, four young friends carefully take their own lives—and in that moment they become almost as one...Categorized as:
epic literary-fiction magical-realism adult anthologies coming-of-age contemporary fiction -
![For a Little While by Rick Bass]()
For a Little While by Rick Bass
8 ratingsA "New York Times Book Review" Editors' Choice "A literary titan...Bass is, hands down, a master of the short form, creating in a few pages a natural world of mythic proportions." -- "New York Times Book Review" Long considered one of the most gifted practitioners of the short story, Rick Bass is unsurpassed in his ability to perceive and portray the enduring truths of the human heart...Categorized as:
literary-fiction adult anthologies audiobook contemporary fiction outdoors psychological -
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![The Lost Storyteller by Amanda Block]()
The Lost Storyteller by Amanda Block
8 ratings"A powerful novel about the bond between fathers and daughters, and how stories connect us all. I loved it" Jenny Colgan THE LOST STORYTELLER is the heartwarming and evocative debut novel from a stunning new voice in fiction, Amanda Block. Perfect for fans of Ruth Hogan, Jessie Burton and Diane Setterfield.Rebecca hasn't seen her father Leo since she was six...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism adult audiobook book contemporary fairy-tale -
![Time Dancers by Steve Cash]()
Time Dancers by Steve Cash
6 ratingsSteve Cash created “an absorbing [and] intriguing saga” (The San Diego Union-Tribune) in his debut novel, The Meq. Outwardly indistinguishable from human beings, but with abilities no human can claim, the Meq search for their lost history and face a mysterious prophesied reckoning. . . .It has been thirty-eight years since Zianno–known as Z–turned twelve. In appearance, he has not aged a day... -
![The Boy Detective Fails by Joe Meno]()
The Boy Detective Fails by Joe Meno
16 ratings"In the twilight of a childhood full of wonder, Billy Argo, boy detective, is brokenhearted to find that his younger sister and crime-solving partner, Caroline, has committed suicide...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure book coming-of-age contemporary crime -
![Pigeon Feathers and Other Stories by John Updike]()
Pigeon Feathers and Other Stories by John Updike
12 ratingsThe triumphant collection of short stories by America's most acclaimed novelist... -
![Things that Fall from the Sky by Kevin Brockmeier]()
Things that Fall from the Sky by Kevin Brockmeier
10 ratingsWeaving together loss and anxiety with fantastic elements and literary sleight-of-hand, Kevin Brockmeier’s richly imagined Things That Fall from the Sky views the nagging realities of the world through a hopeful lens. In the deftly told “These Hands,” a man named Lewis recounts his time babysitting a young girl and his inconsolable sense of loss after she is wrenched away...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism adult anthologies comedy coming-of-age contemporary fiction -
![The Baggage Handler by David Rawlings]()
The Baggage Handler by David Rawlings
10 ratingsWhen three people take the wrong suitcase from baggage claim, their lives change forever. A hothead businessman coming to the city for a showdown meeting to save his job.A mother of three hoping to survive the days at her sister's house before her niece’s wedding.And a young artist pursuing his father’s dream so he can keep his own alive... -
![The Patron Saint of Ugly by Marie Manilla]()
The Patron Saint of Ugly by Marie Manilla
10 ratingsBorn in Sweetwater, West Virginia, with a mop of flaming red hair and a map of the world rendered in port-wine stains on every surface of her body, Garnet Ferrari is used to being an outcast...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure adult audiobook book contemporary -
![The Double by José Saramago]()
The Double by José Saramago
24 ratingsTertuliano Maximo Afonso is a history teacher in a secondary school. He is divorced, involved in a rather one-sided relationship with a bank clerk, and he is depressed. To lift his depression, a colleague suggests he rent a certain video. Tertuliano watches the film and is unimpressed. During the night, noises in his apartment wake him...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism 20th-century 21st-century action-adventure adult book classics -
![The Catalain Book of Secrets by Jessica Lourey, Jess Lourey]()
The Catalain Book of Secrets by Jessica Lourey, Jess Lourey
8 ratingsFaith Falls is a snug little Minnesota town constructed over a mystery, a place where the most impressive building is a gorgeous Queen Anne with turrets, cantilevered gables, and a wraparound porch. In a concealed room beneath the twisting stairs of the Queen Anne lies the Catalain Book of Secrets, the repository of the wisdom the Catalain women have gathered since the beginning of time... -
![The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom]()
The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
51 ratingsFrom the author of the phenomenal #1 New York Times bestseller Tuesdays with Morrie, a novel that explores the unexpected connections of our lives, and the idea that heaven is more than a place; it's an answer. Eddie is a wounded war veteran, an old man who has lived, in his mind, an uninspired life. His job is fixing rides at a seaside amusement park...Categorized as:
family literary-fiction magical-realism 21st-century afterlife audiobook book christian -
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![Swansong by Kerry Andrew]()
Swansong by Kerry Andrew
6 ratingsIn this stunningly assured, immersive and vividly atmospheric first novel, a young woman comes face-to-face with the volatile, haunted wilderness of the Scottish Highlands.Polly Vaughan is trying to escape the ravaging guilt of a disturbing incident in London by heading north to the Scottish Highlands...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism adult book contemporary female-author female-mc fiction -
![Last Summer at Mars Hill by Elizabeth Hand]()
Last Summer at Mars Hill by Elizabeth Hand
6 ratingsThis is Elizabeth Hand's long-awaited collection of short stories, centered around her Nebula and World Fantasy Award-winning novella The Last Summer at Mars Hill. There are 12 pieces in all here, ranging from those first published in places like Interzone and Pulphouse to a two-page poem taken from the pages of Asimov's...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism action-adventure adult anthologies colonization contemporary dark -
![The Televisionary Oracle by Rob Brezsny]()
The Televisionary Oracle by Rob Brezsny
6 ratingsMillions of people already live their lives in accordance with Rob Brezsny's "Real Astrology" prophecies. But the time has come for a deeper dose of Brezsny's brain. The Televisionary Oracle is an archetypal roller-coaster that would make Rumi dizzy and leave Carl Jung gasping for breath...Categorized as:
literary-fiction magical-realism adult alpha-mc anthologies contemporary female-mc feminism -
![Skeletal by Katherine Hayton]()
Skeletal by Katherine Hayton
6 ratingsThree months before she died Daina Harrow faced a bully at school.Six weeks before she died Daina Harrow suffered an assault in the park.One week before she died Daina Harrow stole a secret people had killed to hide. That was ten years ago. Ten long years.Now, her bones have been found on a building site. A coroner's inquest has been reopened. A parade of witnesses is about to start... -
![Don't Try This at Home by Angela Readman]()
Don't Try This at Home by Angela Readman
6 ratingsA girl repeatedly chops her boyfriend in half but, while her other half’ multiplies, she is still not satisfied. Love transforms a mother working down the chippie into Elvis. Clary’s father puts antlers on stuffed rabbits to make jackalopes, but when her mother walks out on them, Clary has to help her father if they are to survive... -
![Here in Avalon by Tara Isabella Burton]()
Here in Avalon by Tara Isabella Burton
6 ratingsAn “enchanting” (Caroline Kepnes, author of You) New York City fairy tale about two sisters that fall under the spell of an underworld cabaret troupe that might be a dangerous cult—but one that makes the materialist world left in its wake feel like a sinister cult itself.Rose has come a long way...Categorized as:
magical-realism literary-fiction fantasy fiction contemporary 21st-century mystery urban-fantasy
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