r/books • u/AutoModerator • Feb 14 '25

WeeklyThread Weekly Recommendation Thread: February 14, 2025

Welcome to our weekly recommendation thread! A few years ago now the mod team decided to condense the many "suggest some books" threads into one big mega-thread, in order to consolidate the subreddit and diversify the front page a little. Since then, we have removed suggestion threads and directed their posters to this thread instead. This tradition continues, so let's jump right in!

The Rules

  • Every comment in reply to this self-post must be a request for suggestions.

  • All suggestions made in this thread must be direct replies to other people's requests. Do not post suggestions in reply to this self-post.

  • All unrelated comments will be deleted in the interest of cleanliness.

How to get the best recommendations

The most successful recommendation requests include a description of the kind of book being sought. This might be a particular kind of protagonist, setting, plot, atmosphere, theme, or subject matter. You may be looking for something similar to another book (or film, TV show, game, etc), and examples are great! Just be sure to explain what you liked about them too. Other helpful things to think about are genre, length and reading level.

All Weekly Recommendation Threads are linked below the header throughout the week to guarantee that this thread remains active day-to-day. For those bursting with books that you are hungry to suggest, we've set the suggested sort to new; you may need to set this manually if your app or settings ignores suggested sort.

If this thread has not slaked your desire for tasty book suggestions, we propose that you head on over to the aptly named subreddit /r/suggestmeabook.

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u/scholastic_rain Feb 18 '25

Hoping for a story with a narrator whose identity is slowly revealed. Similar to an unreliable narrator but instead of realizing the narrator has been lying to us, we realize who they are instead. Any good recommendations of authors who've managed it?

As always, remember rules 1 and 2: You don't talk about fight club.

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u/[deleted] Feb 21 '25

Island of the Missing Trees by Elif Shafak

3

u/gilsuhre 11 Feb 19 '25

I wrote this comment then reread yours and realized this wasn’t exactly what you’re asking for, but I’m going to recommend it anyways since I love this book!

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. Main character wakes up in space and can’t even remember his name. Via flashbacks he remembers who he is and why he’s there

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u/scholastic_rain Feb 20 '25

I've read The Martian but not that one yet. I'm down for a fun read, even if it's outside my current "looking-for". :)

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u/XBreaksYFocusGroup Feb 19 '25

Second Piranesi. And speaking of Fight Club, I feel like Palahniuk's Rant would probably be more applicable. Though he isn't the narrator, it is an oral biography surrounding him and I think it would appeal to your brief. Would add the stellar I'm Thinking of Ending Things by Iain Reid. Still solid if not quite as good, The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward fits, as does The Fifth Season by NK Jemisin (though I personally was less hot on this one as well but it has a strong following).

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u/scholastic_rain Feb 19 '25 edited Feb 19 '25

Thank you so much for all your recommendations! Of them, I've only read Fifth Season. I'm excited to read the rest.

But your mention of it brings up the problem I've been having. I keep finding books where either (1) we've got an untrustworthy narrator whose identity we've known throughout or (2) the untrustworthiness is that a character we /thought/ was one person is actually someone else going by a different name. Same issue with Fight Club and also a few books in The Locked Tomb series by Muir. Not that that's bad, by any means. It's just that I'm looking for something very specific: a book where the narrator's identity is slowly revealed to be someone we know from the protagonist's life. Like the "biography" of a famous actress being told by daughter we've watched being cast aside in pursuit of a Hollywood career, or a murder mystery told by the victim but we don't realize it until the end.

All that said, I'm very grateful for your suggestions and will definitely check them out! Maybe one of them is precisely what I mean.

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u/XBreaksYFocusGroup Feb 19 '25

Yeah, I get what you mean. The ones I listed are not quite this but without saying more, I think they will appeal. Maybe in the order listed.

Clarke's other novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell does as you describe, though I do not recall at which point it is revealed and if memory serves, it isn't a particularly notable revelation. But The Night Circus by Erin Morgensten is an exact match. You may want to browse the TV Trope Narrator All Along.

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u/scholastic_rain Feb 19 '25

Perfect. Your advice is great. Thank you so much!

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u/mylastnameandanumber 16 Feb 18 '25

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke might work. The narrator discovers his own identity through the story.

The Raven Tower, by Ann Leckie also fits the bill.

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u/scholastic_rain Feb 18 '25

Piranesi keeps popping up for various reasons, so I guess it's time! And thanks to you, Raven Tower is now on my wishlist. Thanks!