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What's a (fiction) book that's written intimately and will make me feel awe? (lemm.ee)

submitted 6 months ago by stillitcomes@lemm.ee to c/bookrecs@literature.cafe

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I read Martin McInnes's In Ascension recently. What I loved about it is that it felt both intimate and sweeping. Intimate in the sense of going deep into the protagonist's thoughts and feelings; sweeping in the nature of the things she thinks and does. Discovering and investigating things beyond all human knowledge, monologuing about the cyclic nature of life... The former keeps it grounded, the latter makes it exciting.

Another book that made me feel a similar way is Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation, although it's a very different kind of awe. Being a horror book and all.

What are other books that can make me feel that way again?

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[–] Audalin@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

You should enjoy Italo Calvino's Mr Palomar then.

Being an honest observer of the world outside, Mr Palomar seeks patterns in everything and is always torn between constantly emerging contradicting perspectives. He strives to attain transcendent understanding and fails; he also strives to connect with mundane everyday things and fails. He can't even decide which of the two is a nobler goal, and that indecision is also something he analyses.

It's a short beautiful book, give it a try.