Any recommendations for good literary fiction on Kindle?

[Adele Ward]

When I say literary fiction, I don't mean the classics. I mean novels like The Mill River Recluse by Darcie Chan. I'm guessing it's literary fiction from the blurbs I've read. These recommendations could be by published authors, or self published authors.

[docnoir]

When I say literary fiction, I don't mean the classics. I mean novels like The Mill River Recluse by Darcie Chan. I'm guessing it's literary fiction from the blurbs I've read. These recommendations could be by published authors, or self published authors.

I'd go with rising star Kyle Minor. He's got a great short story collection out (available on Kindle) and he's got this short for sale, too, called "The Truth and All Its Ugly" http://amzn.to/y4N1fA. He's really one of the best around.

[Adele Ward]

I'll check those out. One of the great things about Kindle is that it's possible to get hold of short stories. They're just so hard to find in bookshops now, or published in print either. It's a form I love.

[docnoir]

Since I've been involved with quite a few literary magazines, and I also teach in a university creative writing program, I deal with short stories all the time. Maybe so much so that I hardly ever write them anymore! But I love it when a good short turns you on to a great author.

Also, Donald Ray Pollack (KNOCKEMSTIFF http://amzn.to/wDxaPR), Bonnie Jo Campbell (AMERICAN SALVAGE http://amzn.to/AtTMWn), my friend Frank Bill, who did fantastic with his collection this year (CRIMES IN SOUTHERN INDIANA http://amzn.to/zU8kkD), and Daniel Woodrell http://amzn.to/xfgFp6 all had good literary collections out.

[WritersWife]

I've read several very good books recently...here are a few that come to mind...happy reading! 

Commune of Women - Suzan Still (www.amazon.com/Commune-of-Women-ebook/dp/B0056A0VF8)
Double Exposure - Michael Lister (http://www.amazon.com/Double-Exposure-ebook/dp/B005307MGC)
The Turtle Boy - Kealan Patrick Burke (www.amazon.com/Turtle-Timmy-Quinn-Book-ebook/dp/B0041T5BC)


 

[Adele Ward]

Thanks for these suggestions. It's so good to see so many short stories as well as novels. Where else would that happen except on a Kindle board these days?

[Darlene Jones]

The Tiger's Wife and The Language of Flowers are two that I enjoyed recently.

[Nancy O'Hara]

The Art of Fielding is quite good even if it is about baseball:
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fielding-Novel-ebook/dp/B004QZ9PE2/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1325816733&sr=1-1

[Matt Bone]

Some modern literary reads:

Ali Smith - There But For The
Roberto Bolano - The Savage Detectives
Julian Barnes - The Sense Of An Ending
Jennifer Egan - A Visit From The Goon Squad
Aravind Adiga - Last Man In Tower

Edit: Not sure if the first two are on the kindle, but the last three definitely are.

[James Everington]

Here's some I've really enjoyed:

Jim Breslin - Elephant (Raymond Carver-esque short sories)
Neil Schiller - Oblivious (more Carver-esque short stories, but set in North England)
Marion Stein - Loisaida A New York Story (really good multi character novel set in 80s NY)
Dan Holloway - Songs From The Other Side Of The Wall (if you like Murakami you'll like this...)

James

[LauraB]

 

Never Let Me Go, and The Sense of an Ending are both on kindle. I read them both lately and enjoyed them.

[Adele Ward]

Never Let Me Go is one of my all time favourite novels. There's a part in it that really tore me apart. I won't say what it is. I must read Julian Barnes because I haven't for years, so that will definitely go on my To Be Read list. I want all my books on Kindle and I'm clearing bookshelves from my house for a minimalist look. Don't worry - I'm not destroying the books!

Some more great suggestions in here including authors I hadn't heard of so I'll be looking them all up. This is great because we can keep reading the authors we know and love if we don't get suggestions like these.

[James Everington]

I really liked Never Let Me Go, but have been somewhat disappointed with the others of his I've read since. They were all 'well-written' but lacked a bit of... oompph for me.

David Mitchell hasn't let me down yet though.

[Tony Rabig]

Look for the following writers:

Jon Hassler
Richard Russo
Joseph Epstein (two short story collections available)
V. S. Pritchett
Anne Tyler
Ann Joslin Williams
Thomas Williams (there are a couple Thomas Williams listed in the Kindle store -- the book you want is The Hair of Harold Roux)
Stanley Elkin
Tim O'Brien
Stewart O'Nan
Joyce Carol Oates

I'll probably think of some more later.

And I'll second several of James Everington's recommendations.

[Adele Ward]

@James I really like Never Let Me Go, The Remains of the Day, and Nocturnes (short stories). I wasn't really keen on When We Were Orphans. I wasn't completely sure in that if it was all a delusion due to the narrator having a condition like Aspergers and only imagining he was a private detective as there were clues that people didn't view him the way he viewed himself. But at other times his 'delusions' seemed to be reality, so it didn't work too well for me. A similar kind of self deception does work in The Remains of the Day much better. It would ruin it to see the film first though, because the reader mustn't know what is really happening with the housekeeper until the end. The main character hasn't got a clue and neither should we.

@Tony. Some great suggestions. I keep meaning to read more Joyce Carol Oates and good to hear she's on Kindle.

[StephenLivingston]

Try Aravind Adiga's "The White Tiger".  I thought it was excellent.
Best wishes, Stephen Livingston.

[Maryann Faro]

Alice Hoffman. She's trad published yet I notice that a couple of her ebooks are priced quite reasonably. For example, Seventh Heaven is under $5 as I type this. Seventh Heaven

(Note: I can't attest for the formatting of the ebook, because I have the hard copy book around here somewhere and didn't buy the ebook.)

[Steve Silkin]

I see that you can get Glenway Wescott's "Apartment in Athens" and "Pilgrim Hawk" for Kindle. (Although they're both in the $9 range, and Pilgrim Hawk is a pretty short book. But they're both great.)

If you don't know Wescott: Hemingway ridiculed him in a brief passage in "The Sun Also Rises." (They met in a Parisian bar, and Wescott was openly gay.) Wescott got his revenge, in a way: His book "The Grandmothers" went on to outsell Hemingway, Fitzgerald and just about everyone else of their generation. (It's an extraordinary book, too - the life stories of his pioneer grandparents, aunts and uncles and how they got through the Civil War - but I don't see it available on Kindle.)

"Apartment in Athens" is the story of a German officer quartered in the apartment of a Greek family during the Nazi occupation. "Pilgrim Hawk" is the story of a woman who brings her hawk and her husband for a visit to the French country house of the narrator's sister. I can't recommend them highly enough. They are great, great books!! (Don't read the introduction to Pilgrim Hawk before you read the book, though, it gives too much away, read it afterward.)

[Adele Ward]

These sound good and it's encouraging to see so much literary fiction available for Kindle, but by trad published and self-published authors. I don't mind about price to get the books I like. I read on Kindle because I prefer it and love my decluttered bookshelves! Well - I'm still working on the bookshelves but it's happening. Some of these sound intriguing - especially the hawk.

[djgross]

Three of my favorites from 2011:



The Language of Flowers has already been mentioned in the thread, as has Alice Hoffman.

I loved Never Let Me Go - beautiful and disturbing

[Sean Patrick Reardon]

Good timing. Just put the following review on Amazon:



5 Stars: A Work of Art
I have been entertained by many a good read, but what I truly enjoy, the reason why I read, is to be emotionally moved. A truly good piece of writing stays with you after the last page has been read and makes an impact on the way you view not only the world around you, but yourself. TOLLESBURY TIME FOREVER is such a story. The product description caught my attention and after reading the sample chapters, I could not buy it fast enough. There are sentences, paragraphs, and passages within, that are better than entire novels I have read. During the course of the read, I had to make the decision to keep moving on rather than re-reading the beautiful prose, because the story was so good, I wanted to finsh it. A catch-22 for sure, but I knew I would be revisting the story again.

Along with the excellent writing and story, there are plenty of twists and turns you will never figure out, and it all builds up to a tremendous ending.

From the first page to the last, I was engaged, entertained, and most of all emotionally invested. As a reader, I could not ask for any more!

[dgaughran]

The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa (who won the Nobel Prize last year)

EDIT: Not available for the Kindle. Good to see his publisher up to speed. You would think now that a guy winning the Nobel Prize might give you some impetus to release one of his biggest sellers as an e-book, right? Not so much.

Ok, new recommendation, "Birds Without Wings" by Louis de Bernieres http://www.amazon.com/Birds-Without-Wings-ebook/dp/B005Y0N2FQ/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1326154355&sr=1-5

Expensive, but worth every penny. A masterpiece.

[R. Doug]

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

[Rebecca Burke]

Margaret Atwood's books are great if you haven't already read them. The dystopian novels The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake are definitely on Kindle now; it would be surprising if they all weren't. Julian Barnes' novel The Sense of an Ending couldn't be better, and it is on Kindle (a psychological page-turner set in contemporary England; won the Booker prize).

[journeymama]

Yeah, I loved the Tiger's Wife. Also, The Boy in the Suitcase was mystery/crime, but very literary in nature. Beautiful.