And the Mountains Echoed
Khaled Hosseini
Hosseini spanning generations and continents from one act of separation. He always wrecks me.
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Never Let Me Go
Kazuo Ishiguro
Boarding-school kids whose purpose slowly, quietly reveals itself. Devastating in the calmest possible way.
Perfection
Vincenzo Latronico
A young expat couple in Berlin with the perfectly curated life and a creeping sense that none of it means anything. Short and quietly devastating.
★ 5Shuggie Bain
Douglas Stuart
I read Shuggie in three hours during a sleepless night (in retrospect, it probably exacerbated my insomnia rather than curing it.) This novel is relentless. The setting and situation—a crowded tenement apartment in 1980s Glasgow—is bleak when Shuggie begins, and things get bleaker. And bleaker. And bleaker. If you can stand the emotional flagellation, Shuggie will reward you. The characterization