Award-winning author Cormac McCarthy passed away last month at age 89. He published his first novel, The Orchard Keeper in 1965, and his most recent duology, The Passenger and Stella Maris, in 2022. Known for his bracing, bleak, and atmospheric prose, his literary fiction drew on both Southern and Western genre traditions. McCarthy's characters were often flawed, yet sympathetic, and their complexities gave his audience much with which to identify. While his voice is hard to match, here are several read-alike titles you may enjoy.
If you liked The Road, try...
For more apocalyptic fiction with complex characters and haunting settings, try The Book of the Unnamed Midwife by Meg Elison, Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler, and Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel.
If you liked No Country for Old Men, try...
For a gritty, atmospheric Western with memorable characters, try The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu by Tom Lin, Lucky Red by Claudia Cravens, Lone Women by Victor LaValle (currently a Peak Pick), and The Best Bad Things by Katrina Marie Carrasco.
If you liked All the Pretty Horses, try...
For more lyrical coming-of-age and family sagas with a moody tone and strong sense of place, try Woman of Light by Kali Fajardo-Anstine, Calling for a Blanket Dance by Oscar Hokeah, and The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver (Kingsolver just won the Women's Prize for Fiction for her newest novel, Demon Copperhead; Kingsolver and McCarthy share Appalachian roots and both cite it as a literary influence).
~Posted by Genesee R.
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