If you love reading stories that hide twists, high-tension endings or simply an original plot, you are a reader looking for strong emotions, books that leave their mark not only for the message and style, but also for the architecture that the authors managed to put together with mastery.
In this article we will suggest 5 perfect books to read if you are looking for a surprising plot. Not only thrillers, which inevitably are often characterized by this peculiarity, but also sci-fi novels, noir and epics of the magical realism genre. Let’s start dancing!
5 books to read with a surprising plot
“Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace
Many include it among the books that should be read at least once in a lifetime. “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace has a unique plot and style. There are no works that resemble this one. It is impossible to predict plot developments until you have read the entire book. Almost impossible to tear yourself away from it.
We recommend it if you love sci-fi novels and if you want something truly out of the ordinary.
In a not too distant future which worryingly resembles our present, goods, entertainment and advertising have now also occupied the interstices of daily life.
Canada and the United States are one supernation called ONAN, Quebec pursues independence through terrorism, they take drugs to avoid dying of boredom and desperation. And a lost and mysterious film, “Infinite jest”, by the late director James Incandenza, could become a weapon of mass destruction…
“The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle” by Stuart Turton
We don’t want to reveal too much about the plot of “The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle”. We’ll just tell you that it’s a mysterious and incredibly enveloping read that never ceases to surprise, even when the crime seems to have been definitively committed.
Blackheath House is a majestic country residence surrounded by thousands of acres of forest, a huge estate which, in its rooms with stuccos chipped by time, is ready to welcome guests to the masquerade ball organized by Lord Peter and Lady Helena Hardcastle.
The guests are members of high society, officers, bankers, doctors to whom the Hardcastle estate is well known. Nineteen years earlier they were all present at the reception where a tragic event – the death of the young Thomas Hardcastle – marked the history of the family and their residence, condemning both to an inexorable decline.
Now they have come attracted by the singular circumstance of finding themselves together again, by the surprises promised by Lord Peter for the evening, by the bizarre costumes to wear, by the fireworks.
At eleven in the evening, however, death returns to cast its dice at Blackheath House. The moment the predicted fireworks explode in the air, Evelyn, the young and beautiful daughter of Lord Peter and Lady Helena, slowly slips into the water of the pond that adorns the garden in front of the house. Dead, from a gunshot to her belly…
“Atonement” by Ian McEwan
In this book, what makes the plot so surprising and unpredictable is the subjective interpretation of events. One of Ian McEwan’s most intense novels.
At thirteen, a love that blossoms can seem like plagiarism. A little girl who witnesses violence can convince herself that she has recognized the person responsible and have an innocent person convicted, ruining him and ruining herself. Because all life will be marked by consequences.
The little girl will grow up, become a writer, but will not free herself from the weight of the injustice inflicted on an innocent person, on her sister in love and ultimately on herself too.
“The Lying Love” by Gillian Flynn
“Liar Love” is one of the most cited titles when talking about works with a plot full of twists and turns. In this case, it is a textbook thriller, which has love and its darkest sides at its centre.
Amy and Nick meet on a freezing January evening. An exchange of glances and it’s immediately love. She is the perfect girl, beautiful and self-confident. He has a sly and charming look.
They are happy, a wonderful future awaits them. A few years later, however, everything changed: from Brooklyn they ended up in a remote corner of Missouri, as young career professionals they are now adrift unemployed, he owns a bar, she a housewife in a provincial town. Until, on the morning of their fifth anniversary, Amy disappears…
“Whale” by Cheon Myeong-kwan
Finally, a book that makes the unpredictable and originality its main characteristic. Everything from the plot to the characters makes “Whale” an incredible read. Even the genre of the work is difficult to categorize: an extraordinary Korean epic that tells the intertwined story of three women who seem to live in a liminal world, on the border between dream and reality.
Set in South Korea, Whale follows the lives of its characters as they intertwine in the beautiful world created by Cheon Myeong-Kwan.
A woman sells her daughter to a passing beekeeper for two jars of honey. A fifteen-pound baby girl is born in the dead of winter but is called “Spring Girl.” A storm tears down the roof of a dilapidated restaurant to reveal a hidden fortune.
A whale-shaped cinema holds the dreams of an entire family. Geumbok, who has been chasing an indescribable thrill ever since he first saw a whale crest in the ocean; her daughter Chunhui, who communicates with elephants and no one else; and a woman capable of controlling bees with a whistle.
With a plot overflowing with surprises and dark humor, Whale is a satire and an adventure with epic momentum, written by one of the most original pens in international literature.
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