Literary fiction · Similar reads
Books like The Finkler Question
The best books like The Finkler Question are The Great Gatsby, Normal People, and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson is about jewish identity, grief and friendship, antisemitism. If that's what drew you in, here are 12 books that share its DNA — each summarized on Superbook, and ready to chat with in the app.
- The Great Gatsby
01
F. Scott Fitzgerald · Classics
The Great Gatsby is narrated by Nick Carraway, a young Midwesterner who moves to Long Island in the summer of 1922 and finds himself adjacent to the fabulous, mysterious parties of his neighbor Jay Gatsby.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - Normal People
02
Sally Rooney · Literary fiction
Normal People follows Connell and Marianne from their small-town Irish secondary school through their years at Trinity College Dublin.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
03
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Dave Eggers · Memoir
Dave Eggers's debut memoir about losing both parents to cancer within five weeks and raising his younger brother Toph while trying to start a literary magazine in San Francisco in the mid-1990s arrived in 2000 with unusual self-consciousness about its own nature.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - The Bell Jar
04
Sylvia Plath · Memoir
The Bell Jar is Sylvia Plath's only novel, published in January 1963 under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas, one month before Plath's death.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - Beloved
05
Toni Morrison · Literary fiction
Beloved is set in post-Civil War Ohio, where Sethe, a formerly enslaved woman, lives with her daughter Denver in a house shadowed by the ghost of a baby she killed rather than let be taken back into slavery.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - A Little Life
06
Hanya Yanagihara · Literary fiction
A Little Life follows four men from college into middle age and beyond — Willem, an actor; JB, a painter; Malcolm, an architect; and Jude, a lawyer with a past that is revealed in increasingly devastating detail as the novel progresses.
Both dig into male friendship.
Read the summary → - Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust
07
Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen · History
Hitler's Willing Executioners is Daniel Goldhagen's argument that the Holocaust was made possible by a specifically German form of antisemitism — what he calls "eliminationist antisemitism" — that was so deeply embedded in German culture by the twentieth century that ordinary Germans participated in the genocide willingly, not reluctantly, and often with evident enthusiasm.
Both dig into antisemitism.
Read the summary → - The Chosen
08
Chaim Potok · Religion & Spirituality
The Chosen is set in Brooklyn in the 1940s and follows two Jewish boys — Reuven Malter, modern Orthodox and the son of a Talmud scholar, and Danny Saunders, the brilliant son of a Hasidic rebbe — who meet during a baseball game that turns violent and becomes an unlikely friendship.
Both dig into jewish identity.
Read the summary → - The Origins of Totalitarianism
09
The Origins of Totalitarianism
Hannah Arendt · History
Hannah Arendt published The Origins of Totalitarianism in 1951, just six years after the end of World War II.
Both dig into antisemitism.
Read the summary → - The Plot Against America
10
Philip Roth · Historical fiction
In Philip Roth's alternate history, Charles Lindbergh defeats Franklin Roosevelt in the 1940 presidential election on an America First platform, negotiates non-aggression agreements with Hitler and Hirohito, and begins a systematic program of quiet antisemitic policy that gradually shifts the conditions of Jewish American life.
Both dig into antisemitism.
Read the summary → - A Farewell to Arms
11
Ernest Hemingway · Literary fiction
A Farewell to Arms is set during the First World War in northern Italy and follows Frederic Henry, an American serving as a lieutenant in the Italian ambulance corps, who falls in love with Catherine Barkley, a British nurse.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - A Fine Balance
12
Rohinton Mistry · Literary fiction
A Fine Balance is set in an unnamed Indian city during Indira Gandhi's Emergency of 1975–1977, a period of suspended democracy, forced sterilization, and slum clearances that is barely taught in the West and barely taught in India.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary →
Books like The Finkler Question: quick answers
What are the best books like The Finkler Question?
The best books like The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson are The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Normal People by Sally Rooney, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, Beloved by Toni Morrison, plus 7 more below. Each was chosen for themes it shares with The Finkler Question, such as jewish identity, grief and friendship, antisemitism.
What should I read after The Finkler Question?
A natural next read after The Finkler Question is The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. A kindred literary fiction read. Other strong choices are Normal People by Sally Rooney, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.
What books are similar to The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson?
The Finkler Question centers on jewish identity, grief and friendship, antisemitism. Books with a similar feel include The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Normal People by Sally Rooney, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, Beloved by Toni Morrison, A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara — all free to read and chat with on Superbook.
