Short stories · Similar reads
Books like Exhalation: Stories
The best books like Exhalation: Stories are The Alchemist, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, and Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness. Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang is about free will and determinism, memory and identity, technology and consciousness. 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 Alchemist
01
Paulo Coelho · Religion & Spirituality
The Alchemist is a Brazilian novel first published in 1988 and translated into 80 languages, making it one of the most translated books in history.
A kindred short stories read.
Read the summary → - Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
02
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Yuval Noah Harari · History
Sapiens traces the full arc of human history from the emergence of Homo sapiens in Africa roughly 70,000 years ago to the present.
A kindred short stories read.
Read the summary → - Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness
03
Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness
Peter Godfrey-Smith · Science
Peter Godfrey-Smith is a philosopher of science and a scuba diver who began spending time with octopuses off the coast of Sydney, and Other Minds is the result of that dual perspective.
A kindred short stories read.
Read the summary → - Ficciones
04
Jorge Luis Borges · Short stories
Ficciones collects seventeen short stories and fictions by the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, first published in two parts in 1941 and 1944.
Shares memory and identity and time and causality with Exhalation: Stories.
Read the summary → - Stories of Your Life and Others
05
Stories of Your Life and Others
Ted Chiang · Short stories
Eight stories, all of them rigorously thought-out, many of them devastating.
Both dig into free will and determinism.
Read the summary → - Lila
06
Marilynne Robinson · Literary fiction
Lila is the third novel set in Gilead, Iowa, and it arrives as a prequel and companion to both Gilead and Home.
Both dig into memory and identity.
Read the summary → - Night Watch
07
Terry Pratchett · Fantasy
Night Watch is the twenty-ninth Discworld novel and the one many readers consider Pratchett's masterpiece.
Both dig into memory and identity.
Read the summary → - Old Man's War
08
John Scalzi · Science fiction
John Perry is 75 years old when he enlists in the Colonial Defense Forces.
Both dig into what it means to be human.
Read the summary → - Piranesi
09
Susanna Clarke · Fantasy
Piranesi is structured as the journal of a man who calls himself Piranesi, living in a House that contains the world: a vast and apparently infinite series of halls filled with marble statues, where the tides come in twice a day and the skies are visible through the upper floors.
Both dig into memory and identity.
Read the summary → - Project Hail Mary
10
Andy Weir · Science fiction
Ryland Grace wakes up alone on a spacecraft with no memory of who he is, where he is, or why he's there.
Both dig into memory and identity.
Read the summary → - The English Patient
11
Michael Ondaatje · Literary fiction
The English Patient is set at the end of the Second World War, in a damaged Italian villa north of Florence.
Both dig into memory and identity.
Read the summary → - Dubliners
12
James Joyce · Short stories
Dubliners is a collection of fifteen short stories set in Dublin in the early twentieth century, published in 1914 after nearly a decade of rejections and publisher disputes over its frank treatment of Irish life.
A kindred short stories read.
Read the summary →
Books like Exhalation: Stories: quick answers
What are the best books like Exhalation: Stories?
The best books like Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang are The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari, Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith, Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges, Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang, plus 7 more below. Each was chosen for themes it shares with Exhalation: Stories, such as free will and determinism, memory and identity, technology and consciousness.
What should I read after Exhalation: Stories?
A natural next read after Exhalation: Stories is The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. A kindred short stories read. Other strong choices are Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari, Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith, Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges.
What books are similar to Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang?
Exhalation: Stories centers on free will and determinism, memory and identity, technology and consciousness. Books with a similar feel include The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari, Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith, Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges, Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang, Lila by Marilynne Robinson — all free to read and chat with on Superbook.
