Literary fiction · Similar reads
Books like The Plague
The best books like The Plague are The Stranger, The Fall, and The Myth of Sisyphus. The Plague by Albert Camus is about collective suffering, solidarity and isolation, resistance and complicity. 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 Stranger
01
Albert Camus · Literary fiction
Meursault is a French Algerian clerk who, over a few days following his mother's funeral, takes a girlfriend, shoots an Arab man on a beach for no clearly articulable reason, and is tried and sentenced to death.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - The Fall
02
Albert Camus · Literary fiction
Jean-Baptiste Clamence, a former Parisian defense lawyer living in the seamiest bar district of Amsterdam, monologues at a stranger in a series of evenings.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - The Myth of Sisyphus
03
Albert Camus · Philosophy
The Myth of Sisyphus begins with what Camus calls the only truly serious philosophical question: why not commit suicide?
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - Existentialism Is a Humanism
04
Jean-Paul Sartre · Philosophy
Existentialism Is a Humanism began as a 1945 lecture Sartre gave to a packed Paris hall in response to critics who called existentialism pessimistic, quietist, and dangerous.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - Man's Search for Meaning
05
Viktor E. Frankl · Psychology
Man's Search for Meaning is Viktor Frankl's account of his years as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps, including Auschwitz, and the psychological theory he developed from that experience.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary → - Lincoln in the Bardo
06
George Saunders · Literary fiction
Lincoln in the Bardo takes place over a single night in February 1862, when President Abraham Lincoln visits the crypt where his eleven-year-old son Willie has just been buried.
Both dig into collective suffering.
Read the summary → - The Handmaid's Tale
07
Margaret Atwood · Literary fiction
The Handmaid's Tale is set in the near-future theocratic Republic of Gilead, carved out of what was once the northeastern United States after a coup by a fundamentalist Christian movement.
Both dig into resistance and complicity.
Read the summary → - Iron Flame
08
Rebecca Yarros · Fantasy
Iron Flame picks up in the immediate aftermath of Fourth Wing's reveal, with Violet Sorrengail now knowing what the war is actually about and what her mother has been hiding.
Both dig into resistance and complicity.
Read the summary → - The Paris Library
09
Janet Skeslien Charles · Historical fiction
The Paris Library moves between two timelines: Paris in 1939–1944, where young Odile Souchet becomes a librarian at the American Library of Paris just as war is approaching; and rural Montana in the 1980s, where a teenage girl named Lily befriends her French neighbor, the now-elderly Odile, and slowly uncovers the history Odile has never spoken about.
Both dig into resistance and complicity.
Read the summary → - A Farewell to Arms
10
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
11
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 → - A Little Life
12
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.
A kindred literary fiction read.
Read the summary →
Books like The Plague: quick answers
What are the best books like The Plague?
The best books like The Plague by Albert Camus are The Stranger by Albert Camus, The Fall by Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus, Existentialism Is a Humanism by Jean-Paul Sartre, Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl, plus 7 more below. Each was chosen for themes it shares with The Plague, such as collective suffering, solidarity and isolation, resistance and complicity.
What should I read after The Plague?
A natural next read after The Plague is The Stranger by Albert Camus. A kindred literary fiction read. Other strong choices are The Fall by Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus, Existentialism Is a Humanism by Jean-Paul Sartre.
What books are similar to The Plague by Albert Camus?
The Plague centers on collective suffering, solidarity and isolation, resistance and complicity. Books with a similar feel include The Stranger by Albert Camus, The Fall by Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus, Existentialism Is a Humanism by Jean-Paul Sartre, Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl, Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders — all free to read and chat with on Superbook.
