Recommend Books with mysteries that have shocking conclusions. Looking for something that is NOT a plot twist but a unsettling mystery that slowly builds as the book continues. Where the characters are not aware of the mystery in beginning, but the reader notices. Maybe set in the future/dystopian, where characters don't understand why they are in certain situation. Less action more dialogue, with heavy themes and symbolism. Basically looking for something like the anime Darling in the Franxx.
Okay, sooooo let’s see. I’m good with mysteries, but most of them are modern or historical and most realise they’re solving a mystery to begin with. BUT, I have access to awesome databases that can help me narrow some things down for you so, here are some 3-5 star reviewed books that cover dystopian mystery. If you like them, come back and review them for me so we can let others know what you thought!
“The Forever Watch” by David RamirezDuring the thousand-year journey of the spaceship Noah, passengers live in a massive artificial city, purchasing memories of everyday sensations while doing their part to create the next generation of settlers. After telekinetic bureaucrat Hana Dempsey awakens from her nine-month compulsory “breeding duty,” gestating offspring she’ll never meet, she struggles to rejoin society. It’s only after Peace Officer Leon Barrens requests her assistance in solving a string of baffling murders that Hana shakes off her depression and begins to ask uncomfortable questions about Noah’s mission and the human civilization they’ve left behind. Part science fiction mystery, part dystopian thriller, The Forever Watch places well-drawn characters in a circumscribed, yet richly detailed setting and follows their journey from innocence to understanding to agents of their own fates. – Description by Gillian Speace.
“The Man With the Compound Eyes” by Ming-Yi Wu“The English-language debut of an exciting new award-winning voice from Taiwan–a stunning novel that is at once fantasy, reality, and dystopian environmental saga, in which the lives of two people from very different worlds intertwine under the shadow of a man-made catastrophe. On the mythical island of Wayo-Wayo, young Atile'i has just seen his 180th full moon and, following the tradition of his people, is sent out alone into the vast Pacific as a sacrifice to the Sea God. Just when it seems that all hope is lost, he happens upon a new home–a vast island made of trash. Meanwhile, in Taiwan, Alice, a professor of literature, is preparing to commit suicide following the disappearance of her husband and son. But her plans are put on hold when the trash island collides with the Taiwan coast where Alice lives. Her home is destroyed, but meeting Atile'i gives her life new meaning as they set out to solve the mystery of her lost family. Drawing in the narratives of others impacted by the disaster–Alice’s friends and neighbors, environmentalists from abroad, the mysterious man with compound eyes–the novel tells an enthralling, surreal story of the known–and unknown–world around us”–.
“The Dying Game” by Asa Avdic“In the not-too-distant future, a group of carefully chosen people spends 48 hours on a remote Swedish island engaged in what at first seems like an exercise but turns into a high-stakes test of survival and betrayal.It’s 2037, and the world is shockingly different yet terrifyingly the same: there’s been another Cold War, and, at least in the Protectorate of Sweden, loyalty to the all-powerful government is paramount. Anna Francis, recently back from a soul-sucking assignment in remote Kyzyl Kum, is as chilly as a Stockholm winter, a distant mother who leaves her 9-year-old daughter with relatives more often than she sees her. In the well-worn tradition of “just this one last time” that never ends well, she’s approached by the Chairman to participate in the top-secret RAN project, not as an actual member but as a quasi-spy. As if Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None was cross-pollinated with “The Most Dangerous Game,” Anna is charged with observing a small group of hand-selected Swedes for two days on the island of Isola; that is, until she’s meant to fake her own murder and disappear into the walls of the compound to watch how the others respond to the “crime."”
“The Bone Season” by Samantha ShannonPaige Mahoney is a Dreamwalker, a rare type of clairvoyant employed by the Seven Seals, the powerful criminal syndicate that operates within a dystopian 21st-century London controlled by the Scion government. When she’s captured by Scion agents and turned over to the otherworldly Rephaim, Paige – renamed XX-59-40 – ends up in Sheol I, a prison camp where she and her fellow "voyants” will be trained to battle the flesh-eating Emim. Placed under the guardianship of Arcturus, Warden of the Mesarthim, Paige must develop her gifts if she wants to survive, let alone escape. This fast-paced, action-packed fantasy boasts extensive world-building, a complex system of magic, and a well-developed cast of characters. - Description by Gillian Speace.
“Arcadia” by Iain PearsSpanning multiple worlds, this stylistically complex, yet accessible, novel tracks the intersecting lives of several characters. There’s Henry Lytten, a 1960s Oxford scholar; Angela Meersen, a “psychomathematician” from a dystopian future world who has discovered a method of accessing parallel universes; and Jay, a precocious young man from Anterworld, a universe created by Meersen based on Lytten’s writings – an “Arcadia” visited by Rosie Wilson, an otherwise ordinary British teenager who can travel between dimensions. – Description by Gillian Speace.
