LibraryAware

Short & Sweet
Novels with fewer than 200 pages

If you'd like personalized book recommendations, check out our Tailored Titles services for both fiction and nonfiction books.

Things Fall Apart
by Chinua Achebe

A classic novel about the confrontation of African tribal life with colonial rule tells the tragic story of a warrior whose manly, fearless exterior conceals bewilderment, fear, and anger at the breakdown of his society.

The Awakening
by Kate Chopin

Over one long, languid summer Edna Pontellier, fettered by marriage and motherhood, becomes acquainted with Robert Lebrun. As the days shorten and the temperature begins to drop Edna succumbs to Robert's devotion. But in the thrall of this ever-strengthening desire Edna begins to realise the true extent of her psychological, social and sexual confinement and its devastating consequences for her future.

Breakfast at Tiffany's:
a Short Novel and Three Stories
by Truman Capote

The tale of a fun-loving, amoral playgirl in New York City is accompanied by "House of Flowers," "A Diamond Guitar," and "A Christmas Memory."

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
by Sijie Dai

At the height of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, two young boys are sent to the country for "reeducation" at a remote mountain village, where their lives take an unexpected turn when they meet the beautiful daughter of a local tailor and stumble upon a forbidden stash of Western classics in Chinese translations.

The Hound of the Baskervilles
by Arthur Conan Doyle

Could the sudden death of Sir Charles Baskerville have been caused by the gigantic ghostly hound that is said to have haunted his family for generations? Arch-rationalist Sherlock Holmes characteristically dismisses the theory as nonsense. And immersed in another case, he sends Watson to Devon to protect the Baskerville heir and observe the suspects close at hand.

The Girl Who Reads on the Métro
by Christine Feret-Fleury

Dreaming up stories about her fellow readers on the Mťro, a French office worker unexpectedly befriends a reclusive bookseller who asks her to care for his store and young daughter while he is away.

The Guest Cat
by Takashi Hiraide

A couple in their 30s, living in a small rented cottage in a quiet part of Tokyo, no longer have much to say to each other until a cat invites itself into their home, bringing joy and promise, until something happens.

The Summer Book
by Tove Jansson

Presents twenty-two vignettes which tell the story of Sophia, a six-year-old girl awakening to existence, and her grandmother, nearing the end of her life, as they spend the summer on a tiny island off the coast of Finland.

Small Things Like These
by Claire Keegan

In a small Irish town in 1985, coal merchant and family man, Bill Furlong, while delivering an order to the local convent, makes a discovery that forces him to confront both his past and the complicit silences of a town controlled by the church.

What Does It Feel Like?
by Sophie Kinsella

Eve is a successful novelist who wakes up one day in a hospital bed with no memory of how she got there. Her husband, never far from her side, explains that she has had an operation to remove the large, malignant tumor growing in her brain. As Eve learns to walk, talk, and write again-and as she wrestles with her diagnosis, and how and when to explain it to her beloved children-she begins to recall what's most important to her: long walks with her husband's hand clasped firmly around her own, family game nights, and always buying that dress when she sees it. Recounted in brief anecdotes, each one is an attempt to answer the type of impossible questions recognizable to anyone navigating the labyrinth of grief.

Leaving the Atocha Station
by Ben Lerner

Adam Gordon is a brilliant, if highly unreliable, young American poet on a prestigious fellowship in Madrid, struggling to establish his sense of self and his relationship to art. What is actual when our experiences are mediated by language, technology, medication, and the arts? Is poetry an essential art form, or merely a screen for the reader's projections? Instead of following the dictates of his fellowship, Adam’s "research" becomes a meditation on the possibility of the genuine in the arts and beyond: are his relationships with the people he meets in Spain as fraudulent as he fears his poems are? A witness to the 2004 Madrid train bombings and their aftermath, does he participate in historic events or merely watch them pass him by?

Dept. of Speculation
by Jenny Offill

An unflinching portrait of marriage by the award-winning author of Last Things features a heroine simply referred to as "the Wife," who transitions from an idealistic woman who once exchanged love letters with her husband and who confronts an array of universal difficulties.

So Long, See You Tomorrow
by William Maxwell

Haunted by a memory of human failure, an aging man recalls his friendship, as a boy, with a tenant farmer's son and forces himself and others to recall the causes of a bloody murder and its consequences.

Every Heart a Doorway
by Seanan McGuire

Sent away to a home for children who have tumbled into fantastical other worlds and are looking for ways to return, Nancy triggers dark changes among her fellow schoolmates and resolves to expose the truth when a child dies under suspicious magical circumstances.

Convenience Store Woman
by Sayaka Murata

A Japanese woman who has been working at a convenience store for 18 years, much to the disappointment of her family, finds friendship with an alienated, cynical and bitter young man who becomes her coworker.

Grief is the Thing with Feathers
by Max Porter

A recently widowed father of two has difficulty dealing with his grief and the overwhelming sadness of his children, until they are visited by Crow, an actual crow, who serves as an antagonist, protector, therapist and babysitter and helps them heal.

Wide Sargasso Sea
by Jean Rhys

Beautiful and wealthy Antoinette Cosway's passionate love for an English aristocrat threatens to destroy her idyllic West Indian island existence and her very life.

Franny and Zooey
by J. D. Salinger

The short story, Franny, takes place in an unnamed college town and tells the tale of an undergraduate who is becoming disenchanted with the selfishness and inauthenticity she perceives all around her. The novella, Zooey, is named for Zooey Glass, the second youngest member of the Glass family. As his younger sister, Franny suffers a spiritual and existential breakdown in her parents' Manhattan living room-leaving Bessie, her mother, deeply concerned-Zooey comes to her aid, offering what he thinks is brotherly love, understanding, and the words of sage advice.

Frankenstein
by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

A monster assembled by a scientist from parts of dead bodies develops a mind of his own as he learns to loathe himself and hate his creator. Includes illustrated notes throughout the text explaining the historical background of the story.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
by Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn

Ivan Denisovich faces daily hardships and struggles to maintain his humanity while being a prisoner in a Stalinist labor camp.

My Name is Lucy Barton
by Elizabeth Strout

After an appendix operation puts her in the hospital, New York writer Lucy Barton reconnects with her estranged mother as the pair reminisce about the past.

Mrs. Dalloway
by Virginia Woolf

A poignant portrayal of the thoughts and events that comprise one day in a woman's life.

Interested in more suggestions for books, movies, and music?
Click here to sign up for our newsletters.