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What to Read Next After Normal People
With Sally Rooney's new book Beautiful World, Where Are You coming in September, now is the perfect time to catch up on her former Waterstones Book of the Year Normal People. But what to read after you have finished such an iconic work? Fortunately, the Waterstones Blog is on hand to steer you towards some other books, both fiction and non-fiction, that tap into the same style and world as Normal People, starting with Rooney's much lauded debut...
Fiction
£8.99
£7.49
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Two couples' relationships become messily entangled in this mordantly funny debut that established Rooney as the formidable new voice of a generation.
£8.99
Paperback
5+ in stock
Available
Charting the dreams and disappointments of a group of East London women, Anna Hope returns with an electric study of friendship, frustration and the curveballs that life forces you to negotiate.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Queenie Jenkins’ life seems to be steadily spiralling out of control in Candice Carty-Williams luminous debut, which is by turns hilariously funny, dramatic and tender, with a heroine to root for.
£14.99
Hardback
In stock
Available
Psychologically astute and dryly funny, Exciting Times delivers an enthralling dissection of love, commitment, power and privilege in the international circles of contemporary Hong Kong.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Filled with humour and astute observations about the power of language, human nature and the absurdities of academia and adolescence, The Idiot follows the journey of Harvard fresher Selin, bewildered by the opportunities and ordeals of adulthood.
£12.99
Paperback
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Sparkling and utterly original, If I Had Your Face provides a surgical overview of the complex social hierarchies and the absurd beauty standards in modern day Seoul, through the parallel stories of four young women.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
A tender and humane dissection of what happens to a relationship when unforeseen events conspire to sabotage it, Tayari Jones’s story subtly probes issues of race and justice with a piercing emotional intelligence and colossal heart.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
An intimate, immersive study of identity and parenthood, Ordinary People tackles themes of sex and grief, friendship and aging, and the fragile architecture of love in twenty-first century South London.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Combining a deeply observant story about race, belonging, motherhood and the dangers of smug liberalism with the pace and fervour of a psychological thriller, Little Fires Everywhere is a truly remarkable novel of American suburbia’s dark undercurrents.
£8.99
Paperback
5+ in stock
Available
Through one couple’s story, De Botton explores infatuation, commitment, tenderness and infidelity in an unapologetically realistic way that expands the very idea of the nature of love itself.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Intoxicatingly written, with a cast of characters to instantly fall for, Reid's debut is a nostalgia-fuelled trip into the hedonistic world of 70's L.A and the stratospheric rise and fall of a band whose sound defined an era.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
A devastating critique of gender politics and female subjugation smuggled within the body of a grandstanding comic novel, Fleishman is in Trouble ripples with sharp wit and punchy prose.
Non-fiction
£9.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
An essential distillation of the knowledge gleaned from open and honest conversations about the lessons of failure, Day walks us through the impossibility of a flawless world to find a place where failure is our strength.
£9.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
A riveting exploration of female sexuality and desire, and the often yawning chasms between enticing fantasy and cruel reality, Three Women is suffused both with erotic yearning and raw honesty, and serves as a vital document of twenty-first century sexual politics.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Dolly Alderton hits home with her brilliant coming-of-age story. Essential reading for anyone who’s ever fallen in (and out) of love.
£9.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Both a fascinating snapshot of survivalist, rural America and an uplifting tribute to the power of learning, Westover’s memoir charts her journey from a bleak Idaho childhood to a Cambridge-educated academic.
Related books
£16.99
£14.99
Hardback
10+ in stock
Available
One of contemporary literature’s brightest talents follows up the former Waterstones Book of the Year Normal People with an incisive and affecting dissection of the lives and loves of a quartet of young friends in Dublin and the west of Ireland.
£16.99
£14.99
Hardback
Temporarily unavailable
Currently unavailable to order
One of contemporary literature’s brightest talents follows up the former Waterstones Book of the Year Normal People with an incisive and affecting dissection of the lives and loves of a quartet of young friends in Dublin and west of Ireland.
£8.99
Paperback
10+ in stock
Available
Capturing the zeitgeist with all the skill and subtlety of her debut, Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney’s Normal People is both a study of how one person can irrevocably shape another, and a profound examination of love, power and influence.
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Comments
Thank you, I've read half of these, the rest are going on the wish list, just my taste in novels, great list. View more
Kirsten DaleyNew reply
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