Entertaining stories for smart readers.
Based on curated lists from The Guardian, Flavorwire and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, Quora and Reddit, and picks from philosophical fiction authors like Khaled Hosseini, Irvin D. Yalom, Rebecca Goldstein and Daniel Quinn, here is a roundup of the 106 best philosophical novels ever written. To compile the final rankings, I assigned a weighted score to each novel appearing … Read more
It’s been a little over a year since I published my list of The 81 Best Sci-Fi Crime Novels, which means there was an entire year’s worth of futuristic crime fiction that list didn’t account for. As with my previous genre lists, I plan to publish annual updates with the best sci-fi crime fiction of the past year. The following … Read more
Another year, another outstanding array of mystery and crime fiction that delivers thrills and resonates long after you turn the page. This year’s addendum to my list of The 112 Best Literary Mysteries and Crime Novels is based on curated lists from Amazon, The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings … Read more
As the two-faced god Janus leads us into another year, it’s time for the annual addendum to my list of The 105 Best Philosophical Novels. This year’s rankings are based on curated lists from The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings on Goodreads and Amazon. After running the numbers, these … Read more
2026 marks the ten-year anniversary of my list of The 110 Best Dystopian Novels. Every year since then, I have produced annual lists of the best new dystopian fiction. This year’s list compiled curated lists from The Honey Pop, Amazon, The Guardian, The New York Times, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings on Goodreads and … Read more
Writing the Marcus Carver Sci-Fi Crime Series has proved to be a tricky balance. It is set in the near-enough future that the world can’t be totally unfamiliar. Yet there needs to be enough new technology and social development to satisfy the demands of the genre and the natural change that occurs over several decades. Whenever I describe something in … Read more
As an author, people often ask me where I get the ideas for my stories. The initial impulse for a story can come from a variety of places: another story I’m reading, current events, observing a public interaction. But one of the most fruitful ways I’ve found to build a creative spark into a fully realized story setting is to … Read more
Once again, it’s time for the annual addendum to my list of The 112 Best Literary Mysteries and Crime Novels. Using curated lists from Book Riot, The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings on Goodreads and Amazon, I narrowed a field of over sixty novels to the following five best … Read more
I published my original list of The 105 Best Philosophical Novels in 2017. Each year since then, I have issued an addendum with the best philosophical fiction released in the past twelve months. Based on curated lists from The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings on Goodreads and Amazon, these … Read more
As we open a new year, it’s time for the annual update to my list of The 110 Best Dystopian Novels. Starting with nearly seventy contenders, I used curated lists from Amazon, The Guardian, The New York Times, Publishers Weekly and more, suggestions from readers on Goodreads, and ratings on Goodreads and Amazon to narrow the field to the five* … Read more