Recommendations
Books Like Beautiful World, Where Are You
Best books to read after Beautiful World, Where Are You by Sally Rooney
Sally Rooney's Beautiful World, Where Are You is her most philosophical novel — two women in their thirties navigating love and the difficulty of being alive in the twenty-first century. These recommendations continue the Rooney canon, explore the tradition of the contemporary Irish literary novel, or offer companion reading in the tradition of the novel that asks whether art and private happiness are possible when so much else is broken.
- 1Buy
Normal People
by Sally Rooney
The essential companion Rooney — Connell and Marianne from Sligo to Trinity College Dublin; the most emotionally immediate of the three Rooney novels and the recommended starting point for readers new to her work, as well as the natural companion for readers who finished Beautiful World and want more Rooney.
- 2Buy
Conversations with Friends
by Sally Rooney
The companion debut Rooney — Frances and Bobbi, two Dublin college students entangled with a married couple; introduces Rooney's prose style and her interest in power dynamics and class in intimate relationships, and many readers consider Frances a more morally interesting narrator than the women in Beautiful World.
- 3Buy
My Brilliant Friend
by Elena Ferrante
The companion in the tradition of the literary novel about female friendship and how class shapes intimacy — Elena and Lila in Naples; the most frequently cited companion for Rooney readers who want the same depth of attention to two women shaping each other across years, at much greater length and with more historical sweep.
- 4Buy
Weather
by Jenny Offill
The companion literary novel that asks the same question as Beautiful World — how to maintain a private life while aware of catastrophe; Offill's fragmented climate-anxiety novel and Rooney's philosophical novel about the same problem in different formal registers.
- 5Buy
Dept. of Speculation
by Jenny Offill
The companion literary novel of intimacy under pressure — Offill's fragmented account of a marriage and an affair; shares Beautiful World's interest in the gap between the life we imagined and the life we are living, and in the impossibility of fully articulating what we feel.
- 6Buy
Exciting Times
by Naoise Dolan
The Dublin companion in the same generation as Rooney — Ava in Hong Kong, navigating two relationships in dry, ironic prose; the literary novel most directly compared to Rooney in style and preoccupation, and the companion for Beautiful World readers who want another Irish literary voice of the same generation.
- 7Buy
On Beauty
by Zadie Smith
The companion in the tradition of the literary novel about class and the difficulty of living up to one's stated ideals — Smith's academic comedy in Massachusetts; shares Beautiful World's interest in intellectuals who think carefully about politics and ethics and fail to apply those beliefs to their personal lives.
- 8Buy
Intermezzo
by Sally Rooney
Rooney's fourth novel — two brothers grieving their father and navigating love in their different ways; the most recent Rooney and the natural continuation for readers who want to see where she went after Beautiful World's explicit engagement with her own public persona.
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