BVBook Verdict

If you liked

Books like The damnation of Theron Ware, or, Illumination

Loved The damnation of Theron Ware, or, Illumination by Harold Frederic? Here are 10 books with a similar appeal — drawn mostly from psychology, ranked by how confidently we'd recommend them next.

10 books · ranked

  1. 1

    Man's Search for Meaning

    Viktor Frankl · 1946 · Psychology

    A psychiatrist's survival of the camps and the meaning he drew from it; brief, profound and enduring.

  2. 2

    Thinking, Fast and Slow

    Daniel Kahneman · 2011 · Psychology

    How the mind's two systems lead us into predictable errors; the definitive popular book on cognitive bias.

  3. 3

    The Body Keeps the Score

    Bessel van der Kolk · 2014 · Psychology

    How trauma lives in the body and how people heal; a landmark that reached far beyond therapists.

  4. 4

    Flow

    Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi · 1990 · Psychology

    The psychologist who coined the concept of 'flow' — the state of complete immersion in a challenging activity — presents his research on optimal experience and argues that happiness comes not from leisure but from deep engagement with work and activity that stretches our abilities.

  5. 5

    Maggie, a girl of the streets

    Stephen Crane · 1893 · Psychology

    This edition of Maggie reprints Crane's original, unexpurgated 1893 text and includes many additional contemporary documents chosen to help reconstruct the historical, cultural, and social milieu of l

  6. 6

    McTeague

    Frank Norris · 1899 · Psychology

    It was Sunday, and, according to his custom on that day, McTeague took his dinner at two in the afternoon at the car conductors' coffee-joint on Polk Street. He had a thick gray soup; heavy, underdone

  7. 7

    Textplus - New Grub Street

    George Gissing · 1891 · Psychology

    "New Grub Street portrays the intrigues and hardships of the publishing world in late Victorian England. In a materialistic, class-conscious society that rewards commercial savvy over artistic achieve

  8. 8

    Hedda Gabler

    Henrik Ibsen · 1890 · Psychology

    A masterpiece of modern theater, Hedda Gabler is a dark psychological drama whose powerful and reckless heroine has tested the mettle of leading actresses of every generation since its first productio

  9. 9

    Sult

    Knut Hamsun · 1890 · Psychology

    First published in Norway in 1890, Hunger probes into the depths of consciousness with frightening and gripping power. Like the works of Dostoyevsky, it marks an extraordinary break with Western liter

  10. 10

    Jean-Christophe

    Romain Rolland · 1900 · Psychology

    Supposedly based on Beethoven, Jean-Christophe Krafft's life, personality, and artistic development are the themes of this series of volumes, along with the difficulties of the artist in society.

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