Why am I passionate about this?

Ever since reading Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal in high school, I’ve always appreciated books and stories that can tackle dark subject matter in a completely deadpan way. The creator knows what they’re doing is kind of a joke and they’re inviting you along for the ride. I enjoy reading books where I think the writer had a really good time writing it, even if that means occasionally torturing the reader.


I wrote

Sociopaths in Love

By Andersen Prunty,

Book cover of Sociopaths in Love

What is my book about?

Boy meets girl. They fall in love. They move in together and start a new life. They're beautiful and they…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of American Psycho

Andersen Prunty Why did I love this book?

Is the main character, Patrick Bateman, truly a psychopath or is he just a pampered ’80s Wall Street bro with a penchant for extremely detailed and specific consumerism who entertains dark and violent fantasies? This is one of my favorite absurd satires with some of the most hilarious and disturbing passages I’ve read. I’m a huge fan of Bret Easton Ellis’s work. A brilliant stylist, Ellis marches the reader through blow-by-blow descriptions of everything from brutal murders to pages-long descriptions of people talking about the merits of and different types of bottled water. As a working-class Midwesterner, it’s been interesting to me to see how much of this book (brand obsession, narcissism, staying abreast of the latest trends) has become the norm on social media, especially via influencers. Now I have to go return some videotapes.

By Bret Easton Ellis,

Why should I read it?

11 authors picked American Psycho as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Patrick Bateman is 26 and works on Wall Street. Handsome, sophisticated, charming and intelligent, he is also a psychopath.


Book cover of Tampa

Andersen Prunty Why did I love this book?

This is a seriocomic novel about a female eighth-grade teacher who sexually lures her male students. Extremely graphic and thought-provoking, Tampa also manages to be an incredibly entertaining dark comedy. Like a lot of sensationalistic books, this approaches a serious topic and turns it into a nearly absurd piece of entertainment. It’s also extremely well written. I loved it.

By Alissa Nutting,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Tampa as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Celeste Price is an eighth-grade English teacher in suburban Tampa. She is attractive. She drives a red Corvette. Her husband, Ford, is rich, square-jawed and devoted to her. But Celeste has a secret. She has a singular sexual obsession - fourteen-year-old boys. It is a craving she pursues with sociopathic meticulousness and forethought.
Within weeks of her first term at a new school, Celeste has lured the charmingly modest Jack Patrick into her web - car rides after dark, rendezvous at Jack's house while his single father works the late shift, and body-slamming encounters in Celeste's empty classroom between periods.…


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Book cover of The Midnight Man

The Midnight Man By Julie Anderson,

A historical thriller set in south London just after World War II, as Britain returns to civilian life and the men return home from the fight, causing the women to leave their wartime roles. The South London Hospital for Women and Children is a hospital, (based on a real place)…

Book cover of High Life

Andersen Prunty Why did I love this book?

High Life is pitch black Hollywood noir. It’s one of those rare books that starts out dark and just keeps getting darker and more disturbing. Stokoe outdoes himself on nearly every page. This book was shocking and eye-opening, even for me. I’ve read a lot of extreme horror and I think this might outdo nearly all of them. Stokoe manages to fully flesh out the characters, rendering them terrifying, absurd, and profoundly sad, and does so with a style that is compulsively readable.

By Matthew Stokoe,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked High Life as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Hollywood. The City of Dreams at the end of the nineties. Jack has one ambition – to get famous. He doesn’t care how. He just wants to be like the people he sees in tabloid magazines and on TV: Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp, Tom and Nicole, Arnie, Bruce, Sly.... But the desire for fame has a dark side and he finds himself in a world of drugs and crime, whores, snuff shows, incest, deceit and despair. When his wife is found dead – murdered and disemboweled – and the search for her killer leads him to the femme fatale of…


Book cover of Child of God

Andersen Prunty Why did I love this book?

I’m not the world’s biggest Cormac McCarthy fan. I enjoyed The Road and Suttree, but found a few others I’ve read of his something of a slog, so I was happy to give this one a chance. It’s a poetically written book about a necrophiliac who lives in a cave surrounded by his victims. I like how the main character, already on the edge, continues to unravel as the book unfolds and how McCarthy writes him with sympathetic detail.

By Cormac McCarthy,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Child of God as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this taut, chilling novel from the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Road, Lester Ballard—a violent, dispossessed man falsely accused of rape—haunts the hill country of East Tennessee when he is released from jail.

While telling his story, Cormac McCarthy depicts the most sordid aspects of life with dignity, humor, and characteristic lyrical brilliance.

"Like the novelists he admires-Melville, Dostoyevsky, Faulkner-Cormac McCarthy has created an imaginative oeuvre greater and deeper than any single book. Such writers wrestle with the gods themselves." —Washington Post

Look for Cormac McCarthy's new novel, The Passenger.


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Book cover of The Road from Belhaven

The Road from Belhaven By Margot Livesey,

The Road from Belhaven is set in 1880s Scotland. Growing up in the care of her grandparents on Belhaven Farm, Lizzie Craig discovers as a small girl that she can see the future. But she soon realises that she must keep her gift a secret. While she can sometimes glimpse…

Book cover of The Restraint of Beasts: A Comedic Novel

Andersen Prunty Why did I love this book?

The previous four books on my list have been pretty dark. “Heavy,” I guess, is relative. I find a lot of humor in them and, ultimately, that’s why I either have re-read them or plan to. This one isn’t as heavy on the violence as the previous ones. Often cited as a good example of dry British humor, written by a former bus driver, it’s the story of two fence-builders who travel the English and Scottish countryside in a caravan erecting fences. However, it seems like every time they’re on a job, they end up accidentally murdering someone. Rather than getting bogged down by things like remorse or guilt, they are much more interested in covering it up and saving their backs. One of them is obsessed with heavy metal and his hair. It’s a very weird and satisfying book.

By Magnus Mills,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Restraint of Beasts as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'Tam and I took hold of Mr McCrindle and lowered him into the hole, feet first. We decided to leave his cap on'. Fencers Tam, Richie and their ever-exasperated English foreman are forced to move from rural Scotland to England for work. After a disastrous start involving a botched fence and an accidental murder, the three move to a damp caravan in Upper Bowland and soon find themselves in direct competition with the sinister Hall Brothers whose business enterprises seem to combine fencing, butchering and sausage-making. "The Restraint of Beasts" introduced readers to the now much-loved unique voice of Magnus…


Explore my book 😀

Sociopaths in Love

By Andersen Prunty,

Book cover of Sociopaths in Love

What is my book about?

Boy meets girl. They fall in love. They move in together and start a new life. They're beautiful and they have new things, expensive things, the best of everything, whatever they want. But that's only the surface. Beneath the surface is something much different. Something much darker. Theirs is a love like no other and only one of them will survive it.

Book cover of American Psycho
Book cover of Tampa
Book cover of High Life

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Interested in psychopathy, Tennessee, and teacher student relationship?

Psychopathy 77 books
Tennessee 67 books