88 books like The End of the World

By James Tynion IV, Martin Simmonds (artist),

Here are 88 books that The End of the World fans have personally recommended if you like The End of the World. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of House of Stairs

Aella Black Author Of Lock Down

From my list on YA about experiments gone wrong.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a former book editor turned writer and a lover of literature in all forms. Young adult literature will forever be my favorite. Though I’m no longer “young,” I have two teenagers who love YA as much as I do and we bond over these stories. Since one prefers contemporary & urban fantasy, and the other likes dystopian & epic fantasy, I read a lot of everything! I particularly enjoy books with characters who triumph over extreme adversity, and if you do too, then you'll like the books on this list.

Aella's book list on YA about experiments gone wrong

Aella Black Why did Aella love this book?

This book was written in the mid-70s and “set in a dystopian America in the near future.” Fortunately, our present isn’t quite like this. Five 16-year-old orphans awaken to find themselves in a building with no ceiling, walls, or floor—only endless flights of stairs in every direction. It’s a story about human nature and the human condition, as well as a cautionary tale about government control. Supposedly written for young readers (what we’d consider “middle grade” today), I believe it’s better suited for teens and adults.

By William Sleator,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked House of Stairs as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This chilling, suspenseful indictment of mind control is a classic of science fiction and will haunt readers long after the last page is turned.

One by one, five sixteen-year-old orphans are brought to a strange building. It is not a prison, not a hospital; it has no walls, no ceiling, no floor. Nothing but endless flights of stairs leading nowhere--except back to a strange red machine. The five must learn to love the machine and let it rule their lives. But will they let it kill their souls?  

"An intensely suspenseful page-turner." --School Library Journal

"A riveting suspense novel with…


Book cover of Brothers

Jesse Karp Author Of Those That Wake

From my list on a world under secret control.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up in the 1970s, still in contention for America’s most paranoid decade (thanks, Watergate). Practically everything I watched, listened to or read (right down to my beloved superhero comics) was asking, what’s hiding behind the world around you? I don’t think of myself as a paranoid guy – I don’t, for instance, believe in a real life Deep State – but these are the sorts of stories that resonate for me. Taken less literally, they do ask worthwhile and still disturbingly relevant questions: what is beneath the world you know and see every day? What is right in front of you, both good and bad, that you aren’t seeing?

Jesse's book list on a world under secret control

Jesse Karp Why did Jesse love this book?

Agent Scylla was dead, but they brought him back because someone is holding a contest, a contest to see who can create the deadliest weapon. As Scylla navigates a world he’s been out of touch with for too long, he finds that there’s something on its outskirts, pulling all the wrong strings. A thrilling espionage adventure drenched in paranoia, this was the most fun I ever had being terrified to learn the truth. The only book I ever read that I literally could not put down. Its momentum – the need to find out what the contest was about and where the search would lead Scylla – was so powerful, I could not stop my fingers from turning the pages.  

By William Goldman,

Why should I read it?

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


Book cover of Time Out of Joint

Jesse Karp Author Of Those That Wake

From my list on a world under secret control.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up in the 1970s, still in contention for America’s most paranoid decade (thanks, Watergate). Practically everything I watched, listened to or read (right down to my beloved superhero comics) was asking, what’s hiding behind the world around you? I don’t think of myself as a paranoid guy – I don’t, for instance, believe in a real life Deep State – but these are the sorts of stories that resonate for me. Taken less literally, they do ask worthwhile and still disturbingly relevant questions: what is beneath the world you know and see every day? What is right in front of you, both good and bad, that you aren’t seeing?

Jesse's book list on a world under secret control

Jesse Karp Why did Jesse love this book?

Suburbanite Ragle Gumm is overcome with a sense of urgency to play a bizarre newspaper game every day. He’s so good at it, he makes a living from its cash prizes. But lately, his world seems to be fraying around him. Things he sees and knows are suddenly...not. And if you can’t trust the very ground you’re standing on, what’s left? This takes the whole “maybe my world isn’t what I think it is” idea about as far as it can go, and it was just about the first story to ever do that. The best, most satisfying book I ever read about a banal, mundane world that turns out to be anything but.

By Philip K. Dick,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Time Out of Joint as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Ragle Gumm is an ordinary man leading an ordinary life, except that he makes his living by entering a newspaper contest every day - and winning, every day.

But he gradually begins to suspect that his life - indeed his whole world - is an illusion, constructed around him for the express purpose of keeping him docile and happy. But if that is the case, what is his real world like, and what is he actually doing every day when he thinks he is guessing 'Where Will The Little Green Man Be Next?'


Book cover of House

Jesse Karp Author Of Those That Wake

From my list on a world under secret control.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up in the 1970s, still in contention for America’s most paranoid decade (thanks, Watergate). Practically everything I watched, listened to or read (right down to my beloved superhero comics) was asking, what’s hiding behind the world around you? I don’t think of myself as a paranoid guy – I don’t, for instance, believe in a real life Deep State – but these are the sorts of stories that resonate for me. Taken less literally, they do ask worthwhile and still disturbingly relevant questions: what is beneath the world you know and see every day? What is right in front of you, both good and bad, that you aren’t seeing?

Jesse's book list on a world under secret control

Jesse Karp Why did Jesse love this book?

It’s about the simplest idea you can hang a story on: three people discover a house in the wilderness and explore it. But this short, black and white, silent graphic novel just sucked me deeper and deeper into the terror of a place that seems to grow impossibly larger, even as your pathway through it becomes narrower and narrower until...well, it’s pretty dark stuff. Simmons’s art is also inky black, but visualizes the concepts at play with beautiful power. There is a terrible force behind the scenes here, but you can never know what it is and you can never defeat it.  

By Josh Simmons,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

This adventurous, silent graphic novel demonstrates the solid strength of this young cartoonist's storytelling ability. Whether plunging into the watery depths of a sinkhole that has obviously swallowed part of a town or entering the uncertain hidden corridors of the house, every turn is captured with intensity by Simmons' scratchy pen. Page composition and panel arrangements are masterfully coordinated to reflect the characters' increasingly claustrophobic panic as the story reaches its crescendo, and to cause a similar and palpable reaction in the reader. House is Josh Simmons' first full-length graphic novel after years of honing his craft on the humorous,…


Book cover of Bent Heavens

Tyler Jones Author Of Heavy Oceans

From my list on plots Mulder and Scully should have investigated.

Why am I passionate about this?

As horror writer, I’m often asked what scares me most, and almost every fear I have is, at its core, about the Unknown. Not just what we don’t know but the things we cannot know. In all my books, I’ve tried to lean into that personal fear as much as possible, and with Heavy Oceans, I was inspired by the cases Mulder and Scully investigated back when the idea of a government lying to and spying on its own citizens seemed almost quaint by comparison to the moments we’re living. And, as the show’s title credit often said, in glowing words that blazed over a darkened sky…"The Truth is Out There."

Tyler's book list on plots Mulder and Scully should have investigated

Tyler Jones Why did Tyler love this book?

Most readers know this feeling well: when a book you love doesn’t seem to get the attention you feel it deserves. That’s exactly how I view Daniel Kraus’ excellent and suspenseful novel, Bent Heavens. Maybe because it was marketed as YA (whatever that means these days), or maybe because he’s so prolific that it can be hard to keep up with all his work.

Whatever the reason, this book features conspiracy theories, a missing father, government secrets, and exactly the kind of fog-shrouded abandoned places Mulder and Scully tend to explore during their investigations. Yeah, it’s creepy. Yeah, it’s mysterious. But more than that, it’s got characters you care about.

By Daniel Kraus,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Bent Heavens as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

Liv Fleming is done with childhood fantasies. Done pretending she believes her missing father's absurd theories about alien abduction. Done going through the motions of checking the traps he set just for her friend Doug's sake. But on the very day she chooses to destroy the traps, she discovers in one of them a creature so inhuman it can only be one thing. In that moment, she's faced with a painful realisation: Her dad was telling the truth. And no one believed him.

Now she and Doug have a choice to make. They can turn the alien over to the…


Book cover of The Illuminatus! Trilogy

Marc E. Fitch Author Of Boy in the Box

From my list on brilliantly bat-shit stories.

Why am I passionate about this?

I read widely and in many genres, so coming up with a thematic list was a difficult task. However, in working on my forthcoming novel Dead Ends, in which a quiet neighborhood descends into paranoia and insanity driven by fear, politics, and technology, I sought out novels that engaged with conspiratorial thinking and violence. I admire writers who don’t hold back and fully engage with their characters and material, particularly if it means going to dark, imaginative and strange places in their work. Please keep an eye out for Dead Ends, coming from Flame Tree Press in 2023.

Marc's book list on brilliantly bat-shit stories

Marc E. Fitch Why did Marc love this book?

This trilogy collection is perhaps the granddaddy of conspiracy novels because, frankly, it encompasses nearly all of them — at least at the time it was written — then weaves in fictional mythos, occult religions, fascist political movements, and a post-modern deconstruction of itself. It’s equal parts fun, crazy, confusing, and challenging. The fact that Shea and Wilson had the capacity to create such a mammoth work encompassing so many far-reaching, interconnecting lines of conspiratorial thought makes it work to behold, not only for its brilliance but also for its influence. This is not The DaVinci Code; it’s bigger, deeper, more imaginative, and more complex.

By Robert Shea, Robert Anton Williams,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Illuminatus! Trilogy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Filled with sex and violence--in and out of time and space--the three books of The Illuminatus are only partly works of the imagination. They tackle all the coverups of our time--from who really shot the Kennedys to why there's a pyramid on a one-dollar bill.


Book cover of The Second Shooter

Marc E. Fitch Author Of Boy in the Box

From my list on brilliantly bat-shit stories.

Why am I passionate about this?

I read widely and in many genres, so coming up with a thematic list was a difficult task. However, in working on my forthcoming novel Dead Ends, in which a quiet neighborhood descends into paranoia and insanity driven by fear, politics, and technology, I sought out novels that engaged with conspiratorial thinking and violence. I admire writers who don’t hold back and fully engage with their characters and material, particularly if it means going to dark, imaginative and strange places in their work. Please keep an eye out for Dead Ends, coming from Flame Tree Press in 2023.

Marc's book list on brilliantly bat-shit stories

Marc E. Fitch Why did Marc love this book?

Nick Mamatas never writes a typical novel and his latest offering is no exception. Built on the very real rumors and conspiracy theories surrounding mass shooting events in the United States, Mamatas' work offers hints and innuendos throughout of an invisible force seeking to create chaos, death, and destruction in collusion with a conspiracy theorist radio host fanning the flames. Like a real-life conspiracy theory, it’s all connected — somehow. Mamatas’ ability to draw a plot line and themes so at odds with our general perception of reality, the story, sadly, begins to reflect our real world of conspiracy theories and political paranoia in what has become a bat-shit age of American life.

By Nick Mamatas,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

"There was video of the second shooter. There was video."

In the first reports of every mass shooting, there's always mention of a second shooter-two sets of gunshots, a figure seen fleeing the scene-and they always seem to evaporate as events are pieced together.

Commissioned by a fringe publisher to investigate the phenomenon, journalist Mike Karras finds himself tailed by drones, attacked by a talk radio host, badgered by his all-knowing (and maybe all-powerful) editor, and teaming up with an immigrant family of conspiracy buffs.

Together, they uncover something larger and stranger than anyone could imagine-a technomystical plot to 'murder…


Book cover of The Resonance of Unseen Things: Poetics, Power, Captivity, and UFOs in the American Uncanny

Susan Crane Author Of Nothing Happened: A History

From my list on books about Nothing, in particular: because Nothing always means Something.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always been fascinated by how we remember the past and why some things get written into histories and other things don’t. I realized that Nothing happens all the time but no one has thought to ask how we remember it. Once I started looking for how Nothing was being remembered, I found it all around me. Books I read as a kid, movies I’d seen, songs I’d heard – these were my sources. So when I started working, Nothing got done (yes, I love puns!).

Susan's book list on books about Nothing, in particular: because Nothing always means Something

Susan Crane Why did Susan love this book?

UFOs? Really? That’s not normally something I would want to read. But Lepselter embedded herself in a New Mexico community of people who believe they were abducted by aliens and makes it feel, well, real.

Do You think Nothing happened to those people? Lepselter shows how they know you’re skeptical, but they’re also traumatized and need that community of people who get it. Is the Truth out there? Did she become a believer? The ending is a stunner.

By Susan Lepselter,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Resonance of Unseen Things as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Resonance of Unseen Things offers an ethnographic meditation on the "uncanny" persistence and cultural freight of conspiracy theory. The project is a reading of conspiracy theory as an index of a certain strain of late 20th-century American despondency and malaise, especially as understood by people experiencing downward social mobility. Written by a cultural anthropologist with a literary background, this deeply interdisciplinary book focuses on the enduring American preoccupation with captivity in a rapidly transforming world. Captivity is a trope that appears in both ordinary and fantastic iterations here, and Susan Lepselter shows how multiple troubled histories-of race, class, gender,…


Book cover of How to Win the War on Truth: An Illustrated Guide to How Mistruths Are Sold, Why They Stick, and How to Reclaim Reality

Dashka Slater Author Of Accountable: The True Story of a Racist Social Media Account and the Teenagers Whose Lives It Changed

From my list on facing down extremism, online and off.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve spent the past ten years reporting and writing true crime narratives about teenagers and hate, first in The 57 Bus and now in Accountable. My research has led me into some fascinating places and has left me convinced that we cannot prevent what we don’t understand. In both books I found that the young people who harmed others weren’t the stereotypical grimacing loners I’d always associated with hate and extremism. Instead, they were imitating behaviors that we see all around us. Being young, with brains that aren’t fully developed in important ways, and lacking the life experience that teaches us a more nuanced understanding of the world, they are ripe for radicalization.

Dashka's book list on facing down extremism, online and off

Dashka Slater Why did Dashka love this book?

After watching both a close friend and a relative get radicalized through online disinformation, I realized that no one is immune, no matter how smart or how educated, if they don’t have the tools to recognize disinformation when it comes their way.

Media scholar Samuel C. Spitale has written a compulsively readable and highly entertaining explanation of what disinformation is and how to recognize and combat it. The propaganda mills are churning out disinformation faster than ever before and even those of us who think we’re too smart to be fooled are vulnerable.

By Samuel C. Spitale, Allan Whincup (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked How to Win the War on Truth as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The average person receives 4,000 to 10,000 media messages a day. It s no wonder we struggle to separate the news from the noise and fact from fiction but in these unprecedented times, it s essential to democracy that we do. For anyone struggling to figure out how to live and vote their values, How to Win the War on Truth is here to help. You ll learn: The history of propaganda, from Edward Bernays to Fox News Why simple messages are so powerful How social messaging creates unconscious biases Who profits from propaganda How propaganda is manufactured and delivered…


Book cover of Project Chartreuse

Christopher Church Author Of The Mythical Blond

From my list on LA detectives with complex emotional lives.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a longtime Angeleno, I’ve read a lot about the dark underbelly of our dysfunctional metropolis, both in the news and in fiction. I try to incorporate the City of Angels as a strong presence in my writing, and when I read other writers who have put Los Angeles at the center, it gives me a sense of things the way they really are, a glimpse at a deeper reality. I see the detectives in LA noir and crime fiction as inextricably intertwined with the city, their weaknesses, and their emotional quandaries emerging from this place.

Christopher's book list on LA detectives with complex emotional lives

Christopher Church Why did Christopher love this book?

I’d be afraid to meet this detective, Slater, in a dark alley, as he’s unpredictable and has a quick temper. At the same time I have to admit he’s the kind of guy I’d want to date. Smart and competent in his investigative work, Slater is a mass of contradictions, a textbook sex addict and in complete denial about it, plus he drinks too much. His pugilistic approach to the world evolves through the series, and in this book his slightly warped moral compass has him working to outsmart the cops to track down a violent conspiracy theorist.

By George Bixley,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Project Chartreuse as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Don’t mess with the hothead—or he might just mess with you. Slater Ibáñez is only interested in two kinds of guys: the ones he wants to punch, and the ones he sleeps with. Things get interesting when they start to overlap. A freelance investigator, Slater trolls the dark side of Los Angeles, rooting out insurance fraud, not afraid to use whatever means necessary to get things done, and not about to hold back with his fists. A queer antihero for a new age, Slater walks the line between ordinary life and the frayed fringes of society, keeping his balance with…


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