100 books like Scythe

I love a good dystopian novel, and this hit all the right notes for me. At first, everything seems perfect in Jonas’s tightly-ordered world—only everyone is hiding something. Jonas is different, but he doesn’t know how.

I loved how thought-provoking The Giver was. It got me asking questions about what it means to be a part of a community, a friend, and a member of a family. What risks are we willing to take for the ultimate good, and what crosses the line?

I found Jonas’s story fascinating and felt genuinely concerned for him throughout the book.

I couldn’t finish this list without including one of the most famous examples of pregnancy in science fiction.

Humanity comes face-to-face with an alien species, the Oankali, who use gene editing, cloning, and mating to refresh their gene pools. The focus is on Lilith, a black woman taken hostage by the aliens who must learn about their plans for her and strategize her responses.

I really appreciate the way Butler’s work manages to speak to the legacy of slavery, particularly through a scene where the aliens create the circumstances for Lilith to breed with a human man in aid of their experiments. Lilith’s refusal to succumb to this animalistic treatment confronts the legacy of breeding humans during slavery.

I find Lilith (like many of Butler’s other characters) a driven character who deals with outlandish situations and the potential invasion of her own body with a pragmatic determination that invites me,… show more.

There is a certain kind of literature that takes my breath away. In my experience, there is nothing more exhilarating than reading a book that you think is contemporary that veers, with the reader hardly noticing, into the speculative. I adore books that take the ordinary world and sprinkle it with magic and possibilities.

With this book, Matt Haig answers a question many of us contemplate: What if? What if I’d taken the other fork in the road? This book answers that question for one flawed, beautiful character, and I was enthralled with every page.  

Maze Runner was a wild ride I couldn't put down. The plot's originality had me hooked with all its twists and turns, turning it into this page-turner I couldn't resist. Dashner's maze world? Pure genius.

Every mystery unfolding kept me racing through the pages, completely caught up in the characters' urgency and the need to unravel the maze's secrets. It felt like a personal challenge, a puzzle I just had to solve.

Dashner's talent for keeping the suspense alive made the whole experience immersive, and I couldn't help but appreciate the intricate plot. Maze Runner is a personal victory, and a story that grabbed me and held on tight until the very end.

This is more suited to the YA market with an appealing darkness that had me gripped from page one.

An allure of illusions, rich description, and magic. I loved this book! Every sentence was beautiful and intriguing–it was quite unlike anything I’ve ever read before. Add in the mystique of a carnival, and this makes for a remarkable read.

Scarlett was a strong female protagonist, and her desperate need to escape had me reading this long into the night. 

This book is always on my list of favorite reads. Morgenstern invites us to inhabit a world where magic not only seems possible but wholly believable. I’ve read this book numerous times, and it always casts a spell over me so completely that the rest of my troubles disappear as quickly and mysteriously as the circus moves to another town.

The competition-turned-love story between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, moves the plot forward at a driving pace while enchanting subplots abound. Whenever I feel like I need to rekindle the magic in my own life, I pull this novel off the shelf.

The Selection is based on reality TV shows like The Bachelor – only he’s a prince and girls compete to be selected into a life of royal privilege.

Just one problem for America Singer, she’s already in love with someone from a lower class and isn’t interested in crowns or jewels…until she meets the prince and realizes not everything is as it appears.

Fated or chosen mate relationships aren’t just a YA dystopian trope; finding the perfect partner is something most of us aspire to, and it’s always thrilling to read about a heroine who refuses her destined path and challenges the social status quo; throwing away a happily ever after in favor of freedom and adventure strikes a chord I can relate to.

At the beginning, readers are drawn into an exciting world where humans battle to save their desolate planet from an alien race. But in typical Brandon Sanderson fashion, good and evil are not clear-cut, and the conflict soon grows far more complex. 

As the series progresses, the main character, Spensa, discovers that the battle for her planet is not as straightforward as she had once thought, and that the aliens she had fought were neither uniform nor uniformly evil. When she infiltrates an alien homeland in Book 2, Spensa is forced to question her original assumptions about who deserves to be saved—not just humans, but maybe also some alien races and even artificially intelligent beings. 

I’m a sucker for good dialogue and this is about as good as it gets. This book nails sarcasm, wit, and humor. You can hear every quip and see every facial expression as you spend the entire book wishing you could have a seat in that spaceship—even if they are facing certain doom. I basically wanted to be best friends with every character… and the authors. (So umm *clears throat* if anyone has Amie or Jay’s number…hook a girl up.)

You know that question about being stranded on a desert island with only one other person and a spaceship? Oh, wait. I think that’s supposed to be a sunken ship. This story has a bit of a similar feel, only instead of an island, it’s a deserted planet, and no one is coming to save Lilac and Tarver—so they have to save themselves instead. This one is a good mix of the rich-girl/poor-boy dynamic, (think Pretty in Pink, flip-flopped) with a hint of mystery, all in the style of Survivor. The depth of feeling is strong in this one.