Books like The Age of Innocence
A man in 1870s New York is torn between a conventional fiancée and a scandalous countess, and the society that constrains his choice also defines who he is.
Explore books like this on the map12 books for readers of The Age of Innocence
The House of Mirth
A beautiful but poor woman in Gilded Age New York navigates the marriage market with diminishing returns, and society's glittering surface conceals a machinery of destruction.
Washington Square
Catherine Sloper, the plain, dutiful heiress of a brilliant New York doctor, is courted by a charming young man her father is certain wants only her money.
The Good Soldier
A naive American narrator tries to tell the 'saddest story' of his friendship with Edward Ashburnham and the four-way adultery he failed to notice until it had ended them all.
Anna Karenina
A married aristocrat's affair with a dashing officer unravels her life, her family, and her sanity against the backdrop of Russian high society.
The Stories of John Cheever
Sixty-one stories of the American suburbs and cities after the war, from The Enormous Radio to The Swimmer.
Howards End
The idealistic Schlegel sisters, the wealthy, practical Wilcoxes and a struggling clerk, Leonard Bast, become entangled over a country house and a disputed bequest, in a novel about who will inherit England.
The Beautiful and Damned
A glamorous New York couple drinks and drifts their way through the Jazz Age while waiting for a grandfather's inheritance.
Madame Bovary
A provincial doctor's wife in mid-nineteenth-century France drowns in romantic fantasies, debt, and affairs, and her destruction exposes the poison of bourgeois aspiration.
The Post-Office Girl
A poor Austrian post-office clerk is briefly swept into a luxury Swiss resort by a rich aunt and returns to her village unable to bear the life she had.
Dodsworth
Sam Dodsworth, a newly retired Midwestern car manufacturer, sets off on a long tour of Europe with his restless wife Fran, who is determined to find the life she thinks she has missed.
A Handful of Dust
A contented English squire devoted to his Gothic country house loses his wife to an idle young social climber, and his life comes apart all the way to the Amazon.
The Portrait of a Lady
A young American woman in 1870s Europe navigates suitors, social codes, and the trap of a marriage that looks like freedom but feels like a prison.