Books like Hard Times

Hard Times by Charles Dickens reads as immersive, melancholic. These 12 books share its genome — matched by how they actually read, not just their shelf label.

The Warden

Anthony Trollope · 1855

Shares the comic thread

69% genome match

Vanity Fair

William Makepeace Thackeray · 1848

Shares the comic thread

69% genome match

Mansfield Park

Jane Austen · 1814

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match

The Late George Apley

John P. Marquand

Shares the escape + comic thread

69% genome match

North and South

Elizabeth Gaskell · 1855

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match

Bleak House

Charles Dickens · 1853

Shares the escape thread

83% genome match

The Good Earth

Pearl S. Buck · 2027

Shares the escape thread

71% genome match

Jane Eyre

Charlotte Brontë · 1847

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match

Howards End

E.M. Forster · 1910

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match

Agnes Grey

Anne Brontë · 1847

Both explore class

69% genome match

Sister Carrie

Theodore Dreiser · 1900

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match

The Grapes of Wrath

John Steinbeck · 1939

Shares the escape thread

69% genome match