Ultimate Guide to Grief Fiction

“We're all united by grief, and somehow divided by the same thing.” - Bridget Kemmerer, Letters to the Lost

Some say that grief is the price we pay for love. Others say that it's simply love in another form; love that persists after the person or thing we loved is gone. Just like love, grief might be one of the most universal experiences we humans experience, and yet it can make you feel incredibly isolated.

For me, during times of isolation and grief, books have always been friend, comfort and support. But knowing where to start when reading about grief seem like a daunting task. Here, I hope to lend you a little helping hand. Because everybody's individual grief will look different, I can't possibly provide the perfect recommendation for every single reader. What I can do, is cast a wide net including many of the books on the topic I've personally read, which is what I'll do in this post.

The list is enormous, covering well over 100 books (and counting) across multiple genres. For ease of navigation, there's a little menu below.

1. My personal favourites

2. Adult Fiction

3. Fantasy, Science-fiction and Magical Realism

4. Horror & Thriller

5. Young Adult Fiction

6. Middle-grade Fiction

7. Non-Fiction

8. Where to find even more recommendations

Personal Favourites Highlighted

1. Migrations – Charlotte McConaghy A melancholic literary fiction novel about a woman willing to literally cross the arctic ocean to outrun a grief that haunts her ashore.

2. We Are Okay – Nina LaCour Snowed in in almost empty college dorm building during the winter break, a young woman reconnects with a long lost friend whilst grieving the life and family she’s had to leave behind.

3. Our Wives Under the Sea – Julia Armfield An eco-horror novel about the relationship between two women drifting apart in the wake of a deep-sea mission that ended in catastrophe, and left one of them forever changed.

4. Grief is the Thing With Feathers – Max Porter A novella in verse in which a family is taunted by the spirit of a meanspirited crow following the death of their mother.

5. A Monster Calls – Patrick Ness

   A middle-grade horror novel in which a young boy finds an unexpected partner in dealing with his grief over his mothers terminal illness within a monster that appears at night outside his window.

6. Green Fuse Burning - Tiffany Morris An exploration of grief over the loss of a parent, queerness, death and rebirth, all through a lens of natural beauty and terror, inside an eco-horro novella.

7. Bridge of Clay – Markus Zusak A haunting young-adult novel centering a family of boys that threatens to break apart after the death of their mother.

8.  When Breath Becomes Air – Paul Kalanithi  The posthumously published dairies of a a young neurosurgeon faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis, who attempts to answer the question 'What makes a life worth living?'

9. Stone Yard Devotional - Charlotte Wood A quiet literary novel where woman abandons her city life and marriage to return to the place of her childhood, holing up in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of the Monaro.

10. Death Valley - Melissa Broder A hallucinatory magical realism novel about a woman getting lost in the Californian desert whilst attempting to outrun her own grief over both her father in the ICU and a husband whose longstanding illness is slowly worsening.

Adult Fiction

1. Wild Dark Shore - Charlotte McConaghy Keywords: family, loss of parent/spouse, isolation, arctic setting, eco-fiction, mystery. Also by the same author: Once There Were Wolves & Migrations

2. Grief is the Thing With Feathers – Max Porter Keywords: Loss of parent/spouse, Poetry, Ted Hughes

3.  Station Eleven – Emily St. John Mandel  Keywords: loss of family/friends/way-of-life, post-apocalyptic, pandemic. Also by the same author: The Glass Hotel & Sea of Tranquillity

4. I Cheerfully Refuse – Leif Enger Keywords: post-apocalyptic/dystopian, loss of family, sailing, themes of Greek mythology.

5. Stone Yard Devotional - Charlotte Wood Keywords: grief, isolation, memories, loss of parent at young age.

6. Death Valley - Melissa Broder Keywords: weird magical realism, hallucinatory, loss of parent, caregiving/hospice care, chronic illness.

7. The Museum of You – Carys Bray

   Keywords: loss of parent, father-daughter-dynamic, connecting through physical memories.

8. Everything I Never Told You – Celeste Ng Keywords: loss of child, death by suicide, familial grief.

9. Where the Forest Meets the Stars – Glendy Vanderah Keywords: cancer, loss of parent, reconnecting after trauma, romantic subplot.

10. The Unseen World – Liz Moore Keywords: loss of parent, dementia, computer-science, technology/AI

11. Never Let me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro Keywords: dystopia, boardingschool, loss of friends, loss of health/future.

12. Yerba Buena – Nina LaCour Keywords: loss of family/parents, romance, healing through connection. By the same author: We Are Okay & Watch Over Me

13. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous - Ocean Vuong Keywords: loss of parent, immigration, Vietnam, generational trauma/grief, translation/language.

14. Private Rites – Julia Armfield Keywords: loss of parent, complex sibling dynamics, dystopia/apocalyptic. By the same author: Salt Slow & Our Wives Under the Sea

15. Intermezzo – Sally Rooney Keywords: brothers, loss of parents, substance abuse

16. The Blue Sisters – Coco Mellors Keywords: loss of sibling, complex sisterly dynamics, death by suicide, substance abuse.

17. Transcendent Kingdom – Yaa Gyasi Keywords: loss of parent, women in STEM, second generation immigration, generational loss/trauma

18. The Third Hotel – Laura van der Berg Keywords: weird magical realims, loss of husband, displacement, cinema. Also by the same author: State of Paradise

19. Hamnet – Maggie O’Farrell Keywords: historical fiction, Shakespear, loss of child.

20. Death and the Gardener – Georgi Gosponidov Keywords: death of parent, gardening, Bulgary.

21. Hemlock – Melissa Faliveno Keywords: weird fiction, loss of parent, loss of identity, nature, substance abuse.

22. Wandering Souls – Cecile Pin Keywords: loss of parent, immigration, generational trauma, Vietnam, ghosts.

23. The Desert Sky Between Us – Anne Valente Keywords: loss of parent, sisters, roadtrip.

    By the same author: By Light We Know Our Names (short stories)

24. Night Sleep Death The Stars – Joyce Carol Oates Keywords: loss of parent/spouse, ICU-stay, political violence, family saga.

25. The Infinite Tides – Christian Kiefer Keywords: astronaut returning to Earth, loss of child

26. Show Me Where it Hurts – Claire Gleeson Keywords: loss of family (spouse and children)

27. Pearl - Siân Hughes Keywords: loss of parent, Irish nature, art and the medieval titular poem.

28. Under Water – Tara Menon Keywords: loss of parent, friendship, Thailand, tsunami-survivors.

29. A Million Things – Emily Spurr Keywords: mental illness, substance abuse, death of/abandonment by parent.

30. The Burrow – Melanie Cheng Keywords: loss of child, reconnecting over pet, COVID-pandemic.

31. Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow - Gabrielle Zevlin Keywords: friendship, game-development, disability Note: although I personally didn't enjoy this book, I can see why it works for so many others. I'd recommend reading my review, if you're interested in why it didn't work for me personally.

Fantasy, Science-Fiction & Magical Realism

1. The Gracekeepers – Kirsty Logan Genre: soft-fantasy, post-apocalyptic (flooded world) By the same author: The Gloaming, Now She is Witch, A Portable Shelter (short stories).

2. The Broken Earth Trilogy – N.K. Jemisin Genre: high fantasy trilogy

3. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly Genre: fantasy with horror elements, fairytale-retelling

4. Solaris - Stanislaw Lem Genre: classic sci-fi, space-travel, alien contact

5. Ghost Music - An Yu

   Genre: magical realism Representation: various sorts of loss, including grief over a life not lived/giving up on dreams. By the same author: Braised Pork, Sun Birth

6. Under the Whispering Door – T.J. Klune Genre: cozy fantasy

7. How High We Go In the Dark – Sequioa Nagamatsu Genre: science fiction, post-apocalyptic

8. Creatures of Passage – Morowa Yejide Genre: magical realism, ghosts

9. Watch Over Me – Nina LaCour Genre: magical realism, ghosts

10. Shark Heart - Emily Habeck Genre: magical realism, caregiving.

11. Ghost Fish - Stuart Pennebaker Genre: magical realism, contemporary

12. Terrace Story - Hilary Leichter Genre: literary fiction, magical realism

13. The Living Sea of Waking Dreams – Richard Flanagan Genre: magical realism, contemporary, caregiving.

14. Swim Home to the Vanished – Brandon Shay Basham Genre: magical realism, inspired by indigenous mythology.

15. Wildwood Whispers – Willa Reece Genre: cozy fantasy/magical realism

16. The Echoes – Evi Wyld Genre: contemporary magical realism, ghosts

17. The Iron Garden Sutra – A.D. Sui Genre: science fiction, space travel.

18. The Renovation – Kenan Orlan Genre: magical realism

19. The Great Work – Sheldon Costa Genre: historical fantasy, western

20. By Light We Knew Our Names – Anne Valente Genre: short stories, magical realism

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Horror & Thriller

1. The Haunting of Hill House - Shirley Jackson Keywords: haunted house, mental illness, loss of family.

2. Pet Sematary – Stephen King Keywords: body horror, supernatural, reanimation/zombie, loss of child, animal-death.

3. Our Wives Under the Sea – Julia Armfield Keywords: cosmic/psychological, ocean, LGBTQ-relationships, trauma. loss of spouse.

4. The Fisherman – John Langan Keywords: Lovecraftian, ocean, friendship, loss of spouse, regrets/guilt.

5. Monstrillio -  Gerardo Sámano Córdova

   Keywords: body horror, loss of child, transformation, sexuality.

6. Mapping the Interior – Stephen Graham Jones Keywords: novella, death of parent, generational trauma and discrimination, Trigger warnings: animal cruelty, discrimination against native Americans Also by the same author: The Only Good Indians

7. How to Sell a Haunted House - Grady Hendrix Keywords: loss of parent, sibling dynamics, haunted house, horror-comedy.

8. Come With Me – Ronald Malfi Keywords: ghosts, supernatural, murder-mystery, loss of spouse. horror

9. White is for Witching - Helen Oyeyemi Keywords: loss of parent, mental illness, haunted house.

10. Green Fuse Burning - Tiffany Morris Keywords: horror novella, eco-fiction, loss of parent, indigenous.

11. Crossroads - Laurel Hightower 

    Keywords: horror novella, loss of child, folk-horror, rituals

12. The Caretaker - Marcus Kliewer Keywords: haunted house, supernatural, ritual, loss of parent, trauma.

13. The Sundowners Dance – Todd Keisling Keywords: old-age, loss of spouse, suburbian-cults, lovecraftian.

14. The Valley of Vengeful Ghosts – Kim Fu Keywords: loss of parent, haunted house, ghosts.

15. One Yellow Eye – Leigh Radford Keywords: zombie outbreak, loss of spouse.

16. Elegy for the Undead – Matthew Veseley Keywords: zombie outbreak, LGBTQ+, loss of spouse, romance

17. Good Boy - Neil McRobert Keywords: novella, cosmic, dogs, pet-ownership

18. Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng - Kylie Lee Baker

    Keywords: supernatural horror, loss of sibling. Triggerwarnings for racial discrimination and on-page violence against Asian-Americans following the COVID-pandemic.
    

Young Adult Fiction

1. We Are Okay – Nina LaCour Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of parents One-line synopsis: Snowed in in almost empty college dorm building during the winter break, Marin reconnects with a long lost friend whilst grieving the life and family she’s had to leave behind.
   

2. Watch Over Me – Nina LaCour Genre: magical realism Representation: loss of parents One-line synopsis: After having aged out of the foster system, 18- year old Mila accepts an opportunity to work at a teaching job at an isolated farm on the North Californian Coast. During the daytime she finds connection and friendship in her colleagues and the foster children she tutors, yet during the night the lingering sea mist is filled with ghosts.
   

3. Bridge of Clay – Markus Zusak Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of parent, terminal cancer One-line synopsis: a family of boys threatens to break apart after the death of their mother due to cancer.
   

4. Strange Creatures – Phoebe North Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of sibling (gone missing) One-line synopsis: Annie and her older brother Jamie have been inseparable for as long as she can remember. When Jamie goes missing without a trace, Annie becomes convinced he has entered the fantastical world they used to play pretend in, and believes that she's the only one who can bring him back.
   

5. Me Moth – Amber McBride Genre: novel in verse, magical realism Representation: loss of parents, traumatic accident One-line synopsis: a girl grieving the recent loss of her parents in a fatal car accident, and a boy battling depression find each other on a roadtrip, chasing down the ghosts that haunt them both.
   

6. The Last True Poets of the Sea – Julia Drake Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of sibling One-line synopsis: 16-year old Violet spends her summer researching her family history involving family-curses, shipwrecks and coastal tragedies to keep her mind of the recent loss of her brother.
   

7. The Astonishing Color of After – Emily X.R. Pan Genre: magical realism Representation: loss of parent Trigger warning: suicide (not on page) One-line synopsis: Leigh Chen Sanders is absolutely certain about one thing: When her mother died by suicide, she turned into a bird. Her search for the bird brings her to her family’s roots in Taiwan, on a journey of chasing after ghosts, uncovering family secrets, and forging a new relationship with her grandparents.
   

8. The Undead Truth of Us – Britney S. Lewis Genre: magical realism Representation: loss of parent, depression, anxiety One-line synopsis: 16-year old Zharie Young is absolutely certain her mother morphed into a zombie before her untimely death, but she can't seem to figure out why. Why her mother died, why her aunt doesn't want her around, why all her dreams seem suddenly, hopelessly out of reach. And why, ever since that day, she's been seeing zombies everywhere.
   

9. We Are the Ants – Shaun David Hutchinson Genre: magical realism Representation: loss of boyfriend, depression. One-line synopsis: Henry Denton has spent years being periodically abducted by aliens. Then the aliens give him an ultimatum: The world will end in 144 days, and all Henry has to do to stop it is push a big red button. Only he isn’t sure he wants to, following the tragic events in his life recently.
   

10. Tell the Wolves I’m Home – Carol Rifka Brunt Genre: historical Representation: loss of uncle One-line synopsis: following his death due to an unnamed illness in 1987, fourteen-year-old June uncovers that the uncle she idolized may have been leading a secret life for years.
    

11. How To Make Friends With the Dark – Kathleen Glasgow Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of parent One-line synopsis: an intimate portrayal of a 16-year olds travel through the darkest depth of grief following the loss of her mother.
    

12. Letters to the Lost – Bridget Kemmerer Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of parent One-line synopsis: An unlikely friendship and romance begins when a boy finds a series of haunting letters on a grave; letter written from a girl to her deceased mother.
    

13. Catfish Rolling - Clara Kumagai

    Genre: magical realism

    Representation: missing parent

    One-line synopsis: Magic-realism blends with Japanese myth and legend in an original story about grief, memory, time in the wake of an earthquake that shook a nation.
    

14. We Speak in Storms – Natalie Lund Genre: magical realism Representation: parent with terminal illness, various losses of loved-ones. One-line synopsis: a small town is haunted by the aftermaths of a tornado that shattered and took the lives of multiple families back in the seventies. When new tornado-warnings appear, the heavy winds bring with them ghostly presences from days past. Three teens find companionship, support and recognition in the stories from those that came before them.
    

15. All the Dead Lie Down – Kyrie McCauley Genre: YA horror One-line synopsis: a recently orphaned teenage girl takes a job as a live-in-nanny at the gothic coastal estate of a distant friend of her late mother. She finds herself haunted by more than just grief alone. Representation: death of parents.
    

16. Sadie - Courtney Summers Genre: contemporary fiction, mixed media. Representation: loss of sibling, violence against women/girls. One-line synopsis: a teenage girl embarks on a harrowing journey across the US to track down her sisters killer. Told through podcast-format of a crime-reporter covering both cases of missing girls.

Middle Grade Fiction

1. A Monster Calls – Patrick Ness Genre: magical realism, horror Representation: loss of parent, terminal cancer One-line synopsis: A young boy finds an unexpected partner in dealing with his grief over his mothers terminal illness within a monster that appears at night outside his window.
   

2. Hazel Bly and the Deep Blue Sea – Ashley Herring Blake Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of parent, loss of (twin)sibling, traumatic accident One-line synopsis: A novel about a girl navigating grief, trauma, and friendship as she explores the local legend of the mermaid that is said to haunt the ocean near their coastal town in Maine.
   

3. August Isle – Ali Standish Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of sibling/family member, trauma One-line synopsis: a young girl uncovers family secrets when she visits the island town of August Isle, Florida, where her mother used to spend her vacations when she was a child. Also by the same author: How To Disappear Completely

4. The Thing about Jellyfish – Ali Benjamin Genre: contemporary Representation: childhood loss of close friend, traumatic accident One-line synopsis: After her best friend dies in a drowning accident, Suzy is convinced that the true cause of the tragedy must have been a rare jellyfish sting. She sets out on a research-journey of her own in order to confirm her theory.
   

5. The Girl From Earths End – Tara Dairman Genre: fantasy Representation: parental (terminal) illness, fear of losing parent. One-line synopsis: 12-year old Hannah lives a peaceful life with her two fathers on a small isolated island, tending to the gardens there. Everything changes when one of her dads falls seriously ill. When Henna learns of the existence of a legendary, near-extinct plant with miraculous healing powers, she sets of on a quest to the main-island to join the Academy of Botany located there, in the hopes of bringing back this plant for her dad.
   

6. Hour of the Bees – Lindsay Eagar Genre: contemporary Representation: grandparent suffering dementia One-line synopsis: a young girl becomes fascinated by the magical stories told by her aging grandfather, as her family moves in with him over the summer to help out with his progressive dementia.
   

7. Where the Sky Lives – Margaret Dilloway Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of uncle One-line synopsis: When life doesn’t make sense, twelve-year-old amateur astronomer Tuesday Beals has always looked to the stars above Zion National Park, where she lives. Her beloved late uncle Ezra taught her astronomy, but now their special stargazing sites are all she has left of him, along with his ashes and a poem that may be a riddle.
   

8. King and the Dragonflies – Kacen Callender Genre: contemporary Representation: loss of sibling Trigger warning: suicide, homophobic and racist language (called out on page) One-line synopsis: Twelve-year-old King is sure his brother Khalid has turned into a dragonfly, following his unexpected passing. Khalid still visits in dreams, and King must keep these secrets to himself as he watches grief transform his family.
   

9. Once For Yes - Allie Millington Genre: magical realism Representation: loss of sibling One-line synopsis: An eleven-year old girl rallies together her entire community to protest the demolishion of their apartment building, that houses all the physical memories she holds of her deceased sister.
   

10. The Labors of Hercules Beal - Gary D. Schmidt

    Genre: contemporary

    Representation: loss of parents

    One-line synopsis: a seventh grader has to figure out how to fulfill an assignment to perform the Twelve Labors of Hercules in real life--and makes discoveries about friendship, community, and himself along the way.
    

11. Imaginary – Lee Bacon

    Genre: magical realism

    Representation: loss of parent

    One-line synopsis: The story of a boy and his imaginary friend--told by the imaginary friend Zach should've outgrown his imaginary friend by now.

Non-Fiction

1. When Breath Becomes Air – Paul Kalanithi Genre: memoir Representation: terminal cancer One-line synopsis: a young neurosurgeon faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis who attempts to answer the question 'What makes a life worth living?'

2. Traveling With Ghosts; A Memoir – Shannon Leone Fowler Genre: memoir Representation: loss of spouse One-line synopsis: From grief to reckoning to reflection to solace, a marine biologist shares the solo journey she took—through war-ravaged Eastern Europe, Israel, and beyond—to find peace after her fiancé suffered a fatal attack by a box jellyfish in Thailand.

3. Undying: a love story – Michel Faber Genre: poetry Representation: loss of spouse, terminal cancer One-line synopsis: a memoir in verse written by author and poet Faber following the death of his wife due to cancer.

4. A Grief Observed – C.S. Lewis Genre: memoir Representation: loss of spouse One-line synopsis: the authors thought, written in longhand journals, chronicling his grief over the loss of his wife.

5. The Long Goodbye – Meghan O’Rourke Genre: memoir Representation: loss of parent, terminal cancer One-line synopsis: Following the death of her mother, O’Rourke attempts to answer the question “What does it mean to mourn today, in a culture that has largely set aside rituals that acknowledge grief?”

6. Seeing Ghosts: A Memoir – Kat Chow Genre: memoir Representation: loss of parent One-line synopsis: An intimate and haunting portrait of grief and the search for meaning from a singular new talent as told through the prism of three generations of her Chinese American family.

7. Notes on Grief – Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche Genre: essays Representation: loss of parent One-line synopsis: a work of mediation, remembrance, and hope, written in the wake of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's beloved father’s death in the summer of 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

8. It's OK that You're Not OK - Megan Devine

Genre: self-help Representation: loss of spouse (own voice), various losses (authors experience as a therapist) One-line synopsis: blending the line between self-help and memoir: the authro shares her personal experiences, tips and research about grieving in a society that often doesn't offer the opportunity, time and space to do so.

9. The Way Through the Woods: of Mourning and Mushrooms - Long Litt Woon

Genre: memoir, science

Representation: loss of spouse

One-line synopsis: A grieving widow feeling disconnected from life discovers a most unexpected obsession--hunting for mushrooms--in a story of healing and purpose.

10. Grief is Love – Marisa Renee Lee Genre: self-help One-line synopsis: Marisa Renee Lee reveals that healing does not mean moving on after losing a loved one healing means learning to acknowledge and create space for your grief.
    

11. In Waves – AJ Dungo Genre: graphic memoir Representation: loss of husband in surfing-accident One-line synopsis: In this graphic novel, surfer and illustrator AJ Dungo remembers his late partner and the shared love of surfing that endured throughout their time together.
    

12. The Year of Magical Thinking – Joan Didion Genre: memoir Representation: loss of child One-line synopsis: Joan Didion explores an intensely personal yet universal experience: a portrait of a marriage–and a life, in good times and bad–that will speak to anyone who has ever loved a husband or wife or child.
    

13. The Archaeology of Loss – Sarah Tarlow Genre: memoir Representation: loss of spouse One-line synopsis: A unflinching memoir exploring the realities of marriage, care-giving, how we die and how we grieve.
    

Looking for even more grief-recommendations?

See my Suspiciously Specific posts themed around the subject: - Suspiciously Specific Grief-fiction: My deceased loved-one turned into a creature... - Suspiciously Specific- Grief-fiction: Finding healing from Grief in Nature...

Link to my post on my personal favourite grief-themed novels here. Link to my Goodreads Grief-and-trauma shelf here. Note, this shelf also includes books that are on my TBR, or that I don't necessarily recommend.