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Built on ISFDB, Wikipedia, Wikidata and Open Library. Curated reading orders carry their reasoning on the page; the rest follow publication order. Data sources & licenses

© Loreful · data: ISFDB · CC BY

More like Heroine Complex

anchored on:urban fantasysuperheroour worldnorth americacontemporarydemons+5 more

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Mood

The mood the book leaves you in.

  • The reading experience is propelled by journeys, exploration, and physical risk; excitement and forward momentum dominate over dread or introspection.
  • Joy and loss are deliberately mixed; the resolution grants characters something real while taking something else away, leaving warmth and sorrow together.
  • The book demands work from the reader — dense prose, difficult structure, unfamiliar ideas, or morally uncomfortable material — as part of its intended effect.
  • Grim events, cruelty, or despair dominate the atmosphere, and the book does not soften them with comfort or comic relief.
  • The atmosphere is quietly unsettling — wrongness, unease, and the uncanny pervade the book without necessarily escalating into overt horror.
  • The book is built to move the reader; character feeling is foregrounded and major scenes aim at a strong emotional response.
  • Humor is a primary aim and the prose plays for laughs — comic situations, wit, or dialogue produce sustained comedy, not occasional levity.
  • The book insists that things can improve; effort and decency are shown to matter, and the arc bends toward better outcomes even through hardship.
  • The book teaches as it goes — real facts, history, science, or craft are conveyed in enough depth that learning is part of the reading experience.
  • The book is designed to uplift and motivate, presenting perseverance or achievement in a way that invites the reader to aspire or act.
  • The overall register is cheerful and easygoing; stakes are kept gentle and the book avoids dwelling on pain or dread.
  • Withheld information drives the experience; the book sustains enigmas and secrets the reader wants resolved, whatever its genre.
  • The book is contemplative and inward-looking, giving more weight to thought, memory, and meaning than to external events.
  • The book works as comfort reading — low tension, a soothing pace, and an atmosphere the reader can unwind in.
  • Grief, loss, or melancholy set the dominant register, and the book lets sorrow stand rather than resolving it into comfort.
  • Sustained suspense is the point; the book keeps the reader braced for what happens next through danger, pressure, or impending revelation.
  • Playful invention and charm define the register — fanciful conceits, light absurdity, and a narration that delights in its own oddity.

About

What the story runs on.

  • Stories in which extraterrestrial beings are central — as characters, cultures, or the object of the plot.
  • Stories structured as a quest — a journey undertaken to find, deliver, or destroy something of great import.
  • Stories in which staying alive against nature, catastrophe, or scarcity is the central problem.
  • Stories of lovers kept apart by law, family, faith, or station, where the obstacle to love is the plot.
  • Stories in which a friendship — its making, testing, or loss — is the emotional center.
  • Stories of growing up — a young protagonist crossing from childhood into adult knowledge and responsibility.
  • Stories about who a character truly is — self-discovery, doubled lives, and the search for a self.
  • Stories about mourning — living through the death of a loved one and what loss does to the survivors.
  • Stories in which a buried family truth — hidden parentage, crimes, or shames — surfaces and reorders the present.
  • Stories driven by maneuvering for power — factions, conspiracies, and statecraft conducted in shadow.
  • Stories in which war itself is the subject — combat, occupation, and what warfare does to soldiers and civilians.
  • Stories organized around investigating a killing — the case, the clues, and the pursuit of the killer, in any genre's clothing.

Shelf

Where it sits in the library.

    • Fiction built on magic or other supernatural elements that have no scientific explanation.
    • Secondary-world fantasy at large scale, where the fate of nations or the world turns on the protagonists' struggle.
    • Fantasy set in a recognizably modern city or contemporary world where the supernatural intrudes on everyday life.
    • Fantasy that blends in horror's atmosphere and imagery, keeping a fantastical frame around grim or frightening material.
    • Action-driven fantasy following warriors or rogues with personal stakes against sorcerous threats, rather than world-spanning conflicts.
    • Fantasy set in a real historical period or a close analogue of one, with magic woven into the era.
    • Fantasy in which protagonists cross from the ordinary world into another world through a portal or similar passage.
    • Fiction that retells or reworks a traditional fairy tale in a new form or setting.
    • Fantasy drawing directly on myths, legends, and folklore, retelling them or building on their figures and logic.
    • Fantasy of ghosts, vampires, shapeshifters, psychics, and similar phenomena, usually set in an otherwise ordinary world.
    • Fiction mixing science-fictional trappings with overtly magical or impossible elements in one setting.
    • Low-stakes fantasy emphasizing comfort, community, and everyday pleasures over conflict and peril.
    • Speculative fiction of pervasive moral ambiguity, violence, and cynicism that rejects heroic conventions — fantasy and SF alike.
      • Fiction that extrapolates from science and technology — future societies, space travel, or speculative inventions — within at least nominally natural laws.
      • Science fiction of interstellar scope — starships, galactic polities, and adventure across star systems.
      • Science fiction committed to scientific rigor, where technical plausibility constrains the story.
      • Science fiction centered on armed forces and warfare, told largely from a military point of view.
      • Science fiction of networked, corporate-dominated near futures, pairing high technology with social decay.
      • Science fiction styled on nineteenth-century steam-powered technology, often in a Victorian or pseudo-Victorian setting.
      • Fiction depicting an oppressive or catastrophic society, presented as a warning.
      • Fiction set after civilization's collapse, following survivors in the ruins of the old world.
      • Fiction in which characters move between past and future, and the mechanics or consequences of that travel drive the plot.
      • Fiction exploring a world where a historical event went differently and history diverged from ours.
      • Science fiction about humanity's first encounter and communication with an alien intelligence.
      • Science fiction in which extraterrestrial forces attack or occupy Earth and humanity resists.
      • Fiction whose primary aim is to frighten or unsettle the reader through dread, menace, or the monstrous.
      • Horror of vast, indifferent, incomprehensible entities before which humanity is insignificant, in the Lovecraft tradition.
      • Horror of decaying houses, buried family secrets, and oppressive atmosphere in the Gothic literary tradition.
      • Horror centered on hauntings and the returning dead.
      • Horror located in the mind — paranoia, obsession, and unreliable perception rather than external monsters.
      • Horror built around the reanimated dead and survival amid their outbreaks.
      • Horror defined by explicit, transgressive gore that refuses to cut away from violence.
      • Speculative fiction of the strange and uncanny that resists both natural explanation and standard genre categories.
      • Fiction organized around solving a crime or puzzle, typically following an investigator toward the identification of a culprit.
      • A puzzle-first mystery that lays out clues so the culprit's identity can be deduced before the reveal.
      • Crime fiction of moral ambiguity, fatalism, and hard-edged style, set among the corrupt and the doomed.
      • A mystery following the realistic routines of police work — forensics, interviews, and case-building.
      • A gentle mystery with an amateur sleuth, a small community, and violence kept off the page.
      • A mystery set in a past era, where the investigation works within that period's methods and society.
      • Fast-paced fiction driven by imminent danger, pursuit, or high-stakes conspiracy, built to sustain tension.
      • A thriller of espionage — agents, tradecraft, and intelligence services in conflict.
      • A thriller centered on lawyers and the courtroom, where litigation carries the suspense.
      • A thriller driven by detailed contemporary or near-future technology, often military or scientific.
      • A thriller whose tension comes from mental states and manipulation between characters rather than external action.
      • Fiction whose central plot is a romantic relationship and its development toward an emotionally satisfying resolution.
      • Romance in which one or both partners are supernatural beings, blending fantasy elements into the love story.
      • A fantasy-romance hybrid in which the romantic arc and the fantasy plot carry equal weight.
      • Romance set in a past era, with courtship shaped by the period's society and manners.
      • Romance set in the present day, without supernatural or historical elements.
      • Fiction set in a real past period, where the historical setting materially shapes characters and events.
        • General and literary fiction emphasizing prose style, character interiority, or formal ambition over genre plot conventions.
        • Fiction in a realistic world where magical events occur and are treated as ordinary, in the tradition of Latin American literature.
        • Fiction that ridicules people, institutions, or society in order to criticize them.
        • Fiction of dreamlike, irrational imagery and logic that breaks from realistic representation.
        • Fiction that plays with narrative convention through metafiction, fragmentation, and self-reference.
        • Fiction propelled by journeys, exploration, and physical peril, where action and survival carry the plot.
        • Adventure fiction of ships and seafaring — naval engagements, voyages, and life at sea.
        • Fiction of the American frontier West — gunmen, ranchers, and lawmen, typically in the late nineteenth century.
        • Fiction centered on soldiers, campaigns, and the experience of warfare, historical or imagined.
          • Fiction written primarily to amuse, using comedic situations, wit, or parody as its organizing principle.
            • Multi-generational fiction following a family or dynasty across decades, with inheritance and kinship as the through-line.
              • Fiction whose world runs on explicit game mechanics — levels, stats, and skills that characters can see and exploit.
                • Fiction about costumed or superpowered heroes and their conflicts with comparable villains.

                Practical

                How long a commitment, whether it stands alone, and whether it has finished.

                Tap a chip to ask for it · tap again to rule it out · once more to clear. Numbers show what would be left.

                • Cover of Highfire
                  Highfire

                  Eoin Colfer · standalone novel · 2020

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasyfunnyfriendshipnorth america+1 more

                  Wyvern, Lord Highfire of the Highfire Eyrie, is the last dragon on Earth and is hiding out in a Louisiana swamp. He strikes a deal with Cajun swamp rat Squib: Squib will keep him company and fetch supplies for him and Vern will protect Squib from the dirty cop that is chasing him. However, there will be soon be a firery reckoning, in which dragons wither finally become extinct or Ver's glory days are back.

                • Cover of Heroine Complex
                  Heroine Complex

                  series · 7 books · 2016

                  similar bycontemporarysuperherourban fantasynorth americabig city+5 more

                • Cover of The Hollows
                  The Hollows

                  series · 39 books · 2004

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasydemonsnorth america+3 more

                  The Hollows is a series of urban fantasy novels by Kim Harrison, originally published by HarperCollins Publishers and by Ace Books since 2020. The series includes 18 novels, numerous novellas and short stories, two graphic novels, and one compendium resource; a 19th novel, Absolute Demon, is forthcoming in 2027.

                • Cover of InCryptid
                  InCryptid

                  series · 53 books · 2012

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasyadventurousnorth americaour world+2 more

                  InCryptid is a series of urban fantasy novels by American author Seanan McGuire, published by DAW Books. They follow multiple generations of a family of cryptozoologists who protect supernatural beings from discovery by humankind.

                • Cover of We Could Be Heroes
                  We Could Be Heroes

                  Mike Chen · standalone novel · 2021

                  similar bycontemporarysuperherofriendshipidentityour world+3 more

                  "An extraordinary and emotional adventure about unlikely friends and the power of choosing who you want to be... Jamie woke up in an empty apartment with no memory and only a few clues to his identity, but with the ability to read and erase other people's memories - a power he uses to hold up banks to buy coffee, cat food and books. Zoe is also searching for her past, and using her abilities of speed and strength... to deliver fast food. And she'll occasionally put on a cool suit and beat up bad guys, if she feels like it. When the archrivals meet in a memory-loss support group, they realize the only way to reveal their hidden pasts might be through each other. As they uncover an ongoing threat, suddenly much more is at stake than their fragile friendship. With countless people at risk, Zoe and Jamie will have to recognize that sometimes being a hero starts with trusting someone else - and yourself."--Publisher.

                • Cover of Captain Underpants
                  Captain Underpants

                  series · 15 books · 1989

                  similar bycontemporaryfunnysuperherofriendshipnorth america+1 more

                  Captain Underpants is an American illustrated children's novel series and multimedia franchise created by author and illustrator Dav Pilkey. The series revolves around two fourth graders, George Beard and Harold Hutchins, living in Piqua, Ohio, and Captain Underpants, an aptly named superhero from one of the boys' homemade comic books, who accidentally becomes real when George and Harold hypnotize their cruel, bossy, and ill-tempered principal, Mr. Krupp.

                • Cover of The Rest of Us Just Live Here
                  The Rest of Us Just Live Here

                  Patrick Ness · standalone novel · 2015

                  similar bycontemporaryfunnyurban fantasyfriendshipour worldnorth america+1 more

                  What if you aren't the Chosen One? The one who's supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever the heck this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death? What if you're like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again. Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week's end of the world, and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life. Even if your best friend is worshipped by mountain lions.

                • Cover of Devilish
                  Devilish

                  Maureen Johnson · standalone novel · 2006

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                  Jane Jarvis, a senior at a Catholic girl's school in Providence, Rhode Island, tries to save her best friend by making a pact with a demon--in the form of a cupcake-eating, very friendly teenage girl.

                • Cover of The Extraordinaries (TJ Klune)
                  The Extraordinaries (TJ Klune)

                  series · 3 books · 2020

                  similar bycontemporarysuperheroidentitynorth americabig city+2 more

                  The Extraordinaries follows Nick Bell, a fanfiction-writing teenager with ADHD who is infatuated with his city's resident superhero, Shadow Star, and decides the only way to get noticed is to become extraordinary himself. TJ Klune's YA trilogy - The Extraordinaries, Flash Fire, and Heat Wave - plays with superhero and fan-fiction tropes as Nick's crush, his friendships, and his sense of who he is collide across the three books.

                • Cover of The Afterlife Academy
                  The Afterlife Academy

                  Frank L. Cole · standalone novel · 2015

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                  HomeMy BooksBrowse ▾Community ▾ Sign up The Afterlife Academy Frank L. Cole 3.91 176 ratings57 reviews Want to Read Kindle $5.99 Rate this book For fans of "Because of Mr. Terupt," "Mr. Terupt Falls Again," and "Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library," this funny, suspenseful adventure is about two very different twelve-year-old boys who must save the world from demons while dealing with parents, school, bullies, and girls. Walter Prairie knows how to deal with bullies. He just has to beat them to the punch. But he doesn't see the biggest hit of his life coming when he is struck dead by a bolt of lightning. Before Walter even knows what's happened, he is sent to a Categorizing office, fast-tracked through the Afterlife Academy, and assigned as a Guardian Agent to protect a High-Level Target. Walter's HLT, Charlie Dewdle, isn't exactly the most popular kid in school. He's what you might call paranormally obsessed. When Charlie finds an ancient book with spells that can be used to open the Gateway for demons to wreak havoc on earth, it's up to him and Walter to fight an eclectic horde of enemies and protect humankind at all costs. But saving the world isn't so easy. Especially when your protector doesn't know the first thing about the Underworld, bullies like Mo Horvath are trying to hunt you down, pretty and popular Melissa Bittner is suddenly talking to you, and your parents think you're going crazy!

                • Cover of Crosstalk
                  Crosstalk

                  Connie Willis · standalone novel · 2016

                  similar bycontemporaryfunnyfriendshipour worldnorth america+2 more

                  Crosstalk is a science fiction novel by Connie Willis, published in 2016. It is a romantic comedy that explores the intersection of telephones and telepathy. In a similar situation to Bellwether and Passage, the main character, Briddey Flannigan, is part of a larger institution who gets caught up in series of escalating events. Additionally, Crosstalk like Bellwether and Passage feature themes of neuroscience, communication and technology.

                • Cover of Misfit
                  Misfit

                  Jon Skovron · standalone novel · 2011

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasyadventurousdemonsidentitynorth america+1 more

                  Seattle sixteen-year-old Jael must negotiate normal life in Catholic school while learning to control the abilities she inherited from her mother, a demon, and protect those she loves from Belial, the Duke of Hell.

                • Cover of The Dresden Files
                  The Dresden Files

                  series · 56 books · 2000

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasynorth americabig city+2 more

                  The Dresden Files is an urban fantasy series written by American author Jim Butcher. The novels are narrated from the first-person perspective of Harry Dresden, a private detective and wizard, as he investigates supernatural disturbances in contemporary Chicago. The first entry, Storm Front, was published in 2000 by Roc Books.

                • Cover of Samuel Johnson
                  Samuel Johnson

                  series · 3 books · 2009

                  similar bycontemporaryadventurousfunnydemonsour world

                  John Connolly's Samuel Johnson trilogy follows an ordinary boy and his dachshund, Boswell, who accidentally open a portal to Hell in his English hometown and end up as the unlikely last line of defense against the demons who pour through, beginning with The Gates. The comic horror trilogy continues through Hell's Bells and The Creeps.

                • Cover of Artemis Fowl
                  Artemis Fowl

                  series · 15 books · 2001

                  similar bycontemporaryadventurousour world+2 more

                  Artemis Fowl is a series of eleven fantasy novels by Irish author Eoin Colfer, revolving around various members of the Fowl family. The first cycle, the Artemis Fowl series, consists of eight books, and the second cycle, The Fowl Twins series, is a trilogy. Both releases have received commercial success and positive critical reception in the children's literature genre, and also originated graphic novel adaptations. As of 2013, the novels have sold more than 21 million copies in 44 languages, and are one of the best-selling series of all time. In 2010, Artemis Fowl was voted by readers as their favorite Puffin Books title of all time.

                • Cover of Jeremy Leclerc
                  Jeremy Leclerc

                  series · 11 books · 2007

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                • Cover of Department of Peculiar Science / Another Coop Heist
                  Department of Peculiar Science / Another Coop Heist

                  series · 2 books · 2016

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                • Cover of The Iron Druid Chronicles
                  The Iron Druid Chronicles

                  series · 70 books · 2011

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                  The Iron Druid Chronicles is a series of urban fantasy novels, novellas, novelettes and short stories, written by Kevin Hearne and published by Del Rey Books. All the books, including short stories, have recorded audiobooks narrated by Luke Daniels and Christopher Ragland

                • Cover of War for the Oaks
                  War for the Oaks

                  series · 2 books · 1987

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                  Emma Bull's 1987 urban fantasy debut follows Minneapolis rock singer Eddi McCandry after a faerie noble conscripts her into the ancient war between the Seelie and Unseelie Courts, forcing her to keep her band and her life together while fighting a battle she never asked for in her own city. Widely credited with helping found the urban fantasy genre, it won the Locus Award for Best First Novel.

                • Cover of Melvin Beederman Superhero
                  Melvin Beederman Superhero

                  series · 8 books · 2006

                  similar bycontemporarysuperherofunnyour world+3 more

                • Cover of Monster
                  Monster

                  A. Lee Martinez · standalone novel · 2009

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasyfunnyour worldnorth americabig city+2 more

                  Meet Monster. Meet Judy. Two humans who don't like each other much, but together must fight dragons, fire-breathing felines, trolls, Inuit walrus dogs, and a crazy cat lady - for the future of the universe.Monster runs a pest control agency. He's overworked and has domestic troubles - like having the girlfriend from hell.Judy works the night shift at the local Food Plus Mart. Not the most glamorous life, but Judy is happy. No one bothers her and if she has to spell things out for the night-manager every now and again, so be it.But when Judy finds a Yeti in the freezer aisle eating all the Rocky Road, her life collides with Monster's in a rather alarming fashion. Because Monster doesn't catch raccoons; he catches the things that go bump in the night. Things like ogres, trolls, and dragons.Oh, and his girlfriend from Hell? She actually is from Hell.

                • Cover of Genie Lo
                  Genie Lo

                  series · 2 books · 2017

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                • Cover of Hell on Earth (Jackie Kessler)
                  Hell on Earth (Jackie Kessler)

                  series · 7 books · 2007

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasydemonsour worldnorth america+3 more

                  Jackie Kessler, also known as Jackie Morse Kessler, is an American author of young adult, superhero, paranormal romance, and urban fantasy fiction, including novels, novellas, short stories, and comic books.

                • Cover of Wild Ride
                  Wild Ride

                  Jennifer Crusie & Bob Mayer · standalone novel · 2010

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasyadventurousdemonsnorth america+1 more

                  When Mary Alice Brannigan comes home to Ohio to restore the Dreamland amusement park, she doesn't expect to fall in love with a clown. Nor does she expect to find that she's the newest recruit in the Guardia, an elite team of demon fighters formed centuries before to guard the five Untouchables, the most powerful demons in the history of the world, now imprisoned right there in Dreamland.