Anxious People Readalikes | SWAN Consortium

Author

Formats:

Book, Large Print, Audiobook CD, Pre-loaded Audio

Description

Taken hostage by a failed bank robber while attending an open house, eight anxiety-prone strangers--including a redemption-seeking bank director, two couples who would fix their marriages, and a plucky octogenarian--discover their unexpected common traits. Looking at real estate isn't usually a life-or-death situation, but an apartment open house becomes just that when a failed bank robber bursts in and takes a group of eight strangers hostage. Each...

2) Nine perfect strangers

Author

Moriarty, Liane

Series

Thorndike Press large print core

Notes

Like Fredrik Backman, Liane Moriarty combines literary fiction, suspense, and humor in a similar setup—strangers thrown together.

Formats:

Book, Large Print, Audiobook CD, Pre-loaded Audio

Description

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Could ten days at a health resort really change you forever? These nine perfect strangers are about to find out. Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Some are here to lose weight, some are here to get a reboot on life, some are here for reasons they can't even admit to themselves. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know these ten days might involve some real work. But none of them could imagine just...

3) I don't expect anyone to believe me

Author

Villalobos, Juan Pablo

Notes

This is another novel that is hard to pinpoint. Is it a thriller? Comedy? Crime caper? All we know is that it is wildly entertaining.

Description

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'I don't expect anyone to believe me,' warns the narrator of this novel, a Mexican student called Juan Pablo Villalobos. He is about to fly to Barcelona on a scholarship when he's kidnapped in a bookshop and whisked away by thugs to a basement. The gangsters are threatening his cousin--a wannabe entrepreneur known to some as 'Projects' and to others as 'dickhead' - who is gagged and tied to a chair. The thugs say Juan Pablo must work for them. His...

4) Separation anxiety: a novel

Author

Zigman, Laura

Notes

While Judy is only one anxious person, not eight, her story is told with a similar wit and heft as Anxious People.

Formats:

Book, Large Print, Audiobook CD

Description

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Judy never intended to start wearing the dog. But when she stumbled across her son Teddy's old baby sling during a halfhearted basement cleaning, something in her snapped. So: the dog went into the sling, Judy felt connected to another living being, and she's repeated the process every day since. Life hasn't gone according to Judy's plan. Her career as a children's book author offered a glimpse of success before taking an embarrassing nose dive. Teddy,...

5) Deacon King Kong: a novel

Author

McBride, James

Notes

McBride inserts humor into his weighty novel and, like Backman, is a master of characterization whether major or minor players.

Formats:

Book, Large Print, Audiobook CD, Pre-loaded Audio

Description

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"From James McBride, author of the National Book Award-winning The Good Lord Bird, comes a wise and witty novel about what happens to the witnesses of a shooting. In September 1969, a fumbling, cranky old church deacon known as Sportcoat shuffles into the courtyard of the Cause Houses housing project in south Brooklyn, pulls a .45 from his pocket, and in front of everybody shoots the project's drug dealer at point-blank range. The reasons for this...

6) The extraordinary journey of the fakir who got trapped in an Ikea wardrobe

Author

Puértolas, Romain

Notes

Try this for the title alone, which is indicative of the compelling and satirical story lying within.

Description

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When the fakir--a professional con artist--arrives in Paris, he has just one goal: to get to Ikea. Armed with only a counterfeit hundred-euro note in the pocket of his silk trousers, he is confident that he has all he needs to thrive. But his plan goes horribly awry when he hides inside a wardrobe at the iconic Swedish retailer--the first in a series of accidents that will send him on a whirlwind tour across Europe. Pursued across the continent by...

7) Nothing to see here

Author

Wilson, Kevin

Notes

Both Anxious People and Nothing to See Here are quirky and humorous but with a heart of gold.

Formats:

Book, Large Print, Audiobook CD

Description

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"Lillian and Madison were unlikely, yet inseparable friends at their boarding school. Then Lillian had to leave the school unexpectedly in the wake of a scandal, and they have barely spoken since. Years later, Lillian gets a letter from Madison pleading for her help. Madison's twin stepkids are moving in, and she wants Lillian to be their caretaker. However, there's a catch: the twins spontaneously combust when they get agitated. Lillian is convinced...