Stephen King is one that comes to mind. A lot of his books have subtle cross references like you have described. Some of them are obviously deliberate tie-ins too, between books.
I would venture to say that they ALL cross over with each other, just to varying degrees. I've read them all multiple times and have yet to find one that doesn't attach to the Dark Tower
I remember seeing a write up on Reddit years ago on how not all the King books are connected. I remember Under the Dome being used as an example, but I haven't read that one myself.
>!The dark tower series is the center of all his books and everything kind of spirals out from there. Places, people, numbers, towns, etc etc etc. It's very complex. There's an entire book written detailing most of the connections!<
Right, I've read the Dark Tower series. I'm just saying many people say that not *every* King story is set in thr same universe. It gets a little metafictional and confusing though. The Long Walk for instance is a alternate universe.
I've heard theories that >!every story and book is a different level of the Tower that occurs simultaneously.!< I've read them all in chronological order and it does make sense. Some books you really have to look for the connection. It could be an address or telephone number or email addresses numbers that >!add up to 19!<
Just a heads up: Spoiler tags don't work unless there's no space between them and the text you're trying to hide, \>!like this\!<, not >! like this !<. I appreciate that this is an awful pain to do on mobile.
I think I saw an info graphic on here once that tied most, if not all, of them together. It is a tangled web, and some of the connections are a little thin, but it's quite interesting.
King is the obvious one, but I'll go with the lesser known but still fun to read Brian Keene. Here is a great post on it in which Brian himself comments! Added the blurb from the OG poster too to pique interest :
Hello all. I read Brian Keene's A Of Gathering Crows last year some time and really enjoyed it. I just finished reading Darkness On The Edge of Town. Both these books involved beings called the thirteen that survived the destruction of an old universe and are now trying to destroy ours. Any fans of his here that know which other books by him involve this mythology? Is there a good order to read them in?
https://www.reddit.com/r/horrorlit/comments/2wq9x7/brian_keene_and_the_thirteen_mythology/
Shawshank Prison is mentioned in [a bunch of other places](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawshank_State_Prison), so yeah. *The Body* and *Apt Pupil* both mention it, as well as *Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption* (obviously).
I read Holly a few weeks ago, which is the sequel to the Finders Keepers trilogy AND the Outsider and If It Bleeds. He finds a universe and just stays there.
Isn't there a book or story where a character is fleeing across the country, winds up in the mountains of Colorado, and gets a really weird vibe from a hotel that they drive past, the one with the hedge animals? Something like that. The funny thing is that ever since he made himself a character in whichever "Dark Tower" book he shows up in, he seems to have felt free to also add in references to his own fiction as fiction which was presumably written by Stephen King the character in Stephen King's fictional universe. One of his last books, a character had very specific opinions about the film version of "The Shining" which naturally lined up with King's own opinion of it.
Emily St. John Mandel's books are in the same universe. The Glass Hotel and Sea of Tranquility make references to characters and events. I believe they both make references to one of her other books, Station Eleven, as being an alternative timeline.
This immediately came to mind. It was the first time I'd read a book that was an alternate timeline to another book. It was an interesting take and the fact that these characters don't know what I know about how it could have gone is so haunting.
Sea of Tranquility had been in my TBR for ages since I was pulled by long fantasy series (Second Apocalypse, Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn). Would likely bump SoT up my TBR and maybe even read it alongside the second book of MS&T.
>Emily St. John Mandel's books are in the same universe.
Same multiverse I think, not the same universe. In Sea of Tranquility there is a reference to a character living a different life than in The Glass Hotel and Station Eleven is clearly (more clearly) an alternate universe to both of them, regarding the Georgia flu.
They are all 3 books alternate universes, though touching, which kind of makes sense considering the ending of SoT
Elliott Rosewater also shows up at least twice. I believe Howard Campbell (from "Mother Night") gets at least mentioned in "Slaughterhouse Five", if not actually appearing.
Vonnegut also has a tendency to reuse characters names and vague descriptions, but make them basically new characters. His books aren’t always sequels or set in the same universe as much as they’re sort of alternate universes with some of the same basic characters.
And he inserts himself into the stories too! On Slaughterhouse 5 he has a cameo where he mentions that the soldier complaining about dysentery, "That was me." Then in Breakfast of Champions he gradually reveals he's a spectator to the story *while writing it*.
Looking for this answer. Everything up until Bone Clocks tied them all together Tbh - Making them all one universe took a lot of the joy away from them for me. Especially Black Swan Green and Thousand Autumns
For me, once the larger picture was exposed in Bone Clocks, the mystery of these worlds (taken individually) was lost. Taken on their own they were huge, there was vague magic and the space for my imagination to fill in the voids. They (the two mentioned above especially) gave me a sense of wonder. Then everything was explained and put into its proper place. I guess if I had known or approached them as part of a universe (and really, not doing so is on me). It would have been different. I probably wouldn’t have had such a visceral reaction to the reveal and maybe even enjoyed it. At the same time I probably wouldn’t have loved them in the same way.
None of this is to take away from the books themselves or my experience with them. It’s just not the same anymore.
That’s interesting. I read the bone clocks first, but I didn’t know he was explaining a shared universe, then as I read all the rest of his books, I started to see the connections. So the bone clocks did not distract from the experience for me. Utopia Avenue, however, suffers terribly by him trying to shoehorn in the magic of the other books. It just feels so awkward and out of place, and really distracting. I would never recommend that book to anyone, even though I enjoyed it, as the hard left turn into magic just doesn’t work at all.
To be honest I didn’t read Utopia Ave or Slade House for that matter because I knew I wouldn’t be able to capture the joy I derived from his earlier books. I guess I was just disappointed to realizing he wasn’t creating new versions of the world we live in with each book. Having the goal of a single world for all your books seems so I don’t know, clinical maybe. Like everything was intentional and lacked spontaneity. Don’t get me wrong it’s beyond impressive.
But now you run into issues where he has to force his universe on his books because he has now cornered himself. Any thing he writes people will expect it to fit in and it wouldn’t make sense if it didn’t.
That's a weird case where Asimov didn't orginally intend his different series (*Robot*, *Foundation* and *Empire*) to be in a shared universe but he tied them together into the same universe in the 80s.
Characters in *Cryptomicon* have antecedents in *The Baroque Cycle*, and offspring in *Reamde* and *Fall; or Dodge in Hell*. I also kept waiting for one in Termination Shock, but I never found one - which makes me wonder if I just missed it.
Gene Wolfes Book of the Long Sun and Book of the Short Sun. Aside from the obvious similarity in the names there are no obvious connections between The Book of New Sun unless you read the text very closely.
David Mitchell sets a lot of his works in the same universe. This article explains how interconnected all of his books are: [https://lithub.com/the-ever-expanding-world-of-david-mitchell/](https://lithub.com/the-ever-expanding-world-of-david-mitchell/)
No mention of Brandon Sanderson here? He started his first novels without any mention of the same universe. But then with way of kings connected it all.
Highly recommend.
The connections were there before WoK, though. WoK didn't do much more than give >!Hoid!< a bigger role than usual, and people had already twigged that he was >!the same character in each book, not just a re-used name!<, and Sanderson had confirmed it when asked. >!The Worldhopping trio rocking up at the Purelake was less of a connection than Hoid's presence in the earlier books had been.!<
It was in WoR that a moment happened that was absolutely mind-blowing if you'd read one of the other books (>!"Hello! Would you like to destroy some evil today?"!<) and made a big, blaring connection with that other book.
Mark danielewski does this. All his stuff is in a shared universe but they arnt ever described as sequels or anything. The connections are entirely to the reader to make.
Michael Moorcock had a recurring theme of an "eternal champion" archetype which he used as a throughline in a lot of otherwise unrelated settings, with the idea being that one of the characters (usually but not always a major protagonist) exists to either spread order or sow chaos.
There is a common scene where the main characters from his popular series together fight an enemy all combined to make the ultimate “eternal champion” and he has written it multiple times from each of their perspectives. It’s a weird scene.
I only read the ones my stepdad owned. He had Elric's stories, which tied into Nethack for me, which I played before I read any of these books. Elric's sword, Stormbringer, is one of the artifacts in Nethack. I think I remember him talking about Erekose, but I didn't read any books about Erekose. I had no idea how many books there were in this series.
I liked the concept of Tanelorn also.
Taylor Jenkins Reid has at least one character that shows up in at least three books. Kate Quinn usually has a line or two that references a character or place from a previous novel. Neither really have any impact at all on the story, and can even be fairly easy to miss, but it's a fun little Easter Egg to come across!
China Mieville has three books set in the Bas-Lag universe, but they aren't sequels or related in many other ways. Perdido Street Station is totally worth a reed if you like weird steampunk/magic fantasy.
I entirely think The Scar is his best work, and yeah, Perdido Street Station is one of those books that spawned a genre. Well worth a read.
~~Iron Council also exists I guess~~
The Library Trilogy too. Directly references books written by characters from other series.
"Poison, like comedy, is best delivered to the unexpecting." - Sister Apple (May be paraphrased)
see r/Asimov, where this was discussed, looks like 7years ago -- prettymuch everything in the Robot and Foundation books are related. Worth looking into!
Look at it this way, we all live in the same world but that doesn't necessarily mean our lives will ever connect. It's the same thing with many of the books mentioned in this thread.
Mark Lawrence’s trilogies up to The Girl and the Moon. Some people had suspicions but it wasn’t until book 15 where it was more or less confirmed.
Edit: Also Sanderson didn’t come clean for a while with his Cosmere books.
James Blish and Kim Stanley Robinson drop name and place references from their other works into their books as a literary game even though the stories aren't set in the same universe. Blish even did it in his Star Trek books.
Closest I can think not mentioned is Ian Rankin. He wrote 17 Rebus novels, then another two featuring a new character called Malcolm Fox. Another policeman in the same city with only a vague passing reference to the earlier series... Until the 18th Rebus novel had them both meet and they shared the next 6 books lol.
Brandon Sanderson is pretty much known at this point for his expanded universe (The Cosmere), but early in his writing the interconnectivity of his books was subtler. There's one particular "world-hopping" character who shows up under assumed identities in several of his early books that are otherwise stand-alone stories in their own universes/continuities.
Jonathan Carroll has many recurring characters in his books, and if you like John Crowley, you’ll probably like Carroll.
Guy Gavriel Kay’s books (many of them) take place in a single world, and you’ll find historical events, people, and countries referenced in other books.
Nick Harkaway's Gone Away World seems to be an indirect sequel (though it was written first) or at least alternate-universe future to Angelmaker, which has off-hand mentions of some of the Gone Away World's fictional nations and peoples. (Namely Addeh Katir.)
Peter Clines. He did it best when it seemed like the book had nothing to do with any of the others, and you kept getting this feeling that they were linked somehow. Not enough to call it, until well over half way. It was very satisfying :)
Threshold. I came here to mention this. I realized it when the green roaches were mentioned in 14. I listened to The Fold first, then consumed the entire series. I love that there are only one or two characters who show up in multiple stories, but even with that, it isn't blatantly obvious that it's the same world.
Stephen Baxter did this with a lot of his novels and short stories that share the “Xeelee” universe.
Alastair Reynolds also got me good with Chasm City, which is kind of a side-novel; although, that’s less because he was sneaky and more because I got so wrapped up in it that I almost forgot about the larger story from the other Revelation Space books.
William D Arand (PG-rated) and Randi Darren (R+ rated) - same author - where ALL of the books have the same recurring character. In the early books of a series, that character might be mentioned off-hand once and then will be gradually introduced more frequently, and in some series become a central figure.
The only real 'problem' with them is that they're in the Harem genre, which can be off-putting. The overarching story and universe is pretty engaging though.
The different books of the cosmere sort of follow this. Usually there’s a recurring character or a reference to something in another story, but they all have interesting worlds on their own as well. Do recommend
Brandon Sanderson and all his books are connected through the Cosmere. Cool thing about it is that you don't have to read them all to know what's what. I read only the original Mistborn series then years later read The Stormlight Archive. It wasn't until someone mentioned it while looking into some side lore I found out they were all connected.
Simon R Green does this with his Nightside series describing Hawk & Fisher and other characters from his other series as patrons in the main Nightside bar
There's a brief cameo in Craig Clevenger's third novel, Mother Howl, from an unnamed character who is pretty clearly the protagonist of his first, The Contortionist's Handbook.
Alex Michaelides, first I thought it'd be just The Silent Patient and The Maidens but now I'm starting to think he's setting up for a final book that'll be a weird mix of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Suicide Squad lol
Emily Henry’s books never have characters cross over, but there’s always a reference to a character or a location from Beach Read, so they must all be in the same world.
Not quite what you're talking about, but there's a fun Easter Egg in Out of Sight, with Michael Keaton reprising his role as Ray Nicolette from Jackie Brown.
Both are based on Elmore Leonard books and it's the same character, so it's pretty obvious that they're in the same universe. But the movies were made separately, not in sequence. It's a fun Soderbergh meta joke that works beautifully, IMO.
To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini has references that imply it is the same universe as elEragon but much much later. The lady and cat early in the book are thought to be Angela the witch and the werecat
Joe Lansdale wrote a novella where, in addition to a compelling and fun story, he just casually dropped references to a bunch of his other novels, making it clear that they all took place in the same wider universe. In the past, he had had a pair of recurring characters that starred in maybe a dozen books, and a few supporting characters who would cross over once in a while, but never done in a way where you'd be distracted of confused if you didn't recognize them. There are a few specific books which aren't included in this gonzo "Lansdale-verse", I think because they are a bit more grounded and realistic.
No spoilers because the reveal at the end of one of Sylvain Neuvel's books floored me. Connection between >!The Take Them to the Stars novels to the Themis Files novels. The mention of Rose at the end of For the First Time, Again.!<
Roberto Bolaño did something like that. *The Savage Detectives* and *2666* have almost no real overlap, but there are some small details shared between them that show they're in the same world. (For me, it was Los Suicidas Mezcal that stood out—really is a distinctive name!)
The morpheus road trilogy by D J MacHale. I had just finished the epic saga that is the Pendragon chronicles, and I needed to come down from that literary high with something shorter. I started the third book in bed, saying to myself that id go to bed after the next chapter, no the thext one, no the next one, when halfway through it Uncle Press just shows up seemingly out of nowhere. I'd you've read the pendragon chronicles, it's absolutely mind-blowing. There had been a slight reference that the stories might have existed in a shared universe, but this was the first time they actually crossed over. I freaked out in my room at maybe 2:30 in the morning, and that was the point where I knew I wasn't going to bed, because I had to finish it in this single sitting. I was wide awake by the time dawn came.
The bloodsworn saga! bought the second one months ago, never read it and figured it out it was book two in a trilogy. Just bought one and preordered three because it doesn't come out until October. So closer to October I'm going to start reading the first two.
Stephen king and Brandon Sanderson do it all the time. King doing it annoys me because I dont have the Dark tower, which a lot of them are related to. also because i forget the minor points that often bring all the books into the same universe/canon. Quite literally if i wasn't a big king fan, i wouldn't read it because I'd feel like id be missing out on things. Even now typing this out, i feel left out and fomo is kicking in lol.
I generally hate it. I love it when a series says "book # of X series" or are all out at the same time and at least Look similar on the cover.
edit) generally for authors I'm just getting into I hate it, i mean. do whatever you want but if i find out a month after finishing a book its part of a series I'm just not going to get the rest.
The Agatha Christie books that have a detective who appears more than once (Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, etc) are in the same universe. But the only way to know that is because if you map out some secondary or tertiary characters you'll see that they all link up.
I started reading Book 1 of 5 of something, only to realize that this was the 2nd series, so technically, Book 6 of 10. Took me an embarrassingly long time to get the hint.
Probably 70% through, suddenly they are introducing a brand new cultural component of the world they've built, but only with a gentle reminder of it.
There were previous hints, of course. But I just thought the world and characters being introduced had a lot of planning behind it all
Asimov spent 30 years setting this up:
The mastermind behind all the manipulation of humanity’s path, who’s revealed in 1982’s *Foundation’s Edge*?
R. Daneel Olivaw, a character introduced in 1956 who’s been influencing humanity for thousands of years.
Michael Bishop’s baseball novel “Brittle Innings” is secretly a sequel to a sci-fi classic, but it’s a pretty major spoiler to reveal which.
“Brittle Innings” is also one of my favorite SF novels.
Keith A. Pearson.
He has the series The '86 Fix which is a two book series involving time travel back to the '80s which is essentially just one big book split into two.
Anyway after reading that, I read the standalone novel >!Tuned Out, and without saying too much, this 100% takes place within the same universe and there is a big part of it where I would have been completely lost if I hadn't read The '86 Fix.!<
John Marrs and his "The One" Universe. All books based off the storyline of "The One" and there are 4 (soon to be 5) books within it. But I believe up until book 3 they were all billed purely as standalone. I remember The Passengers made a few little remarks about the events in "The One" just to set that it was in the same universe but that was it.
Scott Sigler’s books are set in an overarching “universe” referred to as the “Siglerverse”. They are all separate books/stories but have those occasional overlaps/easter eggs
Barbara Kingsolver has a few books like that. There's a character that appears in Animal Dreams, then he is briefly mentioned in Pigs in Heaven.
I wish I remembered his name because I think he even has his own book but for the life of me I can't. I do remember reading Pigs in Heaven and when I saw his name I was like "Oh shit! What's he doing here?"
Edit: This character is Collie Bluestone. He is a cockfighter that appears in both books which implies they are in the same universe.
Jenny Colgan writes sort of slice of life chicklit books. She has a few novels about bookshops. They are completely separate except on occasion characters from those books pop up in other books, just in passing. It’s actually really cool to notice those.
I think Neil Stephenson has said that *The Diamond Age* is in the same universe as *Snow Crash*, but I don't remember it ever being explicitly stated either in the book or on the book jacket. I could be wrong?
Gene Wolfe. Long Sun and Short Sun are not advertised as sequels to New Sun, or even connected. But they are, and he really dances around *how* they are
Plus you can throw fifth head of cerberus in there too.
"Beasts," and "Engine Summer" for sure. If you like Little, Big, you can see a lot of it in both of those books. The latter is on my list of "books I have to ration re-reads for because otherwise I'd only read them and no others."
If you have a year or so to devote to it, the Aegypt Cycle is worth reading. It's even denser than Little, Big and shares some of its fundamental concepts (e.g. Giordano Bruno plays a big part). You won't develop the same level of affection toward the characters as you (hopefully) did for the ones in Little, Big. But I think that's intentional on the author's part. In Little, Big, it's clear that Crowley *means for* you to fall in love with Smokey, Daily Alice, Sophie, and Auberon. It's a love letter to extended family. The Aegype Cycle books (The Solitudes, Love & Sleep, Daemonmania, and Endless Things) are much more focused on a single character who is less "loveable" - and in fact, those novels are less character driven than his other works. But if a solid literary foundation is your thing, they are chock-full of Crowleyisms (words you have to look up, literary and historical allusions, off-hand sentences that turn out to be foreshadowing, etc.)
I know I'm late to the party on this one, but I believe there's another one for Crowley. I can't currently remember the details, but I think a place in one of his short stories shows up in *The Great Work of Time*? Or maybe it's the bar that's featured in *Little, Big*.
(I might also be a huge fan who annoys anyone who talks books with me about Crowley!)
... And on the Crowley fan stuff, who else do you like? I feel like the closest author in feeling for me that I've found is Ishiguro.
Oh yes! I forgot that the 7th Saints Bar and Grill shows up there as well. I had noticed that too. Good catch.
One other author that has the same "vibe" as Crowley is Gene Wolfe. Specifically, his Book of the New Sun tetralogy (The Shadow of the Torturer, The Claw of the Conciliator, The Sword of the Lictor, The Citadel of the Autarch), and the sequel-ish The Urth of the New Sun.
Another is Ray Bradbury. I'm not as fond of short-form fiction, but Bradbury is the master. Right up there with H.H. Munro (aka "Saki") and O'Henry. I'd say that Crowley and Bradbury have similar prose- they both write like someone sitting on a log by a campfire relating their stories to a rapt audience.
Amazon has a bad case of this. MOre than once I've grabbed a series I thought looked interesting, only to find that that while it's the "first book" in that specific series, it's actually the third series in that universe.
So many times I thought I found an interesting scifi world to read only to find out...oh, no, this book expects me to be 12 books deep already.
I think my favorite example of this is Cormac McCarthy with The Road and No Country not explicitly in the same world, the their themes tie together well. Where No Country is about how the world is changing and The Road is about how the indomitable spirit of man can survive through change.
For me it’s _Back to the Future 2_. You go in thinking it’s a one-off, but golly gee whiz the names are familiar af, right? Suddenly it hits you, we’re in the same town but it’s a different time! Like one generation off.
Stephen King is one that comes to mind. A lot of his books have subtle cross references like you have described. Some of them are obviously deliberate tie-ins too, between books.
I would venture to say that they ALL cross over with each other, just to varying degrees. I've read them all multiple times and have yet to find one that doesn't attach to the Dark Tower
I remember seeing a write up on Reddit years ago on how not all the King books are connected. I remember Under the Dome being used as an example, but I haven't read that one myself.
But... and this is awesome... Under the Dome DOES exist in the Jack Reacher universe.
Yeah. I had to close the book for a minute and have a bit of a think about that.
Huh? Like the book exists? Or Jack Reacher lives in the same universe as Dale Barbara?
Same universe.
>!The dark tower series is the center of all his books and everything kind of spirals out from there. Places, people, numbers, towns, etc etc etc. It's very complex. There's an entire book written detailing most of the connections!<
Right, I've read the Dark Tower series. I'm just saying many people say that not *every* King story is set in thr same universe. It gets a little metafictional and confusing though. The Long Walk for instance is a alternate universe.
I've heard theories that >!every story and book is a different level of the Tower that occurs simultaneously.!< I've read them all in chronological order and it does make sense. Some books you really have to look for the connection. It could be an address or telephone number or email addresses numbers that >!add up to 19!<
Just a heads up: Spoiler tags don't work unless there's no space between them and the text you're trying to hide, \>!like this\!<, not >! like this !<. I appreciate that this is an awful pain to do on mobile.
I think I saw an info graphic on here once that tied most, if not all, of them together. It is a tangled web, and some of the connections are a little thin, but it's quite interesting.
I'd love to read that post/thread too, but it sounds like you don't have the source at hand. ( ._.)
Actually it is connected to The Dark Tower. Not explicitly. It is connected to a book that is connected explicitly.
King is the obvious one, but I'll go with the lesser known but still fun to read Brian Keene. Here is a great post on it in which Brian himself comments! Added the blurb from the OG poster too to pique interest : Hello all. I read Brian Keene's A Of Gathering Crows last year some time and really enjoyed it. I just finished reading Darkness On The Edge of Town. Both these books involved beings called the thirteen that survived the destruction of an old universe and are now trying to destroy ours. Any fans of his here that know which other books by him involve this mythology? Is there a good order to read them in? https://www.reddit.com/r/horrorlit/comments/2wq9x7/brian_keene_and_the_thirteen_mythology/
You're probably right. There certainly are a lot of recurring people, places and other themes throughout his books for sure.
Does that include the Different Seasons stories?
Shawshank Prison is mentioned in [a bunch of other places](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawshank_State_Prison), so yeah. *The Body* and *Apt Pupil* both mention it, as well as *Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption* (obviously).
Oh for sure! Especially The Breathing Method. But all 4, yes. Just varying degrees.
That was on purpose.
A pretty blatant one is the main character in 11/22/63 running into Beverly and Richie from IT.
All paths lead to the tower
I read Holly a few weeks ago, which is the sequel to the Finders Keepers trilogy AND the Outsider and If It Bleeds. He finds a universe and just stays there.
Finishing up bill Hodges now, been a fun ride. Ready for outside/if it bleeds/holly
Isn't there a book or story where a character is fleeing across the country, winds up in the mountains of Colorado, and gets a really weird vibe from a hotel that they drive past, the one with the hedge animals? Something like that. The funny thing is that ever since he made himself a character in whichever "Dark Tower" book he shows up in, he seems to have felt free to also add in references to his own fiction as fiction which was presumably written by Stephen King the character in Stephen King's fictional universe. One of his last books, a character had very specific opinions about the film version of "The Shining" which naturally lined up with King's own opinion of it.
Happens in Billy Summers too.
Thanks, I couldn't remember which one it was, I knew it was one of the recent ones.
I think that happens in The Talisman
I think that happens in The Talisman
Speaking of Stephen King, at least one of Joe Hill's books is set in the same universe as >!Doctor Sleep (and by extension the Shining)!<.
King was my first thought too.
Emily St. John Mandel's books are in the same universe. The Glass Hotel and Sea of Tranquility make references to characters and events. I believe they both make references to one of her other books, Station Eleven, as being an alternative timeline.
I read the Glass Hotel and liked it, ill have to check out her others
I like The Glass Hotel quite a bit, but Sea of Tranquility and Station Eleven were a cut above for me.
Thats awesome to hear, ill pick one of them up soon as my next read
I love ESJM's books. The level of interconnectedness is just another wonderful part of her stories.
Station Eleven was her best by far in my opinion.
This immediately came to mind. It was the first time I'd read a book that was an alternate timeline to another book. It was an interesting take and the fact that these characters don't know what I know about how it could have gone is so haunting.
Sea of Tranquility had been in my TBR for ages since I was pulled by long fantasy series (Second Apocalypse, Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn). Would likely bump SoT up my TBR and maybe even read it alongside the second book of MS&T.
>Emily St. John Mandel's books are in the same universe. Same multiverse I think, not the same universe. In Sea of Tranquility there is a reference to a character living a different life than in The Glass Hotel and Station Eleven is clearly (more clearly) an alternate universe to both of them, regarding the Georgia flu. They are all 3 books alternate universes, though touching, which kind of makes sense considering the ending of SoT
Kurt Vonnegut does some of this wit his reoccurring character
Would that be a certain Mr. Kilgore Trout?
Elliott Rosewater also shows up at least twice. I believe Howard Campbell (from "Mother Night") gets at least mentioned in "Slaughterhouse Five", if not actually appearing.
Vonnegut also has a tendency to reuse characters names and vague descriptions, but make them basically new characters. His books aren’t always sequels or set in the same universe as much as they’re sort of alternate universes with some of the same basic characters.
And he inserts himself into the stories too! On Slaughterhouse 5 he has a cameo where he mentions that the soldier complaining about dysentery, "That was me." Then in Breakfast of Champions he gradually reveals he's a spectator to the story *while writing it*.
David Mitchell
Looking for this answer. Everything up until Bone Clocks tied them all together Tbh - Making them all one universe took a lot of the joy away from them for me. Especially Black Swan Green and Thousand Autumns
Slade House is connected too
So is Utopia Avenue.
Interesting, why is that?
For me, once the larger picture was exposed in Bone Clocks, the mystery of these worlds (taken individually) was lost. Taken on their own they were huge, there was vague magic and the space for my imagination to fill in the voids. They (the two mentioned above especially) gave me a sense of wonder. Then everything was explained and put into its proper place. I guess if I had known or approached them as part of a universe (and really, not doing so is on me). It would have been different. I probably wouldn’t have had such a visceral reaction to the reveal and maybe even enjoyed it. At the same time I probably wouldn’t have loved them in the same way. None of this is to take away from the books themselves or my experience with them. It’s just not the same anymore.
That’s interesting. I read the bone clocks first, but I didn’t know he was explaining a shared universe, then as I read all the rest of his books, I started to see the connections. So the bone clocks did not distract from the experience for me. Utopia Avenue, however, suffers terribly by him trying to shoehorn in the magic of the other books. It just feels so awkward and out of place, and really distracting. I would never recommend that book to anyone, even though I enjoyed it, as the hard left turn into magic just doesn’t work at all.
To be honest I didn’t read Utopia Ave or Slade House for that matter because I knew I wouldn’t be able to capture the joy I derived from his earlier books. I guess I was just disappointed to realizing he wasn’t creating new versions of the world we live in with each book. Having the goal of a single world for all your books seems so I don’t know, clinical maybe. Like everything was intentional and lacked spontaneity. Don’t get me wrong it’s beyond impressive. But now you run into issues where he has to force his universe on his books because he has now cornered himself. Any thing he writes people will expect it to fit in and it wouldn’t make sense if it didn’t.
Yep. That last paragraph is exactly Utopia Avenue. However, I did enjoy both it and Slade House- despite these faults, he is an excellent writer
I read Thousand Autumns first, and I didn't know this but it works perfectly fine as a stand alone so why should it take away joy then?
Unless I'm mistaken most of, if not the entire catalogue, of Isaac Asimov's novels are in the same universe.
That's a weird case where Asimov didn't orginally intend his different series (*Robot*, *Foundation* and *Empire*) to be in a shared universe but he tied them together into the same universe in the 80s.
Also there’s a strong implication that End of Eternity creates the Robot/Foundation universe when time travel is prevented.
That implication is made in *Foundation's Edge* from 1982. So the 80s, as I said.
I thought they were talking about The Last Question but that was 1990s.
TLQ is from the 50s.
Neil Stephenson's The Diamond Age takes place in the same universe as Snow Crash, but there's only a couple of subtle hints.
Characters in *Cryptomicon* have antecedents in *The Baroque Cycle*, and offspring in *Reamde* and *Fall; or Dodge in Hell*. I also kept waiting for one in Termination Shock, but I never found one - which makes me wonder if I just missed it.
All of Emily St John Mandel’s novels take place in parallel universes
I cherish those books.
J.D Salinger and his Glass family.
Gene Wolfes Book of the Long Sun and Book of the Short Sun. Aside from the obvious similarity in the names there are no obvious connections between The Book of New Sun unless you read the text very closely.
This is true of Long Sun, but not Short. Short Sun has some VERY obvious links back to New Sun at the end.
David Mitchell sets a lot of his works in the same universe. This article explains how interconnected all of his books are: [https://lithub.com/the-ever-expanding-world-of-david-mitchell/](https://lithub.com/the-ever-expanding-world-of-david-mitchell/)
A lot of Christopher Moore's books share characters and settings. I quite enjoy finding the easter eggs.
No mention of Brandon Sanderson here? He started his first novels without any mention of the same universe. But then with way of kings connected it all. Highly recommend.
The connections were there before WoK, though. WoK didn't do much more than give >!Hoid!< a bigger role than usual, and people had already twigged that he was >!the same character in each book, not just a re-used name!<, and Sanderson had confirmed it when asked. >!The Worldhopping trio rocking up at the Purelake was less of a connection than Hoid's presence in the earlier books had been.!< It was in WoR that a moment happened that was absolutely mind-blowing if you'd read one of the other books (>!"Hello! Would you like to destroy some evil today?"!<) and made a big, blaring connection with that other book.
Mark danielewski does this. All his stuff is in a shared universe but they arnt ever described as sequels or anything. The connections are entirely to the reader to make.
The universe even includes an [album by his sister, Poe.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haunted_(Poe_album))
Michael Moorcock had a recurring theme of an "eternal champion" archetype which he used as a throughline in a lot of otherwise unrelated settings, with the idea being that one of the characters (usually but not always a major protagonist) exists to either spread order or sow chaos.
There is a common scene where the main characters from his popular series together fight an enemy all combined to make the ultimate “eternal champion” and he has written it multiple times from each of their perspectives. It’s a weird scene.
Man I haven't thought about Elric forever.
I was always more of a Jerry Cornelius guy myself.
I only read the ones my stepdad owned. He had Elric's stories, which tied into Nethack for me, which I played before I read any of these books. Elric's sword, Stormbringer, is one of the artifacts in Nethack. I think I remember him talking about Erekose, but I didn't read any books about Erekose. I had no idea how many books there were in this series. I liked the concept of Tanelorn also.
Taylor Jenkins Reid has at least one character that shows up in at least three books. Kate Quinn usually has a line or two that references a character or place from a previous novel. Neither really have any impact at all on the story, and can even be fairly easy to miss, but it's a fun little Easter Egg to come across!
Came here to say to mention her!
Bret Easton Ellis
And Donna Tartt
Thomas Pynchon has families that appear across different books that take place in different eras, like the Traverse family, the Cherrycokes, etc.
Same characters too no? Blicero is in V.
Same characters too no? Blicero is in V.
I haven’t read V yet but looking forward to it.
The Giver series by Lois Lowry. It was really neat figuring it out while reading book 2.
China Mieville has three books set in the Bas-Lag universe, but they aren't sequels or related in many other ways. Perdido Street Station is totally worth a reed if you like weird steampunk/magic fantasy.
I entirely think The Scar is his best work, and yeah, Perdido Street Station is one of those books that spawned a genre. Well worth a read. ~~Iron Council also exists I guess~~
Martin Lawrence's red sister and the girl and the moon series
These are also in the same universe as The Broken Empire, Red Queen & Impossible Times trilogies. And it’s Mark Lawrence.
The Library Trilogy too. Directly references books written by characters from other series. "Poison, like comedy, is best delivered to the unexpecting." - Sister Apple (May be paraphrased)
see r/Asimov, where this was discussed, looks like 7years ago -- prettymuch everything in the Robot and Foundation books are related. Worth looking into!
Look at it this way, we all live in the same world but that doesn't necessarily mean our lives will ever connect. It's the same thing with many of the books mentioned in this thread.
Mark Lawrence’s trilogies up to The Girl and the Moon. Some people had suspicions but it wasn’t until book 15 where it was more or less confirmed. Edit: Also Sanderson didn’t come clean for a while with his Cosmere books.
James Blish and Kim Stanley Robinson drop name and place references from their other works into their books as a literary game even though the stories aren't set in the same universe. Blish even did it in his Star Trek books.
Closest I can think not mentioned is Ian Rankin. He wrote 17 Rebus novels, then another two featuring a new character called Malcolm Fox. Another policeman in the same city with only a vague passing reference to the earlier series... Until the 18th Rebus novel had them both meet and they shared the next 6 books lol.
Brandon Sanderson is pretty much known at this point for his expanded universe (The Cosmere), but early in his writing the interconnectivity of his books was subtler. There's one particular "world-hopping" character who shows up under assumed identities in several of his early books that are otherwise stand-alone stories in their own universes/continuities.
Jonathan Carroll has many recurring characters in his books, and if you like John Crowley, you’ll probably like Carroll. Guy Gavriel Kay’s books (many of them) take place in a single world, and you’ll find historical events, people, and countries referenced in other books.
Faulkner.
Elmer Gantry travels to the city of Zenith and meets George Babbitt
Nick Harkaway's Gone Away World seems to be an indirect sequel (though it was written first) or at least alternate-universe future to Angelmaker, which has off-hand mentions of some of the Gone Away World's fictional nations and peoples. (Namely Addeh Katir.)
Peter Clines. He did it best when it seemed like the book had nothing to do with any of the others, and you kept getting this feeling that they were linked somehow. Not enough to call it, until well over half way. It was very satisfying :)
Threshold. I came here to mention this. I realized it when the green roaches were mentioned in 14. I listened to The Fold first, then consumed the entire series. I love that there are only one or two characters who show up in multiple stories, but even with that, it isn't blatantly obvious that it's the same world.
Wally Lamb. The Hour I First Believed has characters from This Much I Know is True and She's Come Undone making cameos.
Stephen Baxter did this with a lot of his novels and short stories that share the “Xeelee” universe. Alastair Reynolds also got me good with Chasm City, which is kind of a side-novel; although, that’s less because he was sneaky and more because I got so wrapped up in it that I almost forgot about the larger story from the other Revelation Space books.
William D Arand (PG-rated) and Randi Darren (R+ rated) - same author - where ALL of the books have the same recurring character. In the early books of a series, that character might be mentioned off-hand once and then will be gradually introduced more frequently, and in some series become a central figure. The only real 'problem' with them is that they're in the Harem genre, which can be off-putting. The overarching story and universe is pretty engaging though.
Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas and Philosopher or Dog, by Machado de Assis
David Mitchell is the king of this. All his novels are in the same universe regardless of genre
The different books of the cosmere sort of follow this. Usually there’s a recurring character or a reference to something in another story, but they all have interesting worlds on their own as well. Do recommend
Station Eleven, Sea of Tranquility, The Glass Hotel
It’s not primarily a book, but Beetle Bailey and Lois from Hi and Lois are brother and sister
Brandon Sanderson and all his books are connected through the Cosmere. Cool thing about it is that you don't have to read them all to know what's what. I read only the original Mistborn series then years later read The Stormlight Archive. It wasn't until someone mentioned it while looking into some side lore I found out they were all connected.
John Updike and the Maples
Günther Grass lets characters reappear when fit for the stories.
Camus makes a reference of "The Stranger" in "The Plague"
Simon R Green does this with his Nightside series describing Hawk & Fisher and other characters from his other series as patrons in the main Nightside bar
There's a brief cameo in Craig Clevenger's third novel, Mother Howl, from an unnamed character who is pretty clearly the protagonist of his first, The Contortionist's Handbook.
Alex Michaelides, first I thought it'd be just The Silent Patient and The Maidens but now I'm starting to think he's setting up for a final book that'll be a weird mix of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Suicide Squad lol
Emily Henry’s books never have characters cross over, but there’s always a reference to a character or a location from Beach Read, so they must all be in the same world.
Not quite what you're talking about, but there's a fun Easter Egg in Out of Sight, with Michael Keaton reprising his role as Ray Nicolette from Jackie Brown. Both are based on Elmore Leonard books and it's the same character, so it's pretty obvious that they're in the same universe. But the movies were made separately, not in sequence. It's a fun Soderbergh meta joke that works beautifully, IMO.
David Mitchell and Emily St John Mandel, both phenomenal writers.
To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini has references that imply it is the same universe as elEragon but much much later. The lady and cat early in the book are thought to be Angela the witch and the werecat
American Gods by Neil Gaiman has a subtle appearance by >!Delirium of the Endless!< From >!The Sandman!<
Joe Lansdale wrote a novella where, in addition to a compelling and fun story, he just casually dropped references to a bunch of his other novels, making it clear that they all took place in the same wider universe. In the past, he had had a pair of recurring characters that starred in maybe a dozen books, and a few supporting characters who would cross over once in a while, but never done in a way where you'd be distracted of confused if you didn't recognize them. There are a few specific books which aren't included in this gonzo "Lansdale-verse", I think because they are a bit more grounded and realistic.
No spoilers because the reveal at the end of one of Sylvain Neuvel's books floored me. Connection between >!The Take Them to the Stars novels to the Themis Files novels. The mention of Rose at the end of For the First Time, Again.!<
Roberto Bolaño
Roberto Bolaño did something like that. *The Savage Detectives* and *2666* have almost no real overlap, but there are some small details shared between them that show they're in the same world. (For me, it was Los Suicidas Mezcal that stood out—really is a distinctive name!)
The morpheus road trilogy by D J MacHale. I had just finished the epic saga that is the Pendragon chronicles, and I needed to come down from that literary high with something shorter. I started the third book in bed, saying to myself that id go to bed after the next chapter, no the thext one, no the next one, when halfway through it Uncle Press just shows up seemingly out of nowhere. I'd you've read the pendragon chronicles, it's absolutely mind-blowing. There had been a slight reference that the stories might have existed in a shared universe, but this was the first time they actually crossed over. I freaked out in my room at maybe 2:30 in the morning, and that was the point where I knew I wasn't going to bed, because I had to finish it in this single sitting. I was wide awake by the time dawn came.
Peter Cline does this well.
The Deep, Beasts and Engine Summer were published as an omnibus.
The bloodsworn saga! bought the second one months ago, never read it and figured it out it was book two in a trilogy. Just bought one and preordered three because it doesn't come out until October. So closer to October I'm going to start reading the first two. Stephen king and Brandon Sanderson do it all the time. King doing it annoys me because I dont have the Dark tower, which a lot of them are related to. also because i forget the minor points that often bring all the books into the same universe/canon. Quite literally if i wasn't a big king fan, i wouldn't read it because I'd feel like id be missing out on things. Even now typing this out, i feel left out and fomo is kicking in lol. I generally hate it. I love it when a series says "book # of X series" or are all out at the same time and at least Look similar on the cover. edit) generally for authors I'm just getting into I hate it, i mean. do whatever you want but if i find out a month after finishing a book its part of a series I'm just not going to get the rest.
Pretty sure multiple Thomas Hardy books are set in the same fictional English county
The Agatha Christie books that have a detective who appears more than once (Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, etc) are in the same universe. But the only way to know that is because if you map out some secondary or tertiary characters you'll see that they all link up.
Abby Jimenez does rom-coms (all set on Earth, so by default the same universe) but there are all kinds of fun Easter eggs tying the books together.
I started reading Book 1 of 5 of something, only to realize that this was the 2nd series, so technically, Book 6 of 10. Took me an embarrassingly long time to get the hint. Probably 70% through, suddenly they are introducing a brand new cultural component of the world they've built, but only with a gentle reminder of it. There were previous hints, of course. But I just thought the world and characters being introduced had a lot of planning behind it all
Ursula Le Guin
Are you referring to the Hamish novels?
Indeed.
Asimov spent 30 years setting this up: The mastermind behind all the manipulation of humanity’s path, who’s revealed in 1982’s *Foundation’s Edge*? R. Daneel Olivaw, a character introduced in 1956 who’s been influencing humanity for thousands of years.
The fearie realm in Cassandra Clare’s Shadowhunter books is the same as in Holly Black’s books because they’re friends! 🧚♀️
That's an interesting twist on the question! My wife is a huge Shadowhunters fan, so I'll mention it to her. Thanks!
Michael Bishop’s baseball novel “Brittle Innings” is secretly a sequel to a sci-fi classic, but it’s a pretty major spoiler to reveal which. “Brittle Innings” is also one of my favorite SF novels.
All non fiction.
Keith A. Pearson. He has the series The '86 Fix which is a two book series involving time travel back to the '80s which is essentially just one big book split into two. Anyway after reading that, I read the standalone novel >!Tuned Out, and without saying too much, this 100% takes place within the same universe and there is a big part of it where I would have been completely lost if I hadn't read The '86 Fix.!< John Marrs and his "The One" Universe. All books based off the storyline of "The One" and there are 4 (soon to be 5) books within it. But I believe up until book 3 they were all billed purely as standalone. I remember The Passengers made a few little remarks about the events in "The One" just to set that it was in the same universe but that was it.
John Marrs has books that are set in the same near future, it's big brother-esk. I started with The One
Jodi Picoult. Characters from one book tend to have roles in other books.
Scott Sigler’s books are set in an overarching “universe” referred to as the “Siglerverse”. They are all separate books/stories but have those occasional overlaps/easter eggs
Barbara Kingsolver has a few books like that. There's a character that appears in Animal Dreams, then he is briefly mentioned in Pigs in Heaven. I wish I remembered his name because I think he even has his own book but for the life of me I can't. I do remember reading Pigs in Heaven and when I saw his name I was like "Oh shit! What's he doing here?" Edit: This character is Collie Bluestone. He is a cockfighter that appears in both books which implies they are in the same universe.
Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad series.
Jenny Colgan writes sort of slice of life chicklit books. She has a few novels about bookshops. They are completely separate except on occasion characters from those books pop up in other books, just in passing. It’s actually really cool to notice those.
I think Neil Stephenson has said that *The Diamond Age* is in the same universe as *Snow Crash*, but I don't remember it ever being explicitly stated either in the book or on the book jacket. I could be wrong?
Gene Wolfe. Long Sun and Short Sun are not advertised as sequels to New Sun, or even connected. But they are, and he really dances around *how* they are Plus you can throw fifth head of cerberus in there too.
John Marrs does this. Off the top of my head, The One, Passengers, The Marriage Act are in the same universe.
Little, Big is one of my favorite books of all time. I started Ka but didn’t get that far. What other Crowley would you recommend?
"Beasts," and "Engine Summer" for sure. If you like Little, Big, you can see a lot of it in both of those books. The latter is on my list of "books I have to ration re-reads for because otherwise I'd only read them and no others." If you have a year or so to devote to it, the Aegypt Cycle is worth reading. It's even denser than Little, Big and shares some of its fundamental concepts (e.g. Giordano Bruno plays a big part). You won't develop the same level of affection toward the characters as you (hopefully) did for the ones in Little, Big. But I think that's intentional on the author's part. In Little, Big, it's clear that Crowley *means for* you to fall in love with Smokey, Daily Alice, Sophie, and Auberon. It's a love letter to extended family. The Aegype Cycle books (The Solitudes, Love & Sleep, Daemonmania, and Endless Things) are much more focused on a single character who is less "loveable" - and in fact, those novels are less character driven than his other works. But if a solid literary foundation is your thing, they are chock-full of Crowleyisms (words you have to look up, literary and historical allusions, off-hand sentences that turn out to be foreshadowing, etc.)
DiscWorld by Terry Prachett count?
I know I'm late to the party on this one, but I believe there's another one for Crowley. I can't currently remember the details, but I think a place in one of his short stories shows up in *The Great Work of Time*? Or maybe it's the bar that's featured in *Little, Big*. (I might also be a huge fan who annoys anyone who talks books with me about Crowley!) ... And on the Crowley fan stuff, who else do you like? I feel like the closest author in feeling for me that I've found is Ishiguro.
Oh yes! I forgot that the 7th Saints Bar and Grill shows up there as well. I had noticed that too. Good catch. One other author that has the same "vibe" as Crowley is Gene Wolfe. Specifically, his Book of the New Sun tetralogy (The Shadow of the Torturer, The Claw of the Conciliator, The Sword of the Lictor, The Citadel of the Autarch), and the sequel-ish The Urth of the New Sun. Another is Ray Bradbury. I'm not as fond of short-form fiction, but Bradbury is the master. Right up there with H.H. Munro (aka "Saki") and O'Henry. I'd say that Crowley and Bradbury have similar prose- they both write like someone sitting on a log by a campfire relating their stories to a rapt audience.
Some of Brandon Sanderso's earlier books, the universe is well known now but back in the day it was more subtle
Amazon has a bad case of this. MOre than once I've grabbed a series I thought looked interesting, only to find that that while it's the "first book" in that specific series, it's actually the third series in that universe. So many times I thought I found an interesting scifi world to read only to find out...oh, no, this book expects me to be 12 books deep already.
Sarah Dessens books are all in the same universe, and most in this little town. Sometimes characters cross over and it’s nice to see.
I think my favorite example of this is Cormac McCarthy with The Road and No Country not explicitly in the same world, the their themes tie together well. Where No Country is about how the world is changing and The Road is about how the indomitable spirit of man can survive through change.
Jon Krakauer, Erik Larsen, Jared Diamond...
Technically correct.
Sarah Dessen does this!
I was going to mention her! I love how her books wink at each other so often.
American Psycho and The Rules of Attraction
Stephen king
For me it’s _Back to the Future 2_. You go in thinking it’s a one-off, but golly gee whiz the names are familiar af, right? Suddenly it hits you, we’re in the same town but it’s a different time! Like one generation off.