Books like “The Count of Monte Cristo”

What to read after “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexandre Dumas: a list matched by tropes, mood and atmosphere. Under each book you will see what it has in common.

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1
The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne · 1850
Similar plot moves: “Revenge” and “Betrayal”
- Revenge
- Betrayal
In a Puritan town, a young woman is publicly shamed for having a child out of wedlock and refuses to name the father. As she builds a quiet life with her daughter, the man's secret guilt and her wronged husband's quest for revenge eat away at the community. A novel about sin and hypocrisy.
2
Treasure Island
Robert Louis Stevenson · 1883
Same genre: “Adventure novel”
- Betrayal
- Morally Grey Character
Young Jim Hawkins finds a treasure map in a dead sailor's chest and sails for a distant island where a pirate's gold is buried. Among the crew is the one-legged cook Long John Silver, whose charm hides a plan to seize the hoard.
3
Shantaram
Gregory David Roberts · 2003
Shared in the plot: imprisoned, escapes, betray
- Morally Grey Character
An escaped Australian convict flees to Bombay under a false name and disappears into the city's hidden world. He runs a clinic in a slum, is drawn into the orbit of a mafia boss and a guarded woman, and is remade by betrayal, imprisonment and war.
4
Moby-Dick
Herman Melville · 1851
Similar plot moves: “Revenge”
- Revenge
A wandering sailor joins the whaling ship Pequod, whose captain is obsessed with hunting the white whale that took his leg. As the voyage stretches across the oceans, the crew is dragged toward a reckoning. A vast, digressive novel of obsession, the sea and human nature.
5
The Prince and the Pauper
Mark Twain · 1881
Similar plot moves: “Dual Identity”
- Dual Identity
On the same day in Tudor London a beggar boy and the heir to the English throne meet and find they look identical. They trade clothes as a joke, and the swap turns real, so each must survive a life he was never taught to live. A tale of switched places, misrule and what a crown is really worth.
6
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas
Jules Verne · 1870
Same genre: “Adventure novel”
- Morally Grey Character
Three men are taken aboard the Nautilus, a submarine commanded by the brilliant Captain Nemo, after it attacks their ship. As they travel the ocean depths they witness wonders and terrors of the undersea world while their host's motives stay hidden.
7
Gone Girl
Gillian Flynn · 2012
Similar plot moves: “Dual Identity” and “Betrayal”
On their fifth wedding anniversary, Amy Dunne disappears from a rented house and her husband Nick becomes the prime suspect. Two narrators tell very different versions of the same marriage.
8
The Moonstone
Wilkie Collins · 1868
Similar plot moves: “Dual Identity”
- Dual Identity
A priceless yellow diamond looted from an Indian temple is left to Rachel Verinder on her birthday, and vanishes the same night. Family, servants, doctors and a famous detective each tell their part of the story as suspicion moves from one person to another.
9
Captive Prince
C.S. Pacat · 2013
Similar plot moves: “Dual Identity” and “Betrayal”
Damen, prince of Akielos, is betrayed by his half-brother and sent to Vere as a slave and a gift to Prince Laurent, the heir he once fought. Kept in the dark about the other's plans, the two enemies have to survive a court of shifting alliances and old hatred.
10
The Sea-Wolf
Jack London · 1904
Same genre: “Adventure novel”
- Morally Grey Character
A literary critic survives a ferry collision in San Francisco Bay and is picked up by a sealing schooner commanded by Wolf Larsen, a brutal and brilliant captain. Thrown into the crew's rough life, the soft scholar must find his footing under a man who answers to no law but his own.
11
The Amulet of Samarkand
Jonathan Stroud · 2003
Similar plot moves: “Revenge” and “Morally Grey Character”
- Revenge
- Morally Grey Character
Nathaniel is a young apprentice magician who summons the djinni Bartimaeus to steal a powerful amulet from a politician. The djinni is clever, sarcastic and far from willing, and the theft sets off a fight that neither of them expected to survive.
12
Ancillary Justice
Ann Leckie · 2013
Similar plot moves: “Revenge” and “Betrayal”
A soldier who was once a starship's artificial intelligence wakes in a single human body. Cut off from her many selves, she crosses a collapsing empire to find the officer who destroyed everything she was, and to settle a debt of revenge.