Reddit reviews The Alienist

Got the perfect one for you - Caleb Carr - The Alienist


edit -don't worry that it's pre '40s - it's excellent

I'm about half way through The Alienist by Caleb Car and it's awesome. Definitely check it out.

Oh, there's much darker. I think the book was ultimately very sweet and touching even amid the harsh setting.

I'm with you, I don't like dard for dark's sake. But I think there's a big difference between Choke and, say, The Alienist which is the darkest book I've ever read, but also one of the best.

I agree that Aubrey/Maturin is the top of the heap for literary historical fiction.

For other entertaining historical fiction reads:

Gates of Fire by Pressfield. Really any of Pressfield's historical novels are pretty good.

Aztec by Jennings

The Assyrian and The Blood Star by Guild

The Physician by Gordon

Masters of Rome series by McCullough

River God and The Courtneys by Smith

[Sharpe] (https://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B00CKCKXFS/ref=dp_st_0140294295) and Saxon series by Cornwell

The Sand Reckoner by Brandshaw

The Alienist by Carr

Three Day Road by Boyden

[All Quiet on the Western Front] (https://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Western-Front-Erich-Remarque/dp/0449213943/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1479241663&sr=1-1&keywords=all+quiet+on+the+western+front) by Remarque

Let me know if you need more, this is what I came up with off the top of my head.

This is fiction, so not sure if it fits the bill but "The Alienist" by Caleb Carr. A book about the first "psychologists" working as profilers to find a serial killer in 1890s NYC.

The Ecstacy Club

The Alienist

The Alienist by Caleb Carr -

The Alienist by Caleb Carr sounds up your alley. Just fair warning though, it's very descriptive in its scenes, but ultimately it's personal favorite crime novel. The Alienist

Most of what's on here is fairly classic straightforward detective stuff, which is great, but I've always been a sucker for mysteries that merge with other genres or do unusual things. A good handful if that's your bag:

• The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster - 3 short novels packaged together and vaguely related. Also a pretty great mindfuck book
  
• Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem - detective novel whose narrator has Tourette Syndrome
  
• The Alienist by Caleb Carr or In the Shadow of Gotham by Stefanie Pintoff - Historical fiction/mystery taking place around the turn of the century and during the dawns of forensics/criminal psychology/criminology
  
• Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan - Sci-fi/hardboiled detective novel in a future where the human mind can be digitized and backed up off-site, rendering murder irrelevant. Terrific book, I find myself compelled to reread it and its sequels every year or so.
  
  Those are all more or less "detective fiction" style mystery, if you're looking at the broader genre I cannot recommend The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon any more highly. I haven't been sucked into writing like that in a long long time.
  

I've always been a big fan of The Alienist. It's not as big a book as the others mentioned here but I really loved it. It was a fun, exciting good period mystery.

This.

Not This.

The Alienist by Caleb Carr is a favorite of mine.