Victory City

A mythological tale with wisdom, but also such entertaining levity that you'll read about mass suicide with a grin on your face. Full review here

This is quite possibly my favorite work of Rushdie's, who is already one of my favorite writers. It is a stunningly beautiful story of an unlikely, forward-thinking city born of a demigod, and its ebbs and flows of greatness and terror along with her life. It was so emotionally engaging for me, and I found myself legitimately laughing out loud, furious, tearing up, existentially horrified and deeply uplifted throughout the book.

I almost want to start it over again immediately, but my giant reading list (and the other books I'm theoretically on but haven't progressed in) calls me forward.