Book · 1965
Stoner
by John Williams
An unremarkable Missouri professor loses his marriage, his ambitions, and most of his arguments, and the novel insists that still adds up to a life.
What does Reddit think of Stoner?
By ↑552, someone just answers "Stoner, John Williams" and leaves it there; the book needs no pitch anymore in r/suggestmeabook. One commenter admits as much outright: "Cliche but Stoner by John Williams" (↑218), aware that recommending it has become a genre move in its own right. The joke goes further in another reply pairing it with The Count of Monte Cristo and tagging the whole thing "/s" (↑301), needling the gap between an adventure epic and a novel about an unremarkable professor. What people actually praise, when they explain themselves, is the mismatch between subject and effect: a story that "sounds like the most boring and mundane book ever written" (↑463) but produces "a profound sadness... in a good way" (↑218) anyway. r/TrueLit engages with it 139 times against r/suggestmeabook's 1,705, so the literary-fiction crowd is present but heavily outnumbered by the general recommendation-thread crowd. The scored excerpts here read positive across a sample this large, unusually stable for a book about failure.
Community feedback & reader fit
Themes
- · The extraordinary weight found in an ordinary, unremarkable life
- · Academic office politics and quiet professional failure
- · Becoming a recommendation-thread cliche through sheer repetition
- · Finding beauty in mundane, sad subject matter
Common praise
- + Multiple commenters separately call it the most beautiful book they've ever read (↑189), without much more context attached than the title itself.
- + The ↑211 comment credits it with nailing "academic life, office politics, failure, and dignity" in a way that reads as specific rather than a blurb.
- + It gets recommended so often that people now joke about recommending it (↑218's "cliche but"), which is its own kind of staying power.
Common criticism
- − The "/s" joke pairing it with The Count of Monte Cristo (↑301) pokes at how mismatched the book is with anything resembling an adventure recommendation request.
- − Most top-upvoted replies are one-line title-drops rather than arguments, so the volume here reflects recommendation-thread repetition more than developed critical consensus.
Who it's for
Ask r/suggestmeabook for a sad book and you'll get this title within the first few replies, often with no pitch attached at all. If nothing-happens-and-it's-still-devastating sounds appealing rather than boring, that's the exact tension people keep describing here. Academic-novel readers get a specific hook: office politics and professional failure rendered with more dignity than the setup suggests. Expecting momentum, plot turns, or a twist will work against you; the ↑463 comment warns as much before calling it magic anyway.
Mentions over time
Which Reddit comments matter for Stoner?
The most relevant excerpts across the subreddits where this book is mentioned — opinionated, argued takes first, then top-upvoted mentions. Click through to read the full thread.
“Stoner by John Williams I can't quite explain the book without it sounding like the most boring and mundane book ever written, but that's part of the magic. It's a completely ordinary story about a completely ordinary man. Stoner lives the life many of us do: a simple one but the prose is so beau…
“Cliche but Stoner by John Williams - felt a profound sadness while reading it, but in a good way!
“Stoner by John Williams is about an undistinguished English professor at the University of Missouri, and it’s as compelling as anything I’ve ever read. It gets so much right about academic life, office politics, failure, and dignity.
“Stoner by John Williams felt like that to me
“Stoner, by John Williams. It tells a story of a professor and his life and hardships. It is the most beautiful book i've ever read
“My favourite genre! I recommend Stoner by John Williams, I don’t really know how to describe it but it is so good. I also recommend Confederacy of Dunces by John Toole.
“Stoner by John Williams. Totally unexpectedly beautiful.
“Old School by Tobias Wolff When We Were Villains is good but a little too similar to The Secret History. Stoner by John Williams isn’t technically dark academic but it is the interior life of a lonely struggling academic. To me, it’s introverted dark academia with depression. It’s quite good. I…
“Stoner by John Edward Williams I binged it.
“{{Stoner by John Williams}} It is the ultimate sad book about the disappointments life throws at you. It should be considered with The Great Gatsby and Steinbach as the great American novel. If it was a hit when it was published (1960s), instead of gaining popularity in the 2010s, Stoner would be…
“Stoner by John Williams is THE book for this. It's a story of a completely average person who just goes along with life. Not much happens in the story, yet it's somehow beautiful and moving.
“Stoner by John Williams. a devastating book.
“I think this is excellent feedback. I would also suggest considering venturing outside of fantasy. Your perception of story may color your response to technique more easily in the same genre. I would consider something like Stoner by John Williams. It’s a quick read about a drastically different s…
“Stoner by John Williams. Not a memoir but the telling of a story about a very average man. Incredible book.
“Have you read Stoner by John Williams? I feel like that is this vibe exactly.
Convinced? Pick up Stoner
What else does r/suggestmeabook read?
Other books mentioned in the same sub, ranked. Shared-sub overlap with this title breaks ties.
Stoner — frequently asked
Why does Reddit recommend Stoner so often?+
r/suggestmeabook treats it as close to a default answer for sad-book requests; the top mention (↑552) is just the title with no pitch attached. It's recommended so consistently that at least one commenter (↑218) jokes about it being a cliche pick before recommending it anyway.
Is Stoner actually as boring as it sounds?+
The top-upvoted description (↑463) admits it head-on: the book "sounds like the most boring and mundane book ever written," then argues that's exactly the point, calling the effect magic anyway. Nothing in this dataset disputes that the premise is quiet; the disagreement, if any, is about whether that's a flaw.
Is Stoner by John Williams a cliche recommendation on Reddit?+
By its own commenters' admission, yes. One reply (↑218) opens with "Cliche but Stoner by John Williams" before praising it anyway, and another (↑301) jokingly tags a Stoner recommendation "/s" next to The Count of Monte Cristo, which only works as a joke because the title is this recognizable already.