4. Like Life (2002), Lorrie Moore

Like Life is a collection of pretty stories about depressed, highly self-aware, usually-single women trying to deal with lovers, family, dating, work, and their own identities as they go from ‘young woman’ to ‘not-so-young woman.’ I think what’s most satisfying to the depressed individual with Like Life is both the scope she employs, her elegant prose, and her empathetic, sometimes-bitter, sometimes-longing manner of narration. It makes you feel less alone; it makes you feel like being sad is okay – pretty, even. But sad nevertheless.