AKA ontological mystery. The trope where a person wakes up in a place they don’t recognize or won’t reveal, don’t know how they ended up there, and have to escape and/or solve the mystery. All is slowly revealed.
I LOVED More Than This by Patrick Ness, so that’s mainly why I’m asking. Other examples include The Maze Runner (kinda), Project Hail Mary, and Demon by Jason Shiga. I’m good with YA or adult.
Thanks y’all
by _EYRE_
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Umberto Eco does this, Prague Cemetery is a fun one that kept me guessing
The Hike by Drew Magary
Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke.
house of leaves by mark z. danielewski
Blake Crouch’s man-on-the-run thriller **Dark Matter** checks your boxes. It has a sci-fi basis.
The Rook by Daniel O’Malley. It’s about a woman who wakes up in a park surrounded by bodies with no memories but finds a letter from herself detailing her life as an operative in a secret government agency that fights supernatural threats. She is then given the choice to either unravel what’s going on or take up a new identity.
The Scavenger trilogy by KJ Parker
The Scavenger trilogy is about a man, or possibly god, who wakes up on a battlefield with amnesia and discovers that he is being hunted by enemies he no longer remembers.
Shadow (2001)
Pattern (2002)
Memory (2003)
You must read Uzumaki by Junji Ito. Amazing manga, perhaps the best I’ve ever read, and it will give you exactly what you are looking for.
Most recently, The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson.