What's the opposite of a coming-of-age novel?

It hadn’t occurred to us just how much coming-of-age novels overshadow the other side of the aging spectrum in literature.

(We’ll go ahead and assume that means we still have the blinders and self-centered nature of youth.)

Heidi Sopinka, author of The Dictionary of Animal Languages, definitely took note, however.

She pulled together a list of eight books she would categorize as a reifungsroman — literally a “ripening novel,” or more eloquently in English, a coming-of-death novel — after writing one herself.

Check out the recommendations on Electric Literature and show those whippersnappers that it’s not all about them.