Accessible literary fiction recommendations for broadening my reading beyond holiday reads

I enjoyed Animal Farm (George Orwell) and The Lord of the Flies (William Golding) when I did them at school.

I got into the WW1, enjoyed Pat Barker's Regeneration Trilogy (and some of her other hooks) and Birdsong by Sebastian Faulkes.

Barbara Pym. She was a modern Jane Austen.

I'm a big fan of Natalie Haynes' re-tellings of the Greek myths.

Clare Chambers
Kate Atkinson
Lissa Evans
Tracey Chevalier
Clare Keegan
Barbara Kingsolver
Polly Clark
Abraham Verghese
Khaled Hosseini

Have a look at the Women’s Prize for Fiction backlists.

I loved The Calamity Club, the audible version was brilliant

There's a good thread on short but not trashy reads, hang on...

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/what_were_reading/5579130-unputdownable-short-ish-not-trashy-books

I've always loved Daphne du Maurier and every one of hers that my book group has read ( I think we've read 6) has gone down really well.

Anne Tyler and Elizabeth Strout

Yes, I was thinking Jane Eyre too. If you like Mills and Boon, why not try some classic/high brow romantic fiction –

Emily Bronte Wuthering Heights
Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre
Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice
Thomas Hardy Tess of the D'Urbevilles

Some other short classics, though less romantic

George Eliot Silas Marner
Virginia Woolf Mrs Dalloway
Oscar Wilde Dorian Gray

How about P G Wodehouse? His books are light and silly but beautifully written. In fact, critics so revere his style they've compared him to Shakespeare.

Bill Bryson is a great recommendation. Very intelligent, very interesting, and yet warm and accessible.

I'm also a big fan of Bertrand Russell. If you're interested in philosophy, try his popular stuff – warm, witty and wise. He also has a wonderful, crystal clear style. Try The Conquest of Happiness.

Throw yourself in OP. People like Dickens and Russell and Wilde weren't trying to intimidate their readers. They want to entertain you!

Mention of the A level syllabus makes me remember Khaled Hosseini - go for A Thousand Splendid Suns. Weird combo of easy read page-turner / interesting / harrowing!

I'd also recommend Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's short stories - they are really amazingly written and immediate and readable. Then she also has some great novels.

I think you would like Brideshead Revisited such a fantastic read and not complicated to follow or anything like that.

This is such a lovely thread. My never ending reading list has just gotten even longer 📚

Please can I just thank you, @SereneReader , for asking your question. This thread is pure
gold!

If I were you and had missed out on some of the classics, that’s where I’d start. Modern classics. Things they teach on the A Level English syllabus, if you want to move away from easy page turners.
I’m 35 but remember as clear as day reading Lolita (for A Level). And A Streetcar Named Desire.
And The Beach.

Theres a whole list of about 50 alevel text and all the more modern ones are really good - will make you think and if you get into it there’d be loads online to like, help you analyse and gather your thoughts. I think I needed therapy after reading Lolita!! But they’re not difficult reads, and will take you on a journey.

And then I would go for Jane Eyre. Just brilliant.

I'm not sure you could better Pride and Prejudice. It might take a while to adjust to the wordiness, but those words are sublime, and so funny too.

Kristen Hannah is good - The Women was one I read recently and loved. Also Tracy Chevalier (The Girl With The Pearl Earring).

I agree with whoever said to use your local library. Ours has an app called Libby (I think most libraries use it now) which lets you borrow e-books onto your phone/tablet. On the Home Screen there are recommendations for different kinds of books. It’s a good way to borrow lots of books and see what you enjoy; if you don’t like something then just return it early and try something else. The actual library is also good, and the librarians are good at recommending things.

I also didn’t grow up with access to a lot of books (my parents always encouraged reading, but we didn’t live close to anywhere that I could easily find new books), and I remember the joy of discovering libraries and charity shops so I could figure out what I liked!

What exactly are you looking for, that holiday books are not giving you?
There are plenty of popular books that have several layers (Dickens, Victor Hugo, Shakespeare were all popular among the "plebs" and also very sophisticated).
I like Jane Austen, Elena Ferrante, the hunger games trilogy, etc. Popular but layered.

As as young teenager I read M&B (that was 90s so perfectly normal 😆). I then moved onto Lesley Pearse, Josephine Cox and Emma Blair.

Lesley Pearse especially wrote some amazing books although I do think the earlier ones are better than the recent ones.

Have you joined your local library? Most come with a free online ebook catalogue so you can dip in and try new authors without parting with hard cash.

Another vote for Lissa Evans (any) and Kate Atkinson (Behind the Scenes at the Museum).

Also, Mr Loverman by Bernardine Evaristo and Small Island by Andrea Levy and literary but great page turners as well. Both have been made into good dramas.

You might enjoy Normal People by Sally Rooney, it does divide people though so you might hate it (and that's OK too).

Ah yes, Anne Tyler would be perfect.

Agree with previous recommendation for Kate Atkinson, but not the Jackson Brodie series. My favourites are Shrines of Gaiety, Life After Life and Behind the Scenes at the Museum.

You might enjoy Anne Tyler, very well written, character-driven fiction. Her most famous is the Accidental Tourist, I loved Breathing Lessons and Ladder of Years too. Also John Boyne’s The Heart’s Invisible Furies.

I think there are books that are a stepping stone to literary fiction. They have plenty of forward propulsion… you know… page turners but have a bit more literary merit than the books you’ve read without being too dense. Once you try these you can definitely step it up a notch.

Agree with @Divebar2021 above.
OP, a title I read recently which I think could be such a stepping stone is The Walled Garden by Sarah Hardy. The cover (of the paperback at least) is in my view a bit misleading as the book is more than just a love story. But I enjoyed it a lot and picking it up never felt like a chore.

I would recommend:

My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout

If you like that, she has several others that follow on from it.

So - accessible literary fiction - these novelists will make you think but also tell interesting stories in ways that are straightforward:
Margaret Drabble - her earlier books
A S Byatt (try the Frederica Potter series)
Both Drabble & Byatt (sisters ) write wonderfully humane condition-of-England or state-of-the-nation novels.
Kate Atkinson
David Lodge
Kingsley Amis
Elizabeth Bowen
Amanda Craig - just finish her latest, High and Low, about Londoners now. Fantastic

You could go back to the 19century, the great age of the novel and try
Charles Dickens - maybe start with Great Expectations or Tale of Two Cities
Charlotte Brontë
Emily Brontë
Elizabeth Gaskell

and of course, Jane Austen

You asked for literary fiction. Once you get going, there are so many choices - for rather less “accessible” but stunning for her thinking, there’s always Irish Murdoch. Her Booker prize winning novel, The Sea, The Sea was riveting.

Classics can sometimes seem obviating to a new modern-day reader, but if you want a couple that are very accessible and with strong stories I recommend Jane Eyre, The Moonstone and the Sherlock Holmes collected short stories.

For contemporary fiction, Kathryn Stockett’s Calamity Club is a great page turner (so is her first book, The Help), and anything by Emma Donaghue, Sarah Waters and Barbara Kingsolver (Poisonwood Bible is a great story!). Oh, also I think you’d maybe like Helen Forrester, she’s an easy writing style and the stories really pull you in. Her autobiographies of her childhood are superb.

Children’s classics is a brilliant idea.

Also you’ve mentioned literary fiction, but is that really what you’d like to read or would you just prefer to read something more challenging? I ask because I studied literature and I still don’t read a lot of literary fiction because I prefer a traditional/ conventional story (something with an immersive world, strong plot and characters). The classics can be more enjoyable if that’s what you prefer, Jane Austen novels are a good starting point and then if you enjoy there are a ton of Victorian novels.