Can you recommend a lovely classic novel?

[PoloM1nt]

I've just been through a phase of reading a lot of contemporary fiction and lots of it was great but I really fancy reading a good classic novel now.

I would like a book that ultimately makes me feel good once I've finished it. A nice 'curl up by the fire' type novel, along the lines of Austen, Hardy, Elliott, the Brontes etc, but I've read those.

Suggestions welcome!

Evelina by Fanny Burney, if you fancy something Georgian-era.

Pride and Predudice and Zombies.

It's absolutely hilarious.

What about Anna Karenina?
It’s amazing. You are in another world.

How about Anne Radcliffe, The Italian and the Mysteries of Udolpho (the gothic romances that Jane Austen heroines would have devoured and that she parodied in Northanger Abbey). The Red and the Black, by Stendhal. A less often read George Elliot which I loved, Romola, set in Renaissance Florence. I agree with most of the suggestions, particularly my two favourite epics, War and Peace and Gone With the Wind!

If you like mystery books then try Lady audley's secret or the fatal three by mary elizabeth braddon.

My fave braddon book is wyllards weird but not sure if its in print.

Another vote for Rebecca
Jamaica inn also very good.
Tale of two cities is a good dickens read

Trollope, Austen or Gaskill. Trollope in particular I find so much better than Dickens.
Wilkie Collins is good too.

Another recommendation for I Capture the Castle.

A bit more recent, but old-fashioned in outlook: "Thornyhold," by Mary Stewart. Absolutely "cozy," but not "wet."

"The Canterville Ghost," by Oscar Wilde.

"Anne of Green Gables," by L.M. Montgomery is perfectly lovely.

Far from the Madding Crowd, North and South (Gaskell) and a Tenant of Wildfell Hall (Bronte) are usually my classic go to’s when I need a pick me up

I used to enjoy Jean plaidys when much younger
Suzanne Howatch always did a good read
...Penmarric
Also have you tried her religious trilogy and or the starbridge series

The Starbridge series Edit
Glittering Images (1987)
Glamorous Powers (1988)
Ultimate Prizes (1989)
Scandalous Risks (1990)
Mystical Paths (1992)
Absolute Truths (1994)

Ive enjoyed quite a few Phillipa Gregory
Namely the wideacre trilogy

Huckleberry Finn , Mark Twain
The Mowgli Stories , Rudyard Kipling

Tales from the Jazz Age , F Scott Fitzgerald
Short stories!
Kidnapped
Treasure Island

I was about to say Lady Audley’s secret but saw someone has just mentioned it - really gripping Victorian melodrama.

Also loved Villette and Gone With the Wind as others have mentioned.

I enjoyed "Helen" by Maria Edgeworth (pre-Austen) and also "Evalina" by Fanny Burney.

Cider with Rosie is a lovely read.

Also Cold Comfort Farm; Love in a Cold Climate; Miss Pettigrew lives for a day; and Life and Loves of a She-Devil are all of their time and good reads.

Dorothy Dunnett's House of Niccolo series.

Not classics as in 20th century but I mention them as people have mentioned historical stuff and imo Dunnett puts all others in the shade.

ALso any Dickens...

Oh pleeeeaaasee read A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith, it's one of my favourites, I just adore it and in my mind it doesn't get enough recognition.

I also love Little Women (Louisa May Alcott) and The Time Machine (HG Wells).

Cold Comfort Farm, A Room with a View, I Capture The Castle and Love In A Cold Climate all fit the bill I’d say. Trollope well worth a go. Dracula is a rollicking page turner.

Georgette Heyer’s Regency novels are a completely different category but are unrivalled as comfort reading.

Baffled by the people suggesting Villette and Tess which are both really quite bleak. What next? Jude the Obscure?

Thank you for these ideas! I have already read most of the suggestions as I'm quite an avid reader, and yes @Notnownotneverever I have read all the Austens!

Some great new ideas though- I have ordered all the suggestions I've not read before so that should tide me through the next couple of months! (Apart from the 'mystery' suggestions as I'm not really a fan). So my reading list now includes a couple of the Anthony Trollope suggestions, Howards End (don't know how I haven't read it before), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, and North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (I have read Wives & Daughters and Candleford and loved those so I'm sure I'll enjoy this).

Thank you!!!!

North and South is great. It is how pride and prejudice should have been!

Yes to all these (and another vote for the off-derided Georgette H and quietly subversive Mary Braddon)
James - portrait of a lady, turn of the screw (creepy so good for dark nights!)
Also early 20th c
Heart of darkness Conrad
King Solomon's mines - Rider Haggard, definitely agree with pp about catching up with 'boys' books you were denied! )
Waugh - Brideshead Revisited and a handful of dust
Jean Rhys Wide Sargasso Sea (written later, but prequel to Jane Eyre).
Somerset Maugham Of human bondage

Early 60s /late 50s also an excellent time
L- shaped room - Lynne Reid banks
Brighton rock - graham greene
The butterfly John Fowles

Most of mine have been said, but I also love,

Therese Raquin, and Precious Bane by Mary Webb.

Mostly placemarking but I love a tale of two cities. It’s short and a bit of a thriller too.

The Enchanted April.
Excellent Women- written in the 50's but has the feel of Jane Austen.

Recent but in a style very reminiscent of Austen "jonathan strange and Mr norrell" - alternative history with magic!