Is there a book that is gentle and inspirational to read to someone who is very poorly

[GozillasZit]

Terminal cancer
She only wants to see close family and friends around her.
My best friend and I are going to do tag team-
We want to read a book/a to her in shifts - we’re thinking it has to be something with a beautiful story or autobiography?

I’m not a reader at all regretfully but would love to have a stash to choose from

Thank you very much

Are you sure she’s up for this? Some of the suggestions here would irritate me mightily, and her concentration may not be up to following an unfamiliar story, however simple, depending on how she is.

Also, you say you’re not a reader either — can you read aloud fluently enough? I’m being devil’s advocate, obviously — and it’s a very kind thought — but I would find someone who halted and mispronounced words reading to me when very ill very trying.

Have you considered poetry? One of those Nation’s Favourite anthologies things? Short and easier to concentrate on. Or just music?

Another vote here for Cider With Rosie.

I would be prepared to just sit quietly and let them sleep tbh, I have done this in the past with a friend who has terminal cancer and she want in any fit state to be read to,so play it by ear or it might be irritating. I read,did embroidery and held her hand x

Another vote for "I Capture the Castle", gentle and with some humour. It is one of the Kindle Deals of the Day today, so a snip at 99 pence.

** so many typos but you get my drift.

Agatha Christie. The Hercule
Poirot short stories are very good. That's what I'd like someone to read to me

Another vote for Cider with Rosie (Laurie Lee) here.
What a kind and lovely thing to do for your friend/relative.

I’d suggest poetry too - perhaps a Mary Oliver collection?

How about the wonderful story of Henry Sugar by Ronald Dahl? It's a short story so won't require the concentration of a longer book.

The boy, the mole, the fox and the horse- totally beautiful, sending you strength, you are a lovely friend

Under The Tuscan Sun series by Frances Mayes? There are 3-4 books in total. It's all very peaceful and mindful descriptions of food, travel and nature.

Not Narnia unless she's Christian. How about Three Men in a Boat? Gentle, funny, has chapters.

You can frequently get a box set of Pooh Bear books - When We Were Very Young, Now We Are Six, The House at Pooh Corner and Winnie the Pooh.

Poetry - Edmund Lear (The Owl and the Pussycat, for example), TS Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. - the rhythm can be very soothing. Wordsworth, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf, Rumi, Wordsworth (I like Lines Written in Early Spring)

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Passages from whatever Holy Book she might believe in - the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy if not (did that for my brother).

The Wind in the Willows. Swallows and Amazons.

If she was a teacher, she might like Miss Read Books.

If she's so unwell, she's drifting in and out, the rhythms and imagery of nature and poetry might be more like the relaxing feeling of being read bedtime stories by parents - and they can be much easier to sustain reading for a long stretch.

Me Golightly’s Holiday by Sally Vickers is really moving and uplifting. It has a spiritual theme, so check it out first, but it’s wonderful. Sorry about your friend.

The Mapp and Lucia stories by EF Benson are light and how about some short stories by Maeve Binchey, The Lilac Bus

Try an audiobook...... just a thought

If she's at all religious, The Little World of Don Camillo is wonderful.

Although the person who recommended it to me was a raving atheist!

Pollyanna?
Watership Down maybe depending how she’d take the end scene

The Lark by E Nesbit.

Hell's bells - not Pollyanna!

Miss Pettigrew is wonderful, warm, funny and comforting.

Eva Ibbotson's YA books are funny, light and warm. PG Wodehouse also excellent.

Avoid Pollyanna, I imagine it would be grating to your friend, given her situation. I'd probably lob it at you.

Agreed, @SchadenfreudePersonified! I’d be roaring with my remaining strength about how surely someone in end of life care could expect not to have Pollyanna, her missionary barrel and her sodding crutches inflicted on me.

Winnie the Pooh would have a similar effect.

I second an audiobook, that you could sit and listen to with her. Your friend can do so too so that you both know what is going on, and then you can chat around what is going on, what you like, gently remind etc Listening as a shared experience is very soothing, plus - no disrespect - it is beautiful to hear books read by an actor.

my favourite book is Ladder of Years by Anne Tyler. in fact, anything by Anne Tyler. her work is gently ascerbic and beautifully written. very funny as well, in places.