In wanting to read a happy book?

[ICantCopeAnymore]

I suffer with PTSD and anxiety and I love reading. I'm really struggling with my mental health which is very up and down and books used to be my happy place.

More recently, I've found that everything I read is miserable. Full of death, cancer, illness, murder etc. Even the women's fiction books like Katie Fforde type literature have started going the same way, always including a young widow, a dreadful car accident, funerals and dying children. I was recommended "The Lido" and I've never sobbed so much through a book. It was supposed to be an uplifting, heartwarming read and it was about dreadful loneliness and death.

These things are all really triggering for me at the moment - AIBU in just wanting an escape from hospitals and death? I feel like I can't read or watch TV any more without being bombarded with misery.

Can anyone recommend anything to read that isn't traumatic please?

Thank you

This is such a lovely thread, I’m nodding and ‘yes-ing’ along to most of the posts.

Saw some recommended The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, if you liked that try ‘A man called Ove’ it’s also really heart-warming in a similar way.

Maeve Binchy. Lovely, lovely warm books, easy relaxed reads and generally about nice people being pleasant and helpful to others, especially her later books. They sort of restore your faith in humanity.

I second a lot of what others have said, but could not see that anybody had recommended Ms Binchy. She herself sounded like a delightful person.

FlaviaAlbia
Gervaise Phinn was a regular visitor at my primary school. He has written children's books and would read them to us. Lovely man and such a hilarious storyteller

Oh that's lovely Ray

Another vote for Sophie Kinsella, especially the Shopoholic series. Utter crap, but they do get me laughing out loud.

A much more recent discovery was the Comfort Food Cafe books. Oh, and that reminds me, try the Lucy Dillon books as well. Most of them are set in one village and, although each is based around its own protagonists you get characters from the other books making an appearance. A friend gave me one when I was feeling really down a few years ago and it really it the spot.

Gervaise Phinn is very very tedious, he was on the curriculum when I started teaching and was much hated.

Wendy Holden is very cheerful and funny. A bit too easy reading for my tastes- but might hit your sweet spot. Jenny Colgan does nice "normal" chick lit too. Lisa Jewell used to too, but her later ones have gone much darker. Ditto Liane Moriarty. There's often a dead body in there somewhere.

And definitely give Eleanor Oliphant a miss. The ending is uplifting, but there's a long and surprisingly dark journey to get there.

I've recently read Eleanor. I really enjoyed it and thought it was beautiful, but it was quite a hard read for me at times, as I recognised some aspects of my loneliness in her. It wasn't as emotional as The Lido for me though, I'm not even sure why that one effected me so much, because it wasn't traumatic. Just made me think.

Very much enjoying Bill Bryson's this morning

Interestingly, I've just read an article in The Guardian about a new genre of books called "Up Lit" and Eleanor is listed as well as How to Stop Time by Matt Haig.

It seems that is isn't just me who is fed up of doom, gloom and death

Jilly Cooper! Laugh out loud funny, lots of dogs and horses, completely absurd but reassuring as the bad always get their comeuppance and there's usually a happy ending for everyone else. And lots of bonking.

And another vote for Lucy Dillon, especially if you like dogs

Not rtft but I'd recommend Danny Wallace for something light hearted and cheerful. Both his fiction and non-fiction are worth a read.

Also early Lisa Jewell books are good fun and we'll written. Her later stuff is darker but also very engaging.

Sorry @SaucyJack. I See you mentioned Lisa Jewell already.

Anything by Tony Hawkes. So funny you can't read them in public.

I love kids books too, the one memory of Flora banks is fantastic, sad at points but in the main uplifting and rooftoppers

Love dogs, animals in general.

Jilly Cooper is my guilty pleasure. I remember reading Riders when I was about 15 and being deliciously horrified

A fair few Neil Gaiman books aren't exactly happy but aren't full of horrible gorey / maudlin scenes and stories. Some even have proper happy endings.

Neverwhere and American gods both very good.

I think they might be technically YA but they're very well written.

This thread is awesome, thank you! I'm six months pregnant with a toddler too - by the time I get into bed with my book I want to lie there and read happy fluff not heavy stuff There's enough sadness, death and destruction is real life!

OP I'd have a look at Milly Johnson, her Four Seasons books for the bill. You might have the odd widower here and there but nothing terribly heart rending. Also:

Lucy Diamond
Jenny Colgan
Debbie Johnson
Early Marian Keyes (more recent ones probably last 8 years or so are more serious)
Sophie Kinsella
Alexandra Potter

If there are any sad ones by these authors you can normally tell by the blurb so you don't waste time reading half a book that you then don't like but none of them are graphic/distressing.

The Agatha Raisin books are good for some light hearted escapism. Can't remember the author's name. My favourite happy books are The Moonstone and Mr Rosenblum's List

For something terribly lovely and bucolic but also well written (albeit old fashioned) - Miss Read is pretty good!
^^ Definitely! They're so peaceful, particularly the Village series. And why not do a few Enid Blyton - Famous Five, Malory Towers etc.? Always a happy ending, no-one ever dies, and there's usually a picnic or a midnight feast to be enjoyed

Lindsey Kelk
Lucy Robinson
Stella Newman
Harriet Evans
Lucy Ann Holmes

These are all great chick lit authors!

5foot5 - did you know there's a sequel to "future homemakers"?? It's called "the early birds" and it came out a few months ago!!

My go-to comfort reading are Arthur Ransome's children's books. Not just the first (Swallows and Amazons) - there are 12 in the series altogether. Pigeon Post (hence my user name) and Winter Holiday are my favourites.

Have you read Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum novels? It's a long series (over 20 books so far) and the standard has dropped off now but the first 10 or so are very funny.

If you have a Kindle try downloading the What Katy Did novels. There are quite a few available free of charge and they are so cheesy but comforting.

Marian Keyes books have some darkish moments but it is always ok in the end which is comforting. And for total immersion in another world Maeve Binchy or Patricia Scanlan. The reading equivalent of lying in a warm bath with candles glowing and a nice cup of tea or glass of wine to hand.

OMG!! Someone mentioned Riders - don't go there. I loved it when I was a teenager but recently re-read it and was horrified by the casual misogyny and a very graphic rape scene.