Your best book ever....

[Zoeyclash]

I've got a very long car journey coming up and I'm looking for recommendations for a really good audiobook. AIBU to ask what's the best book you've ever read/listened to? I'm open to all types of genres except sci-fi. Thanks!

Misery
The Hobbit
Mort
Tina by Niall Haribson
Hope by Niall Haribson
Boy in the striped pyjamas
Wind in the Williows
Private Peaceful
A monster calls

The God of Small Things

Bertie Carvel absolutely perfect and gorgeous as JS. I just wish they could have included the footnotes somehow - all those little stories and asides really made the novel for me.

Yes, for sure!

Tom's Midnight Garden.

Forget that it's meant to be a children's book, it's a profound and deeply moving, somehow not in a sad way though!

Light a Penny Candle by Maeve Binchy. Read it as a teenager and many more times over the years.

beloved - Toni Morrison
the time traveller’s wife
shuggy bain
the stand - Stephen king

Code of the Woosters

The secret history- Donna Tarrt

I really like the Peter Grainger books, beautifully narrated. Sort of crime/police procedure but characters well rounded and not gory

Omg! Just finished this audiobook. Fabulous, twisty thriller. Best book in a while. Don’t think I have a favourite book, too many to pick just one. The great alone by Kristin Hannah is also a recent read I adored!

When the floods came by Claire morrall and anything by claire morrall really

Posession - AS Byatt
Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine - Gail Honeyman

Oh and I'd second Elly Griffiths

The Light-years (first in the Cazalet Chronicles)
Elizabeth Jane Howard

Behind The Scenes At The Museum
Kate Atkinson

Absolutely yes to anything by Bill Bryson - especially The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid and a Short History of Nearly Everything. First one for the humour and second for the amazing education it gives that you never even knew you wanted!

I love maeve binchy. Her writing is joyous.

The Girl Behind The Gates by Brenda Davies. Heartbreaking yet uplifting.

To Kill a Mockingbird
All of Thomas Hardy and Jane Austen
Jane Eyre - read by Juliet Stevenson on Audible - amazing
The Heart’s Invisible Furies - John Boyne

The 2 audiobooks I’ve enjoyed most on long car journeys are Michelle Obama reading Becoming, her autobiography, and also The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.

Rosamunde Pilcher is always lovely at this time of year - I listened to Winter Solstice last year despite having read it several times already.

Kane & Abel by Jeffrey Archer. I’m really looking forward to the next release, Adam & Eve, in May.
The Watershed by Erin Pizzey. I read this in my late teens/early twenties and enjoyed it. I’ve just bought another copy and look forward to seeing how I feel about it now that I’m late fifties.
Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy.
And Coma by Robin Cook.

Are we allowed 3? If so then An Evil Cradling - Brian Keenan. A suitable boy Vikram Seth and more recently - another Liz nugent book - The truth about Ruby cooper. I think Liz Nugent has a way of writing that draws you in (in my opinion). Obviously it depends on your taste) in a way that others don’t.

Oh and The nightingale by Kristin Hannah. Brilliant and stayed with me.

I recently listened to Woman in White. Really enjoyed it.

I've read the first one of that series. It's well written but maybe a bit heated to read on a train lol 🥵
My favourite book is Salem's Lot by Stephen King. No one captures the feeling of creeping dread and fear like he does.