The most under-rated books you have read - recommendations please

[TondelayoSchwarzkopf]

OK - they are doing overrated books over in AIBU - let's do under-rated because I'm bored of being negative.

These are my favourites that need dusting off and distributing to everyone instead of the usual McEwan / Franzen / Orange / Booker / TV adaptations snooze-fests.

Main Street - Sinclair Lewis.
Beautiful book about a young woman's growing disillusion with suburban life in the midwest.

Angel - Elizabeth Taylor
I know she is raved about by those who know but it's time for her to be famous and exalted. Amazing book about an Edwardian romantic novelist who is totally deluded.

Damon Runyan short stories - hilarious vivid and brilliant - set in the New York of the 1920s and full of gangsters and molls.

The Sheltering Sky - Paul Bowles
Frankly weird but engrossing tale of travellers crossing the Sahara.

Please dig out all of the above and let me know your secret favourites.

Saki - Short Stories. Cannot understand why everyone hasn't heard of him. Sharp and hilarious.

Agree re Saki & Runyan.

Who was Changed and Who was Dead by Barbara Comyns
A random Oxfam bookshop buy but fantastic.

About 18 years ago I read Maddie by Clare Rayner...I really loved it, haven't read it again for fear of it not being as good!

What an awesome title "Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead". Must dig it out.

One of the most brilliant books that I've never heard anyone else mention is Letters of a Fainthearted Feminist by Jill Tweedie. Often get reminded of it on MN because it's the correspondence from a woman with older teenage kids and a small baby, who finds herself in domestic drudgery, writing to her sister who is a dungaree-wearing Greenham-camping feminist. Very funny and opened my eyes.

...Opened my eyes to the domestic drudgery angle I should say. Read it as a teenager.

Love Fainthearted Feminist - am forever being reminded of bits of it, like the house splitting into different time zones because she is up with the baby whereas the teenagers won't get up till lunch.

I am in awe of your CCF knowledge as well :o

'I'll Go To Bed At Noon' by Gerard Woodward. OK, it was Booker shortlisted so it's not that underrated but I have never met anyone who had read it, let alone likes it! I love it. It's a very naturalistically drawn depiction of a family of alcoholics in 1970s London. Superb characterisation.

Anything by Elizabeth Bowen; in particular, 'The House in Paris' and 'Eva Trout'. The woman's a genius!

I blush .

Have read it at least 20 times so no excuse for not having memorised it by now!

Like all really strong-minded women, on whom everybody flops, she adored being bossed about. It was so restful

Zero I love I'll Go to Bed at Noon! It is totally amazing and sad and realistic.

Sorry that exclamation mark prob not that appropriate.

The Dud Avocado by Elaine Dundy - taught Jilly Cooper everything she knows!

I also have a soft spot for The Pumpkin Eater by Penelope Mortimer and The Garrick Year by Margaret Drabble, probably because I read them at an impressionable age. Both very 60's.

Anything by Daphne Du Maurier including My Cousin Rachel - somehwat overshadowed by Rebecca I think.

Reindeer moon by Elizabeth Marshal Thomas.

It is so well written that every time I read it I get lost in it. I first read it 20 years ago after having DS1, and I will NEVER tire of reading it.

some reviews..

This is a great novel that needs to come with a warning. It's has such an rich and authentic texture that those readers who like to submerge themselves in other cultures might get lost in this and never wholly emerge afterwards.

^A great book, well-written and honest. I was sad to end it and thought about it long after I finished reading it. I was completely mesmerised.

This book took me to another world and I forgot I was in this one! ^

My Cousin Rachel is my favourite Du Maurier as well.

So glad I started this thread - bookmarking for the library on Thursday.

I love Barbara Pym's novels.

Just remembered Josephine Tey - the Franchise Affair. Fabulous.

Oo yes, Josephine Tey. I remember being snowed up in a Massachusetts blizzard reading Daughter of Time - wonderful.

Several lovely children's books that I would never have known about if they hadn't come from charity shops and people's attics when I were a wee lassie. I don't remember the authors' names.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (a kind of feel-good, children's version of Angela's Ashes) I think this one's quite popular in the US still

Longtime Passing- about a family of settlers in the Blue Mountains (I think) of NZ. I would love to find a copy of this book again but I think it's been out of print for decades. My own copy was elderly in 1978.

Professor Branestawm- can you still buy his books? I spent literally hours aged 5 laughing myself sick reading his books- and it took a lot to do that.

I found Longtime passing! Same cover as my edition too.

Keith Roberts - Pavane. Alternative reality fiction before the term was invented, beautifully written in terms of language used too. Quite possibly my favourite book ever.

Jill Paton Walsh - Knowledge of Angels - so clever, beautiful (and beautifully written), and moving. I think it was shortlisted for the Booker, but no-one seems to have heard of it.

Rohinton Mistry - I know he's known on here but I am surprised more people IRL haven't read him.

I liked We'll Go To Bed At Noon, too. And Elizabeth Taylor, who's wonderful.

Glad to hear it tondelayo. Have you read the others in the series? I've read 'August' but not the other one, although I really should.

Have just decided though that I probably shouldn't have mentioned it as anything Booker nominated shouldn't really count in this. Can't think of any other novels off the top of my head that are truly underrated but I'm sure I will by tomorrow.

I put this on the other thread, but for very British humour (think Wodehouse but darker), try the brilliant Kyril Bonfiglioli.