Please please please help me find a book to read ...

[ClaraFox]

I used to read all the time and I don't know what happened. I really struggle to get into anything these days. I've got a million samples on my kindle and just can't seem to move past the first chapter or two with anything!

I want something gripping and engaging from the first page. I want it to be easy reading. I like thrillers , psychological thrillers, police stuff, don't mind decent chick lit. I tried to read ' the book thief ' this weekend and absolutely hated it. I don't like Norwegian stuff. I hated Heft. I couldn't get into the Goldfinch. Same with Gone Girl. Got some way into Agatha Raisin and lost interest. Ditto with Robert Galbraith.

Please please - any recommendations for something that's going to instantly grab me?

I know it sounds stupid but I'm actually concerned that I can no longer read properly! Just seem to lack concentration so I think I need something fast paced, absorbing or exciting.

[Pukkapik]

Also, Sweet tooth by Ian McEwan - same sort of category as Restless.

[Pukkapik]

Restless by William Boyd.
Really good read, pacy, female spy story set in 2nd world war and 1970s.

[Beamur]

Not thrillers, but quite gripping.
Kate Atkinson - Life after Life
The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern
Perhaps also
The Snow Child - Eowyn Ivey

[ClaraFox]

off to check out the woodcutter

[Orangesarenottheonlyfruit]

Can I add The Woodcutter by Reginald Hill. He wrote the Dalziel and Pascoe books. It is a utterly gripping and terribly exciting of corruption and lust etc. Some of it is a bit of a stretch but you get so swept up that the more unbelievable aspects are easily overlooked, great fun.

[shartsi]

Dorothy koomson books. I,m currently reading flavours of love, loving it.

[ClaraFox]

I read notes on a scandal years ago ( back when I could read with no problems! ) and it was good.

I'd recommend the following if anyone's interested..

rumours of a hurricane
loreleis secret ( so good!! )
forever amber ( oh god - the ending!!)
I've downloaded a load of samples based on all of these so I'm hopeful something will grab me

[Southeastdweller]

I agree on Kiss Me First.

Notes on a Scandal also excellent.

[eslteacher]

I definitely second The Rosie Project. Also, The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty. It could be seen as chick lit but with a kind of thriller-y / mystery streak. I found it totally gripping from page 1. Also, I read another of her books, What Alice Forgot, and found it to be similarly absorbing.

Of all the books I've read recently, those stand out as being the big page-turners that I just didn't want to put down.

[oversomeniagara]

Hope you enjoy it! I will feel responsible if you don't.

[Stockhausen]

Last book I read was The Good Father, loved it!

The Lifeboat was very absorbing, Charlotte somebody?

Have you read water for elephants? Trash?

[LumpySpacePrincessOhMyGlob]

Just put Rivers of London on my kindle.

[oversomeniagara]

I should add, it's set in the present day London within the modern met police force so is urban fantasy rather than something like Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. www.amazon.co.uk/Rivers-London-1/dp/0575097582?tag=mumsnet&ascsubtag=mnforum-21

[oversomeniagara]

RIVERS OF LONDON SERIES by Ben Aaronovitch. Police procedural with magic. Really easy to read and entertaining. You also learn lots about the history of London.

I've absolutely binged through the audiobooks and can thoroughly recommend them too.

[annaban]

Hi OP, I really enjoyed the girl with the dragon tattoo (trilogy). I read them all on honeymoon a few years ago - v page turnery

[LumpySpacePrincessOhMyGlob]

Does it have to be a thriller? When I'm not in the zone I tend to read some like Sarah Addisson Allen, gentle books with a twist of magical realism all set in the Deep South.

I've just finished Some Kind of Fairytale which was brilliant. Starts with an elderly couple on Christmas Day, they lost their daughter twenty years ago. There's a knock at the door and it's there daughter, only she doesn't look any older.

It was gripping from the start.

[maudpringle]

Have a look out for Laurie Graham or Anne Tyler.

[petal2008]

I've just started A Commonplace Killing by Sian Busby. So far so good ten chapters in. Set just after the second world war. Some good characters, easy to read and you can really get into the feeling of post war London.

Have started three books lately and only got about a third of the way through before giving up. Either because the writing seems clunky or I've guessed what's going to happen, really predictable. Spent ages choosing them as well so very disappointing.

After this current book I'm going to read a couple of biographies. All the fiction stuff I pick all seems to be the same themes.

[PepeLePew]

JK Rowling's crime novel (Cuckoo Calling) is excellent - entertaining, well plotted and a v easy read

[storynanny]

What about trying a Susan Lewis? Easy read but not straightforward chick lit. Im really enjoying her novels on my kindle

[ihatethecold]

I was the same as you op.
I was fed up with not reading but couldn't concentrate to get on with it.

But, I have just read The good Father because of a thread on here.

It was brilliant. So easy to get into.
It has returned the reading bug for me.

[textbook]

Broken Harbour by Tana French and A Place of Execution by Val McDermid both very good crime/thrillers. Agree also re Sophie Hannah - hoping her new offering this year is a return to form.

[paperclip2]

Nicci French: Killing Me Softly is very good and it grips you from the first chapter (but you might know this one already)

[Cheboludo]

I read the Never List but didn't like it. It'd been hyped quite a bit so my expectations were high but I thought the premise was wonderful and the execution dreadful. For me, it was full of plotholes and characters didn't act believably (eg an agoraphobic character, who hates to leave their flat, sets off cross-country.) Others have loved it though, so maybe it's just me.
The Shining Girls is about a drifter and all-round bad sort who stumbles onto a house which allows him to travel through time. He then starts stalking and killing his "shining girls". The story follows the one woman to escape. I believe its depictions of violence are quite graphic but the author said she did this so that people would realise how much the women suffered, to make readers hurt for the victims. I've only heard good things about it but I need to be feeling brave before I start it!