I need a book that will make me forget what time it is.

[Kayemm]

You know what I mean. One that you don't actually read because you are there with the characters.

I've loved:-
The Woman in White
A Prayer for Owen Meaney
Persuasion
Watership Down.
The Book Thief.
A Tale of Two Cities.

Not so much
Eleanor whatshername.
Misery memoirs.
Cloud Atlas

Throw your best suggestions at me?

Thanks.

Harry Potter.

A Fine Balance or The Corrections.

Saw your title and was about to suggest The World According to Garp.

Given you have read Owen Meany you may have already read it, but if not......OMG...get it read!

Lovely Bones

I often suggest these - Susan Howard’s, Starbridge novels, about the history of the Church of England in the twentieth century. Sounds less than thrilling? Astonishingly they are real page turners, and they have the benefit of rather a lot of pages to turn.

I read similar titles to you, my best fiction reads this year have been :

The Moonstone
Lincoln In The Bardo
Small Island
Jamaica Inn
Little Fires Everywhere
Half Of A Yellow Sun
The Girl With All The Gifts
All Quiet On The Western Front
And The Mountains Echoed

That’s Howatch, not Howard’s. Annoying autocorrect....

I'm a massive Anne Tyler fan so I recommend anything by her.
I've also just finished The Mirror and The Light by Hilary Mantel which is the last one in the trilogy with Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies. These set in Tudor times so good for escapism.
I also just enjoyed Tidelands by Phillippa Gregory.
Or
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
All the Light We Cannot see by Anthony Doerr
Cats Eye by Margaret Atwood
Beloved by Toni Morrison
All brilliant reads.

I like some on your list
One of my favourite books is The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

The Morland Dynasty by Cynthia Harold Eagles.
There’s 31 of them now start 1430 right through to the 1930s.
About a family I love them and have done for the last 30 years.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë.
The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy.
American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld.

Count of Monte Cristo
Gone with the wind
Conn iggulden wolf of the plains

Where the Crawdads Sing is being totally raved about on a group I’m in, not tried it myself though.

If you don’t know the story already then Handmaid’s Tale?

I was surprised by the three books below. They are not my usual type of reads, but 2 of the 3 had me sobbing in the bathroom in the early hours so as not to wake my husband when I finished them, and all 3 of them have stayed with me.

The Time Travellers Wife - Audrey Nifenegger
The Nightingale - Kristin Hannah
The Huntress - Kate Quinn

All the light we cannot see, Anthony Doerr
The Book of Negroes, Lawrence Hill
The Dark Lives Trilogy, Ross Greenwood
If you like a police thriller I’ve just read all Carol Wyer books, good page turners.

The last book that made me feel like this was Haruki Murakami IQ84

The Help. My favourite book of all time. I am jealous of those who get to read it for the first time!
I also love a little known teen fiction book called Love Lessons by David Belbin. It is set in Nottingham in the 90’s and is about a teacher/pupil relationship. It is subtly brilliant.

The Heart's Invisible Furies

My favourite book - I lost track of what day it was never mind what time!

OP I think we have very similar tastes in books.....A prayer for Owen Meany, Tale of Two Cities and Woman In White all in my top ten....
I would add anything by Kazuo Ishiguro, probably Never Let Me Go if pushed but they are all so good (and different) I'd struggle to choose), also Armadale which is actually better than the Woman in White, unbelievably also,...Cormac Mccarthy the border trilogy and Moby Dick.

My most recent discovery is We Have Always Lived In the Castle...reading it for the first time was the most wonderful and enjoyable read I've had for many years. I finished it and just started it again!

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit I have just googled Lincoln in the Bardo and it sounds like the most amazing idea for a book, thank you

@RedRec someone else told me recently they thought American Wife was the best book they had ever read, so I'm definitely going to read it now.

I got totally sucked into sapiens, I know it's not characters but I found the whole book fascinating.

@NoMoreMuchin

We seem to have to have very similar taste! Bardo is done as a Greek Chorus type thing, really interesting

4321 is excellent. Long but very much worth your time!

The Cazalet Chronicles - five novels by Elizabeth Jane Howard. I have read them lots of times, and I feel that I have gone back and am with this family at the time of the books.
Absolute favourite escapism and lovely characters .

I'm currently reading Love after Love by Ingrid Persaud. It's wonderful.

A suitable boy...totally absorbing and takes you to a totally different time and place.