Please come and recommend a book

[user1477249785]

Hi all. I have just resigned from my job after a really really hard going time. I haven't had time to read a book in a couple of years. I have a few weeks now to focus on myself and try and decompress so I want to line up a stack of books. I have a few criteria and would be really really grateful for any recommendations.

I'm looking for something that is totally gripping and compelling with a real good story but that isn't hard to get into (my brain is a little fried). I also don't want anything too depressing. My favourite ever book was secret history but I didn't get on at all with either of her other books which I found hard going. I want to be totally absorbed.

I'd really welcome any suggestions. The sort of book you feel sad when you've finished because it was so wonderful...

Thank you!

Anything by Susan Hill. She's very good. Always a page turner but not in a 'trashy' way. I always look forward to reading her.

I enjoyed Room too, as mentioned above. But don't think I could hack reading it in the current lockdown situation
Liked watching the film after reading.

All the light we cannot see, by Anthony Doer.

It gripped me, and is a real page turner. It has short sections/chapters, which alternates between the two protagonists - a blind French girl and a German boy in occupied France.

I agree with PP about loving the Secret History and absolutely hating anything else Tartt ever wrote!!

I’d recommend the Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman, just finished it and it’s good fun, very gripping and heartwarming in the right places

@SkepticalCat

All the light we cannot see, by Anthony Doer.

It gripped me, and is a real page turner. It has short sections/chapters, which alternates between the two protagonists - a blind French girl and a German boy in occupied France.

I really loved this as well.

Jilly Cooper - well written and entertaining. Good fun!

Frank and Stans Bucket list - really enjoyed this book

The Heatwave - Kate Riodan - absorbing story

I really enjoyed Frog Music by Emma Donoghue.

For something short and crisp, I would recommend award-winning dystopian novelette “Folding Beijing”. It imagines a Beijing (well, it can be almost every big city in the world really) which can be folded by a mechanical structure and separates upper, middle and working classes into three segregated spaces. You can easily read it in one Sunday afternoon and English translation is beautifully done and made free to all by sci-fi publisher Uncanny Magazine online.

www.flyingsesame.com/folding-beijing-fantasy-or-reality/

I also loved The Secret History but did not like The Goldfinch (haven’t attempted The Little Friend). Other favourites that haven’t already been mentioned:

The Historian
Gillespie and I
Piranisi
American Gods

I've just discovered Rosamunde Pilcher (I know, I know) and could not put down The Shell Seekers. It is a family saga and it fits your criteria of 'gripping and compelling with a real good story but that isn't hard to get into'. It's sad in parts but I wouldn't say depressing/harrowing. I was absorbed to the point of sitting up way too late in bed reading it. I definitely felt sad when I'd finished it.

Lucinda Riley the 7 sisters series. Can’t wait for the final book to be released.
Colleen hoover Regretting you & heart bones.