Recommend some easy but well-written reads

[Redleavesfalling289]

I love reading (did an English Lit degree), but find with working life I'm usually too knackered to delve into anything too taxing come the evening.

Can anyone recommend any books that are well-written/thought-provoking, but not too hard on the old brain To give you examples of books I've enjoyed recently 'The Midnight Library,' 'Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine', Susan Hill's Simon Serrailler series, 'The Thursday Murder Club.'

In terms of themes, anything with intrigue, or concerning human relationships/character examination is of interest to me (sorry to be so vague.)

Hit me with your favourite bedtime/evening recommendations

The Tales of the City series by Armistead Maupin. Lovely books, easy to read, full of humanity. They will make you long to go to San Francisco.

The Dreaming Suburb and the Avenue goes to War (sequel) by RF Delderfield.

There is a genre called Uplift on Goodreads which might interest you.
All uplifting books obviously 😀

A Gentleman in Moscow- Amor Towles

American Dirt- Jeanine Cummins

Really loved both of these. Well written but readable.

@RiverSkater

The Dreaming Suburb and the Avenue goes to War (sequel) by RF Delderfield.

There is a genre called Uplift on Goodreads which might interest you.
All uplifting books obviously 😀

Oh yes I love these RF Delderfield books. The Horseman Riding By trilogy is lovely too.

Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford

Yes to Hamnet, Thursday Murder Club, Susan Hill's Simon Serrailler (sp?) series, Cazalet Chronicles, All the Light we cannot see

Thanks for the suggestions!

Also, Commonwealth by Anne Patchett. So good.

Also The Heart's Invisible Furies - can't recommend it highly enough.

Shirley Jackson

Anything by Elizabeth Strout.
A book I read recently and really enjoyed, a total pageturner, was Dreamland by Rosa Rankin -Gee, a novel of climate change. Not the kind of book I'd usually seek out, I got it because it was on offer on kindle, but it was unexpectedly excellent and thought-provoking.

Normal People by Sally Rooney is good - I became slightly over-invested in the characters!

@ElizabethinherGermanGarden

The Ruth Galloway series by Elly Griffiths (first one is The Crossing Places; murder mysteries with an archaeological slant) and the Cazalet series by Elizabeth Jane Howard (first one is The Light Years; family saga from 30s onwards - much better than that sounds! )

I'm really enjoying the Ruth Galloway series

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Anything by Mike Gayle ie All The Lonely People

I really like the Helen Grace series by MJ Arlidge

countrypunk
Really agree about the Tales of the City and they do really make you wish you could go to San Francisco but time travel to the 70s and 80 s

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo is well written but delightfully gossipy (not in writing style but because you get to poke about in the characters’ private lives)

Dorothy L. Sayers - all the Peter Whimsey ones. I want to be Harriet Vane when I grow up.

Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner. Best thing I’ve read in years. Witty and sharp and weird and surprising and hopeful.

The Casual Vacancy

Station Eleven - Emily St John Mandel

Pretty much anything written by Jodi Picoult, my faves being:

My Sister's Keeper
Nineteen Minutes
Small Great Things
A Spark of Light

The Girl with the Louding Voice
My Dark Vanessa
Little Fires Everywhere
American Dirt

If you haven't read them, then the Adrian Mole series are fun and easy to read, as well as being nostalgic (for those of us that are getting on a bit).

I recently read The Great Alone by Kristen Hannah, about a family in the 1970s who decide to go and live off-grid in Alaska, which I really enjoyed.

Also The Keeper of Lost Things was excellent.

State of the Union - Nick Hornby

If you haven't read it, loved Notes from an Exhibition.
The Other Bennett Sister.
Hilary Mantel, 'Giving up the Ghost'. I do like her earlier fiction (pre-Wolf Hall) but find it very disturbing in the main. This is an autobiography.

Thank you for this thread, OP.

Blatant place-marking to come back to later.

I'm enjoying Amanda Prowse. Well written, not too taxing and well-drawn characters.

I'm very surprised Piranesi has been recommended, god I found that book hard going.

Big Little Lies by Lianne Moriarty was brilliant.

The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley

Where'd You Go Bernadette by Maria Semple

And I second The Rosie Project series by Graeme Simsion & A Man Called Ove by Frederik Backman

Happy reading!