Please help me find some literary(ish) page turners!

[FatCatSkinnyRat]

Dear readers,

In the next month I will be spending 70+ hours on planes as I jet around the world for a couple of family events.

I am loading up my kindle with some novels I have not read - so far I have Frankenstein and Half of a Yellow Sun waiting to go. Am considering Lessons in Chemistry but can see it divides the masses...... I think I need at least five more.

Can anyone recommend some more page turners please - quality fiction that you can't put down? I will definitely make good progress with the two above but might need to switch to something different at some stage - esp on the 13 hour flights!

Not really into thrillers unless it's something like A Secret History (part thriller).

Thanks everyone! Dreading the flights but looking forward to reading time.....

I agree with all the recommendations of Wilkie Collins and the un-recommendations of Eleanor Oliphant.

Books I enjoyed;

The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch
A Single Thread by Tracy Chevalier
Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor (not that one)

Absolutely love Elizabeth "not that one" Taylor. Angel by her is also very good - the original mean girl.

Oh yes yes to Johnathan Coe!

Agre with so many on here (and vehemently disagree with others 😂).

What about the Neopolitan Quartet by Elena Ferrante?

Yes, I'd forgotten. The hero - Thorfinn, King of Alba - is meant to be the 'real MacBeth', set in 11th century- but lots of plot differences from the Shakespeare version....

The Trees - Percival Everett
The Haunting of Hill House - Shirley Jackson
Trust - Hernan Diaz
An American Marriage - Tayari Jones
Pachinko - Min Jin Lee
The Song of Achilles - Madeleine Miller
Rebecca - Daphne du Maurier
Purple Hibiscus - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The Vanishing Half - Brit Bennett
Ghost Wall - Sarah Moss

Moll Flanders
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
The Metamorphosis
Antigone
The Scarlet Letter
The Bell Jar

Daniel Deronda, by George Elliot.

I was astonished by how invested I was in the protagonists, and how different from the norm for that era the author's attitude was to minorities. The most interesting and engrossing work of classic English literature I have ever read.

Virtually anything by Solzhenitsyn. My favourite is The Cancer Ward. Despite the title (and, yes, some sad parts) it is not grim.

Where the Crawdads sing has some beautiful prose in it.
Gone with the wind and the 'sequel' Scarlett.

Phantoms by Genevieve Riley

Possession by A.S. Byatt is one of my favourite reads. Definitely literary, but also a page-turner. If you loved Fingersmith, I think you’ll enjoy this.

Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

if you like fantasy, then you can’t beat Robin Hobb’s trilogies. Fantastic characterisation and world building. Start with Assassin’s Apprentice but there’s loads to keep you going. Really immersive.

I am loving all these suggestions!

I want to add Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng.

Adds another 20 books to wish list

Agreed. Ages since I read it, but I loved it. Also Middlemarch.

All of Jane Austen, but I expect most people here have already done that. Persuasion is my favourite.

Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone.

Dickens - David Copperfield, Bleak House, Little Dorrit are my favourites.

The Quincunx, a 20th century version of a 19th century novel. Couldn't put it down.

I love Evelyn Waugh too and on the back of that would strongly recommend Anthony Powell's 12-novel sequence, A Dance to the Music of Time.

South Riding by Winifred Holtby.

A Perfect Spy, John le Carre. Not really a spy story, more about what spying does to a man.

I thought Stoner by John Williams was a great book. I couldn't put it down.

Anything by Sarah Moss and Grace McCleen, just perfect

Fantastic novel.... I cried buckets at that one.

Hi everyone, reporting live from the road! I've already devoured the first 2 Patrick Melrose novels (needed a break from the compelling misery, plus saving the 3rd for the flight home) and the first Cazalet which I really loved. Have downloaded the next, also for the flight home. DH is also now on the Melrose bandwagon.

Have started Lessons in Chemistry on audiobook but only 10% in. Too early to make a call.

I find I'm struggling to get engaged with Frankenstein. I read many classics but this is dragging a bit at 30% in. Anyone else found this? I'll plough on however, perhaps interspersed with some Cazalet...

Thank you all for taking the time to recommend these great books. I'll be adding about 30 of the above to my TBR when home!

There are two main versions of Frankenstein. The first edition was published under Percy Bysse Shelley's name (apparently nobody would buy a book written by a woman!) and he 'improved' it. Later editions published under Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's name, without PBS's changes and additions, are much better to read. Her fighting is actually much clearer and simpler than most novels of the era.

Writing, not fighting.

Try Affinity by Sarah Waters-a Victorian Gothic feel that sweeps you along.

Sarah Waters-are you working on a new book? Please hurry along!

Can I add 'a place called winter' and 'mothers boy' both Patrick Gale, Jane Smiley 'a thousand acres' and 'still life' by Sarah winman,

I had to check i hadn't written this post and forgotten about it when I saw that list! May I recommed The Crimson etal and the White By Michel Faber for more wonderfully written Victorian set writing? Also adored the recent The Shrines of Gaity by the excellent Kate Atkinson.

Petal- My P keeps sticking on my laptop!

I recently read Bunny by Mona Awad…I felt like I was on an acid trip. It’s bit gore-ish but artistically done. A bit pretentious but I’m not into poetry so maybe that’s why I found it to be like that haha.

goodreads reviews say it’s like A Secret History through the looking glass.

I seem to be in a habit of reading books where I’m left thinking what the fucks just happened at the end….also just finished The Boy Who Could See Demons by Carolyn Jess-Cooke.