What is this year's 'Captain Corelli' s mandolin'?

[Moredarkchocolateplease]

By which I mean the one book that will be spotted on sun loungers across the hot spots of Europe, covered in suncream and remembered as 'the holiday where I read < insert book name here>

I'm going away at half term and I like to follow the crowd and read a big page turner on my hols 😁😚

I have no idea why the kissing emoji is on here too...

Hmm, maybe Lessons in Chemistry? I feel as though it's everywhere and that everyone has read or is about to read it. It's very good and an easy read!

No it's Barbara Kingsolver's new book. Demon Copperhead.
Last year's was Susanna Clark's Piranesi I think.

I was going to say Lessons in Chemistry too. It's rare that I get on the tube and don't see at least three people reading it.

Yes, Lessons in Chemistry is a good shout.

The move to Kindles for lots of people has meant that I really miss seeing the bestseller for the year on sunbeds. DH and I will still talk about 'The Captain Corelli holiday' or the 'Life of Pi trip' or 'Wasn't that the Di Vinci code year?'.

@ChicoryDip yes that's exactly what u mean! I was also going to use Da Vinci Code!

Agreed re kindles but I still think there is a big sale of paperbacks at the airport especially to disorganised men I suspect!

Will look into all those titles. I've picked up a copy of the Harry Quuebert affair which feels like a nice sunlounger book, but sometimes I want to be sheep like!

Last year I read the Lincoln Highway in paperback on the plane and loved it.

It always amazes me how people rush to buy the latest ‘big thing’. I hardly ever read popular books. It’s not that I think they’re no good. And it isn’t snobbery (I love Bill Bryson, for example). It’s just that I have literally piles of unread books in my room. There are SO many classics I want to read and haven’t got round to (Wuthering Heights, Bleak House, Middlemarch). I haven’t even read everything by my favourite authors (Aldous Huxley, Evelyn Waugh, Virginia Woolf, P G Wodehouse, Oscar Wilde, etc). I also have countless unread non-fiction works piled up. I’ve had Sagan’s Cosmos and Dawkins’ Selfish Gene sat on my shelves for nearly a decade!! Somebody bought me Harold Bloom’s final work for Christmas, and I haven’t even opened the damn thing, let alone read it.

Well I don't think I am 'rushing' more I just quite like the idea of reading some popular easy reading fiction on my holiday!

And given that I've been plodding through two Jonathan Franzen books for the last 6 months whilst working, being ill and supporting my family, my attention span is probably a bit short for Bronte or Elliot and the chances are they'd just send me to sleep on the sun lounger I'm so knackere😁

I also came on ti say lessons in chemistry. It’s good

Absolutely nothing wrong with popular easy fiction!

Oscar Wilde? Nah I’ll stick with Lessons in chemistry etc.

I will try and get a copy of lessons in chemistry too. So I can say I've read it, along with everyone else 😉😄

Lessons in Chemistry is pretty good. I also recently enjoyed Maggie O'Farrell's new book The Marriage Portrait. It's set in Italy so would be a good shout if you were heading to actual Italy on your holidays.

I'm currently away and it's lessons in chemistry

I thought Lessons in Chemistry was OK, not great, just OK.

I would agree with everyone that Lessons in Chemistry would be really popular, especially as it's now in paperback. I also see a lot of people reading the Slough House series books by Mick Herron on public transport.

I might be wrong and out of the loop but I don't feel there's been a summer hit as big as Captain Corelli for quite a while?

The last 'summer hit' I read was Fleishman is in Trouble and I was quite disappointed with that so wrote off the whole thing as pure marketing and vowed not to be taken in again!

Ah I agreed. Gave up on fleischmann too.

Mad that we all remember the summer of Captain Corelli!

Not literary, but I've heard a lot about Pineapple Street.

I've bought that and Demon Copperhead. Looking forward to reading them 😀

I've downloaded Pineapple Street to my Kindle. Hoping it's good.

Just read Lessons in Chemistry and now reading Maggie O'Farrells's Hamnett 😀

If you haven't read Still Life by Sarah Winman, that's lovely. Set in Italy and London through and after WWII - it's got that emotional, sunshiny vibe.

@ArcticBells you’re going to cry. But it’s an amazing book.

Last year’s but Cloud Cuckoo Land or Great Circle would be my holiday choice.

Lessons in Chemistry is so over rated and pretty dull. Couldn’t wait to finish it.

You and I are in a minority @ElderflowerPress33.
I also couldn't wait to finish it.