Uplifting reads for friend going through a hard time.

[Divebar2021]

Hi fellow book lovers. Im off to the US in a week to meet up with a friend I have known for 30 years. She has been feeling low for a while and I’d like to take her a couple of uplifting reads and would love some suggestions.

She is going through menopause feeling crappy and a parent has a terminal illness to give you the background. What books have you found that have been beautiful but uplifting / life affirming? The titles can be fiction or non fiction but not obviously from the “self help” section if that makes sense. I don’t want her to think I’m trying to fix her. Thanks in advance.

I don't know your friend, of course, so I will list the books that I reach for when I'm low. Hope they are of some use:

P. G. Wodehouse: Right Ho Jeeves
Brian Blessed: Absolute Pandemonium (read by the author on audiobook)
Patrick Leigh Fermor: A Time of Gifts
Robert Graves: Goodbye to All That
The Sherlock Holmes books (read by Stephen Fry on audiobook)
Bill Bryson: Notes from a Small Island
Douglas Adams: A Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
John Betjeman: Collected Poems
Evelyn Waugh: Decline and Fall and The Sword of Honour
Oscar Wilde: Dorian Gray
Aldous Huxley: Crome Yellow
Kingsley Amis: Lucky Jim

“Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day” all the way! So funny and heartwarming.

Also “Mrs Tim of the Regiment” is funny, charming and really cosy.

The Lido - really enjoyed this book,

My lovely book that I love is Love Nina by Nina Stibbe. I also comfort read the Cazalet Chronicles, but they aren’t fun, exactly. Girl, Woman, Other is brilliant. All three of those are very British, which if she’s a Brit abroad might give comfort.

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune
Possibly the most beautiful book I've ever read. Like a marshmallow.

The book I am going to suggest is not high brow and may not appeal but someone recommended it to me when I was struggling and it did make me smile. It is ‘The funny thing about Norman Foreman’ by Julietta Henderson.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I’m going to have a look through the reviews for them all. My friend is actually American but may still enjoy some of the very British titles.