Middle aged protagonists

[verytiredrightnow]

Hi, I've read a lot of coming of age type books recently and I'm finding them a bit unrelatable being in my 40s. Can anyone recommend some great books with protagonists in their 40s ot 50s?
Maybe something with a bit of romance in it but it doesn't have to.
Not chick lit.

Have a look at:

Thin Air by Sue Gee
Old Baggage by Lisa Evans - start of a trilogy
Old Filth by Jane Graham - another trilogy
The Idea of Perfection by Kate Grenville
Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
The Shipping News by E Annie Proulx

and there are lots of books published by Persephone Books that deal with women's lives, often mature women and often domestic settings. They specialise in finding and republishing authors who were popular in the past but have been forgotten. Greenbanks by Dorothy Whipple would be a good start.

Just finished The Change by Kirsten Miller. Brilliant book - half detective thriller half bad ass women of a certain age not taking any more shit.

Championing Barbara Pym again! Great reads peopled with more mature female characters.

I know you said ‘not chick lit’ but try Just Got Real by Jane Fallon anyway.

Apple tree yard
Cranford
Barbara Kingsolver books
Richard Osman

Any of the Raynor Winn trilogy. The Salt Path is the first so I'd suggest starting there.

Thanks, some great suggestions. Keep them coming.
The Change sounds right up my street.
Have previously enjoyed the salt path, small pleasures and I love Barbara Kingsolver.

The Manon Bradshaw series by Susie Steiner is great crime fiction with a protagonist who is 39 in the first book. Sadly there are only 3 of them as Steiner died of a brain tumour last year, but they are great.

Odd One Out by Lissa Evans.

I have recently read the Agatha Raisin series by MC Beaton and also the Hawthorn series of books by Anthony Horowitz who wrote Magpie Murders.

Damn! As soon as I read the OP I thought Barbara Pym, but someone got there before me.

The Three Dahlias by Katy Watson is great if you like crime fiction - one twenty something, one forty something and one sixty something working together

Vladimir by Julia May Jonas
Drive Your Plough Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
All's Well by Mona Award
Death Becomes Her by Ottessa Moshfegh

All older female protagonists with some bite!

Hotel du Lac? I love that book

Not sure how you define chick lit.

I would second the "Old Baggage" trilogy by Lissa Evans.

For an amusing romp with a middle aged heroine then Celia Imrie has written a trilogy starting with "Not Quite Nice".

And actually Katie Fforde has some books with middle aged heroines. My favourite is "Going Dutch".

How about Grown Ups by Marian Keyes? I've always avoided her books because I thought they'd be too light but hot this one on a kindle desk and it was good.

I've just read Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. She's 52 and I think I appreciated lots of the themes being close to her in age.

I also really liked Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris which was on the Woman's prize this year and is about a middle-aged woman who stays behind in Sarajevo when the war starts.

And one of my favourite books this year was The Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer which is about a middle aged woman battling with cancer. It sounds depressing but it's funny and moving and just so original.

Sorry should say *Women's Prize shortlist.

And if you want to go to completely the other extreme, I also read Cat Brushing by Jane Campbell, which is a series of short stories about old women written by an 80 year old author.

Forgot that one of the books I have on the go is 30 Days in Paris by Veronica Henry. It doesn't say how old she is but the DC have all left home.

Would a multigenerational book like French Braid by Anne Tyler work?

Anything by Anita Brookner.

I've just really enjoyed Devorgilla Days by Kathleen Hart. So uplifting and honest. If you enjoyed Raynor Winn I thing you will love this.

Oh, also Bella Figura by Kamin Mohammadi. It's a bit of a recipe for life.

Strange weather in Tokyo by Hiromi Kawakami
the land of green plums by herta muller
out by kirino
the unit by ninni holmqvist
the master key by masako togawa

all interesting books with characters ranging from late 30s to 60s and definitely not chick lit