Looking for a French recommendation

[Dappy777]

I am learning to read French and need some recommendations. I’m looking for French novels (20th or 21st century, no earlier) that are well-written but popular, entertaining and relatively easy to read. I can just about read the Maigret novels and Nemirovsky’s Suite Francaise, so no harder than that. I love C. J. Sansom’s Shardlake, so a French equivalent would be great - nothing too heavy, experimental, intellectual or surreal (I know the French love their surrealists).

I don’t like romance or sci fi or fantasy. I’d prefer historical, thrillers, crime and general popular fiction. I suppose I’m looking for something popular and ‘middlebrow’, i.e not trashy, but not highbrow like Virginia Woolf or Iris Murdoch. Something like Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood would be perfect - clear and simple prose yet gripping and exciting. Thanks.😊

Marguerite Yourcenar’s Memoires d’Hadrien? A novel I’ve always adored, Alain-Fournier’s Le Grand Meaulnes? Marguerite Duras, L’amant?

Brilliant thread. Will come back in a bit

Just off the top of my head

Monsieur Linh et sa Petite Fille by Philippe Claudel

Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan, classic coming of age novel

Marcel Pagnol's autobiographical series, starting with La Gloire de Mon Père and Le Château de ma Mère

Après une Vraie Histoire is an intriguing mystery, can't remember the author

Thanks for the replies guys. Will check them out.

'No et Moi' by Delphine de Vigan. We teach it at A Level. It's about a young homeless girl and another girl who befriends her. I think it's really beautifully written.

Try the novels of Leila Slimani - esp. Chancon Douce, or Victoria Mas, Le Bal des Folles.

I loved The Elegance of the Hedgehog, though I read it in English, not French. From French A Level I remember enjoying Un Sac de Billes.

Le liseur du 6h27

The two that I find have quite easy vocab are Annie Ernaux and Margueritte Duras.

Good shout with Annie Ernaux. I love all her work.

Although she doesn't really fit into any of OP's chosen genres...
As you know she writes autobiographical-ish fiction, Nobel prize winner, but simple style.

Madame Bovary or Le Ble en Herbe

Leila Slimani is good.

Someone recommended Marcel Pagnol- I had to read all his books and they are absolutely dreadful with a lot of ancient vocabulary and names of flowers and wildlife. You will be stuck with a dictionnary non-stop.

F

Stupeur et tremblements
by Amélie Nothomb

What absolute bollocks re Pagnol!

Its written in the past historic and there are a couple of bird names you probably need to look up - once. They are charming, funny and sad, and are a classic portrait of Provençal life at the turn of the 19th and 20th century. The stories may not be to your personal taste but they are easy to read without your head stuck in a dictionary.

Charming maybe. But not funny nor sad. Well, I was sad being forced to read them but that's about it. Just mundane descriptions of nature and wildlife. Oh, yes there was one fun part when Marcel's father found "treasures" at the brocante but that was about it.

The Asterix comic books are good.

My A level texts were L'etranger and Ble en herbe, both simple and clear language.

When I lived in France, one thing I liked to do in my downtime was read the French translations of books I was already familiar with. It's easy to work out anything unknown from context if you already know the plot. I remember reading some Bronte stuff, Tender is the Night by F Scott Fitzgerald, some classic sci-fi books and all of Harry Potter and Discworld.

Read a lot of French stuff too, but mostly 17th-19thC, so not what you're after.