“Mid life female”fiction

[milkeyway]

I nearly went with “middle age women’s” fiction but sounded so awful!
Bit clichéd but I’m in my 40s and just love modern(ish) fiction about women my age or older, grown up kids, marriages, affairs, work, juggling, family dynamics, reflecting on the past, childhood etc that draw you in and pack an emotional punch. I loved colm toibin Brooklyn and Long Island, Ann patchet and Ann Tyler, maggie o Farrell, Joanna glen, Hilary Boyd, Rosamund pincher, Louise doughty, Harriet tyce, Claire lynch, Clare keegan…. Nothing too whimsical or chick lit (I can tell by looking at a cover of I’ll hate it!)
Any recommendations along these lines would be wonderful. Thank you.

Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plough Over the Bones of the Dead
Miranda July’s All Fours
Barbara Kingsolver’s Prodigal Summer ( three narrators, but one is a woman in her 40s, and a great character)
Colm Toibín’s Nora Webster
Maria Simple’s Where’d You Go, Bernadette
Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Lolly Willowes

The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year by Sue Townsend.
It may seem like it falls into your category of stuff you won’t like but although it’s very funny it has some very poignant bits and is superbly written.

Anything by Jane Fallon

Elizabeth Strout.
Carol Shields.
Anita Shreve.

I’ve tried and don’t love it, but thank you!

Yes to 2 and 3. I’ve tried ES several times but no!

Try Night Swimmers by Roisin Maguire. I like a lot of the authors you list and I loved this. There are 2 main protagonists but one is a woman in her early 50s

Some of Maeve Binchy might suit? Tara Road and The Glass Lake. I love Monica Dickens especially No More Meadows - Christine is only mid thirties but it ticks some of your boxes.

I am listening to A Family Matter by Claire Lynch which is short but good. Lots of family routines astutely written I find.

Elizabeth Taylor’s short stories and Elizabeth Strout.

Also try Colm Toibin.

Erica James has some that would fit your description

Nevermind, didn’t read your whole post

Catherine Newman’s books
We all want impossible things.
Sandwich
Wreck

Patricia Scanlan and Shelia O’Flanagan might suit

Alison Lurie! Especially Foreign Affairs and The Truth About Lorin Jones.

Oh, I love The Truth About Lorin Jones! Must reread.

If you like scfi, here's a good list. I love Lois McMaster Bujold's Cordelia's Honor and its follow up (after a series of novels about her son), The Red Queen.

5 Sci-Fi Fantasy Novels With Badass Middle-Aged Heroines share.google/7Uqqyowpxod5rihHv

Have read the last two and enjoyed. Couldn’t get on with sandwich on first attempt - just found her way too neurotic and OTT but then found I could tolerate her better after I got to know her in wrecked!

Thanks. Have read the last two and enjoyed. Couldn’t get on with sandwich as I just found the main character annoyingly neurotic and OTT but found I could tolerate her better after I got to know her in Wreck!

Posted twice sorry. Thanks all for some great suggestions, will check these out.

Cathy Retzenbrink - Ordinary Time

Oh lots of good reads here. Has anyone mentioned Clare chambers yet?

I just read Heartburn by Nora Ephron and loved it.

Also the Paper Palace by - Miranda Cowley Heller. It has some similarities to Sandwich but I much preferred it. I would also recommend Heart the Lover by Lily King, although starts off with protagonist in her 20s.

Love all her books!