So on my holiday reading list I have Anna Karenina and the complete MR James Ghost Story Collection...what trashy but well written book can I take as well?

[Enid]

Am thinking Valley of The Dolls atm

Rosemary's baby. That should have you gripped.

ooh yes but have seen the film a gazillion times

My fav trashy-but-well-wrtten books are the Hannibal Lecter books. Can't remember the author's name offhand, but they are a very good read. Obv. you have to have a high tolerance for cannibalism etc.

ooh noooooooooooooo

too nasty

Actually red dragon is better than silence of the lambs in a yuck, squim kind of way

Peyton Place? The Group, by Mary McCarthy, is "Communist intellectual does trash" and is a rackety good read.
Historotrash has to be the bosom-heaving but lovingly researched Katherine by Anya Seton

I loved the Group but have read it sadly

ooh now I read Katherine as a young teen but could probably go there again

Liking the sound of Peyton Place

oh peyton place looks fabulous

thank you marina

"classic trash" - what a lovely category idea

How about Kinflicks?

Or The Serial - though appallingly, it appears to be out of print? (Hmm, wonder if it would appeal to Persephone, what d'you think?)

Or 44 Scotland Street, which is the contemporary equivalent of The Serial?

Or an omnibus Armistead Maupin? [Many many people will now jump in in outrage that I have put Maupin in "trash" ... but we're doing "classic" here, remember]

A nice selection of Georgette Heyer?

That sort of covers the field, doesn't it?

mmmm

lovely lovely classic trash

am still v keen on Valley of the Dolls

The Serial looks great Bink!

I have read all the armistead maupins - I really enjoyed them

Kinflicks! Oh, I love Lisa Alther! Have just remembered Susan somebody and Compromising Positions, that was a good read too

I don't think Armistead would mind being in classic trash at all bink, look at the company he is keeping

Recently re-read Valley of the Dolls - it is fabulously trashy, whizzed through it and a perfect holiday book.

also to consider ...

Jackie Collins
Erica Jong (yes, she is trash )
and Jilly Cooper (though not sure she merits the "well written" tag - definitely classic, however)

Cross Stitch by Diana Gabaldon

I do love a bit of camp

Really trashy-campy-classic - & possibly the wellspring of the genre altogether: George MacDonald Fraser's Flashman books.

And at the total opposite end of the scale (and, perhaps, not quite as much fun - classic whimsy-cosy as opposed to classic wicked-naughty) a bargain batch of Miss Read.

Oh, well, if we're off down that sun-dappled verdant back lane of whimsical nostalgia, enif should pack all of James Herriot and also Lilian Beckwith!
Shamefully, the Colin Wilson Mumblesby mysteries are currently OP. Where are Miss Lucilla Teatime and the Flaxborough Crab when you really need them!

flashman - yes and dh will sneak them too

I dont like HUMOUR much as it is never very funny

SHErlock Holmes - ooh now -

Ooohh yes, Sharpe is great. The ones Cornwell wrote more recently aren't so good though, I reckon. I'd recommend starting with Sharpe's Eagle - the original and best, though not the first if you want to do them all chronologically.

In the same vein I recently read the Hornblower books for the first time and thought they were almost as good as Sharpe; penguin does the lot in 3 anthologies (The Young Hornblower, Captain Hornblower RN, Admiral Hornblower) which most 2nd hand places round here seem to have going for a song!

Oh god you'll LOVE M R James, have I blahed on about him to you before

Also in a similarly exquisite vein is E F Benson's ghost stories.

I've always wanted to read VOTHD

Rosemary's baby is a corker too

And if you really want to cack your pants - The Shining

The worst piece of trash I ever read was jackie collins rock star 3 days before I had ds1. Never before or since.