I am starting a book club (YAY)- need recommendations for easy read, but good and challenging, novel for first meeting

[TheMysticMasseuse]

well the title says it all really! after 3 and a half year of solitary reading while bfing, doing bedtime, cooking, commuting to work etc i am finally taking the plunge and trying to put back the social into the reading (can't think of anything cleverer!).

i got together a few local friends who are all up for it but as we are all mothers in various stages of zombification sleep deprivation, we need something light, uplifting, easy to read, not too long, yet well written and challenging enough to generate discussion.

any thoughts ideas suggestions? thanks!

I'm in a book club with similar criteria for a books - we have previously enjoyed...

The Kite Runner
Half a Yellow Moon
Rebecca (Daphne Du Maurier)
Life of Pi
Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver - quite long so maybe one to choose a few books in, but excellent)

Just read White Tiger myself - a quick read and quirky too - I loved it!

Apologies for lack of authors - am in the middle of bathtime and just snuck off for a moment

HTH.

Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
The Rotters Club - Jonathan Coe
Any Human Heart - William Boyd

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry

No Time to Say Goodbye by ??

The Great Gatsby
Madame Bovary (excellent book for discussing marriage, motherhood, feminism, ...)
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
The Road

Ronhinton Mistry - seconded - he's fab- but for busy mums "Family Matters" is quite a lot shorter and still decidedly Mistry-ish. He's not particularly uplifting, mind you.

sebastian faulks -engleby..not challenging but I loved it

A Fine Balance is my favourite book of all time. However, as Babbity says, this one in particular is the very antithesis of uplifting! A couple of friends who have read it on my recommendation have barely forgiven me as they found it overwhelmingly depressing. There is humour in there too, albeit rather black!

Uplifting...that's a real challenge! Rather off the beaten track but hilarious in a quirky Indian way is Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard by Kiran Desai. It's short and I preferred it to her Booker winning 'The Inheritance of Loss.'

i have already read every single one of these books!

Err, I think you will soon find, MysticMasseuse, that you give an inner squeal of pleasure when the book group chooses a book which you've already read. Does it matter if your first discussion is of a book you read a while ago rather than in the last month?

The Catcher in the Rye (Salinger) - you've probably read that already but v easy to read again and a fab book. If you read it first as a teenager, it will probably mean lots of different things to you now, especially as a parent.

Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood

the kite runner,a thousand splendid suns by same author,khalid houssini(think ive spelt that right?!the curious incident of the dog in the night time by mark haddon all easy reads but brilliant.good luck.

Did you like 'Hullabaloo'? I've never met anyone else who's read it.
What about Amitav Ghosh? The Glass Palace or The Hungry Tide.
Cloth Girl by Marilyn Heward Mills is good...set in Africa; don't think it was too depressing!
For a non-fiction tale that rampages along how about 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil' John Berendt. A tale of Savannah society with colourful characters and mysterios happenings.
Bet you've read all these too!!

Margaret Forsters -An Ordinary Woman
" " - Private Papers

anything By Margaret Forster imo

Margaret Forster's "Significant Sisters" is a fab collection of short bios of amazing women, written in Forster's accessible style - very interesting historically rather than for literary reasons but not too long and bound to have something for everyone!

I haven't read Can Any Mother Help Me but from what I've heard this could be interesting and relevant. (Note to self - borrow from mother).

Oranges are not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson.

Jonathan Frantzen The Corrections

It's a bit long, and warm rather than uplifting but it is truly fabulous

Small Island by ndrea Levy?

on a lighter note

Weight by Jeanette Winterson

yes, I liked engleby too