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Read Any Great Books Lately - Need Rec's?

texstyle

(website)

Veteran

Hi there everyone! I really could use a great book rec to help me relax. I've been having some stressful times of late and watching movies doesn't seem to be the best option since most seem to be full of drama, action and negativity.

Anyone have a rec for something that is interesting, non-violent or depressing and non-political? It doesn't have to be fiction, but fiction would be fine. I'd love a travel story or something along those lines but don't even know where to start it's been so long since I've read just for fun.

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29 replies

Latest reply was from annagybe

JAileen

Veteran

Jan Caron wrote a series of books about a minister in the mountains of N Carolina, I think. They take place in a small town. They're not depressing or violent. The first one is called At Home in Mitford.

ClaraT

Veteran

I've read the Mitford books recommended above. They are light and sweet. Maeve Binchy books are similar in terms of weight and engaging stories. Did you read a Man Called Ove? So good--don't worry if it seems dark at first; it's not. I'm just re-reading Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver. I love this book (it is one of my comfort reads, just like some people have comfort foods...)

Anonymous

I read voraciously, but also know that we Canadians often read very different authors than Americans do. Having such a rich literary "community" (really, nation) , most of "us" read Canadian writers which many Americans aren't familiar with. That aside, I just finished 3 memoirs this past week: one stuck out as one of the best non-fiction books I've read in ages: Gabriel Filippi's The Escapist - about mountain climbing. The other two were Joan Juliet Buck's memoirs (former editor in chief of Paris Vogue) and Graham Nash (CSNY) 's bio. The JJB book was dumb, and the Nash book was fantastic - if you are fan of their music.

Before that bio-binge, I was reading mostly crime fiction - Michael Connelly's newest has a terrific new female detective.

I don't read a heck of a lot of "fun" books - other than police -procedural, which is my idea of fun , lol. I tried the new Arundhati Roy , and didn't make it past the first 40 pages. I'm game for eat new Salman Rushdie - it's getting good reviews. Reese Witherspoon has a reading club, which she posts on instagram, and she suggests books that sound appealing to a wide range of women readers. I've got a few of hers on my to-read list right now in fact. Maybe check that out?

rachylou

Veteran

I've just started the Art of Flavor by chef Daniel Patterson and perfumer Mandy Aftel. It's about how to combine different things, how different cultures and different peoples in history have thought about it. Pretty interesting. Trying to guess what flavour 'styptic' could have been... not acid, not hot - those have their own words...

SW Ann

Veteran

I've had a rough couple of years, and I've needed some significant escape via reading.....My favorite in recent times was "City Girls Guide to Country Living" by Louise Miller (her first, possibly only novel) Not deep, but a fun read. However, you may find yourself craving pie!

DonnaF

Veteran

I listened to these Bill Bryson books on audio CDs but of course they are available as books. I found them very entertaining but light non-fiction. The most stressful was A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering American on the Appalachian Trail because, well, that hike is pretty long and hard. I loved At Home: A Short History of Private Life and I am not a history buff at all. I am not at all a baseball or Babe Ruth fan nor an aviation enthusiast, but I loved One Summer: America 1927. Bryson made me interested in both which is no small feat. I have another two of his audio books checked out but I haven't started either yet.

Private Life and 1927 will fill your head with all kinds of trivia that you can bring up if a cocktail party convo grows too heated. I'm not sure that Bryson's books would be considered *great* insofar as never being out of print and being widely read hundreds of years from now. But I certainly think they are very good and quite engaging. You don't have concern yourself with plot development but 1927 skips around a bit.

Sorry you are feeling so stressed.

Decades ago when I would drive DD to preschool we would listen to music our church choir had recorded. Somehow, it was more relaxing than upbeat pop music. I think the rhythm or phrasing or something was closer to slowed breathing.

Dottie

I've enjoyed reading the series The Seven Sisters, by Lucinda Riley. The series isn't finished yet, I think she's only gotten through 4 of the sisters so far. The books have been very entertaining, are mysterious, and delve into the heritage of seven sisters who were each adopted separately, but never knew where they came from. Each book goes back and forth, from present to past, as the author reveals the mystery of their ancestry.

Suz

(website)

Veteran

So sorry you have been under stress. Reading is a great release, escape, and joy. But it's so true that what works for one will not work for another! I would recommend "tasting" quite a few books if you can. A library is a great resource. You can rent regular, ebooks, or audio books and don't have to commit. Try a chapter or two and if it doesn't speak to you in this moment, let it go with no regrets and go on to what does amuse, console, or enrich your mind and heart.

I'm a constant reader but often read what most people would consider difficult books, both in terms of subject matter and style. (Recent example, The Red Parts by Maggie Nelson). And, yes, Canadian books, too -- re-reading Alice Munro's Runaway right now.

For travel, is there a particular place you dream of going someday? Or where your mind takes you recently in imagination? If so, maybe I can think of the right author.

If you want to laugh and laugh, you can't do better than silly British inter-war comedies like those of PG Wodehouse. Silly slapstick and witty wordplay. I also love Georgette Heyer's Regency romances for that -- The Grand Sophy is hilarious.

pil

Veteran

Texstyle, I have a video recommendation for you - a British tv series called "Detectorists".
I believe it's on Netflix but I found it at our library. It's about two hobby metal 'detectorists' and I found it to be absolutely charming. I love their bantering with each other and and interaction with competing detectorists. Not too many episodes in a season so it isn't a big time commitment.
https://acorn.tv/detectorists

Beth

Veteran

Re. travel, Bill Bryson's books are great fun. If you like Paris, David Leibovitz writes good nonfiction, and Elaine Sciolino's book, The Only Street in Paris: Life on the Rue des Martyrs is fun.

For good escapism, I really enjoyed Deborah Harkness' All Souls Trilogy. I'm not generally into fantasy (at all), but I found these three books to be highly entertaining, engrossing, and reasonably well-written.

Jaime

(website)

Veteran

Swing Time by Zadie Smith. Excellent.

Laura G

Veteran

I second and third PG Wodehouse--light and funny!

kkards

Veteran

for super light but entertaining enough to hold my attention i often turn to "romance" novels...i know, but really somedays i just want a good story with a guaranteed happy ending (YMMV)...Nora Roberts older novels are good, personal favorites...Montana Sky, The Villa, and Northern Lights. Susan Elizabeth Phillips just flat out makes me laugh, personal favorities, Match Me if you Can, Natural Born Charmer. also enjoyed The Matchmaker by Elin Hilderbrand. if you want something deeper, but still light, i recommnber Brooklyn by Colm Toibin

Staysfit

Veteran

I second A man called Ove. It's heartwarming. I read a lot of non-fiction as well as fiction. My job is stressful, so I read a ton to take my mind off of my work. I find that anything interesting can work, it doesn't need to be funny or light. Some recent non fiction I have read includes Spy the Lie, Make it Stick. and Valiant Ambition - George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the fate of the American Revolution. I know you said you didn't want anything political. I'm not sure about history? It's very well done. Another book that was excellent, but the topic might be one that is off your list, was The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. (It's sort of history, and sort of fantasy, but it definitely makes you think.) In fact, I just went to hear him speak and he was just as interesting as his book. I have read a series of books by Elizabeth George (Mysteries), and when I'm desperate and can't decide what to read, I like to read Philippa Gregory and Jhumpa Lahiri. I second the suggestion for Swing Time, it's excellent. (I also listen to audio books using the Hoopla APP and downloading from my local library. I have opportunity to listen on my morning walk and run, and also on my long drive to and from work.

Laurie

Veteran

Every single book by Mary Roach is excellent -she is a science writer and her books are informative and very, very entertaining. Stiff (curious lives of human cadavers), Bonk (Curious coupling of science and sex), Spook (curious science of the afterlife), Grunt (curious science of war), plus a few more.

Not lightweight or uplifting, but a (fiction) book I recently re-read and marveled at at all over again is The Time Traveler's Wife.

Also not lightweight, but wonderful - The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, recently made into a movie with Oprah (haven't seen. Book was too good, don't want to ruin it). It's an important story. My son was so taken with this book when he read it in high school that he contacted the author and she wrote back!

texstyle

(website)

Veteran

Oh my, just got back in to check and I am SO grateful for all of your recommendations and thoughts! Thank you for giving me so many options - I may have trouble choosing just a few. And pil, thank you for providing another distraction option in the series you linked. I will definitely give that one a try too.

P.S. - YLF members are the BEST!

texstyle

(website)

Veteran

Suz - I didn't have time earlier to reply but the thing is that the only nearby library to me is just not good. Very few books at all and even fewer for adults. I used to love spending time at the big library in Austin but it's just too far to travel on a regular basis now that I've moved away.

L'Abeille

Veteran

I recently read a delightful book and have been wondering who to share it with--voila!

It's called "The Various Flavours of Coffee" by Anthony Capella.
(Found at the library, had never heard anything about it.) It's set in post-Victorian London (also Africa and Brazil) and touches on the coffee trade, industrial cartels, suffragettes--in the context of a very personal story. A bit outside my wheelhouse of science fiction, fantasy, and history (my usual escapist fare) but not that far outside.

A recent scifi discovery was Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie. The kind of book that makes you work to understand it, and question your presuppositions about gender in our own world (like the best of Ursula K Leguin).

And can't miss any opportunity to put in a plug for anything by Guy Gavriel Kaye.

UmmLila (Lisa)

Veteran

The Lying Game - Ruth Ware, suspense, lightweight
We Are Never Meeting in Real Life - Samantha Irby, life of a blog person
The Burning Girl - Claire Messed, secret lives of teenagers
next up My Absolute Darling - Gabriel Tallent

DonnaF

Veteran

Gotta *Favorite* this for all its rich suggestions.

Texstyle, does your library do interlibrary loans? Mine will import books from different cities and a number of universities and they are even renewable. I tend to ignore those icons advertising the service, but several years ago when DD gave me a list of books she wanted to read when she was home for the holidays, I gave it a whirl.

Echo

Veteran

I read mostly non-fiction, and my favourite authors are David Quammen (Spillover, The Song of the Dodo), Matt Ridley (especially The Red Queen) and Richard Dawkins (The Ancestor's Tale, The Selfish Gene, River Out of Eden, etc.). Oh, and The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York by Deborah Bloom is a great, non-fiction, entertaining read.

Peri

Veteran

Third (?) rec for A Man Called Ove! One of my favorite books ever. Actually your criteria rules out some others of my favorites...I like fantasy and that can get heavy and tense. But maybe this...I just finished The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue. Hilarious! Set in the 1700s, a British aristocracy young man doing his "grand tour" with his sister and best friend. Well, there were a few more sad elements that none of the reviews I heard mentioned, but overall, really fun.

pil

Veteran

Texstyle, I second DonnaF's suggestion to look into interlibrary loan. It's a terrific service our library offers as well.

texstyle

(website)

Veteran

DonnaF, pil - I imagine they probably do the interlibrary loan - I used to use this service in Austin too so I know how it works. I'll check into it, thank you for the reminder!

Janet

(website)

Veteran

Laurie, I bought "Stiff" many years ago to read. Then my mom died and I just couldn't bear to open it! I think I could handle it now. My BFF is a surgeon, so I'm used to grisly details.

Some random novels:

I just finished "Before the Fall" by Noah Hawley -- a good page-turner thriller. But I started reading it on a plane. Uh, not a good idea.

"Time and Again" by Jack Finney is a fun time travel story. I got on a time travel binge after reading Stephen King's "11.22.63".

"Plainsong" by Kent Haruf and "Short History of a Small Place" by T. R. Pearson are well-written and evocative of their rural settings, and good stories as well.

Suz

(website)

Veteran

Yes, interlibrary loan can be a solution!

I was also going to recommend The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. It's a fascinating story, well told.

Laurinda

Veteran

Tom Cox's Close Encounters of the Furred Kind is a light read with a British/West Country sensibility. It would appeal to cat lovers, but it is not at all a cutesy-wootsy kitty story.

Laurie

Veteran

Janet - I love Time and Again, too! My older son's class took a big trip to NYC in 8th grade, and one of the things they read in advance was that book. I never go to NYC anymore without looking up and noticing the old buildings sandwiched between the ugly new ones, and thinking about what it must have looked like! And I read 11.22.63. I guess I love the time travel concept. (If you have not read Time Traveler's Wife, you must). Understandable why you put off Stiff. I'm in the middle of Grunt - I want to have a beer with Mary Roach!!

UmmLila - I read We Are Never Meeting in Real Life after hearing an interview with Samatha Irby. I was ready to put it down after the first story which I didn't like, but stuck with it and found some of her stories were really moving. She's a character.

annagybe

(website)

Veteran

I've been sucked into the TV series Outlander. I picked up the first book at the airport on the way into New Orleans. The series has been around for a long time.