I have been re-re-reading Diana Wynne Jones books in between blowing my nose, working and writing my administrative law essay. You can see why comfort reading is needed.
But I also feel like some novelty. So, what comfort reading do you all look to in times of stress? *Disclosure* I fully intend to steal your ideas and leach comfort from your books.
So, is reading actually more important than living? It's so hard to tell.
About Me
- Penthe
- I live in the heart of the nation and do a lot of filing. The husband and the son like to read a lot. So do I.
Links
- Ampersand Duck
- Armagnac'd
- Blue Milk
- Books I love
- Charlotte's Library
- Eglantine's Cake
- Enough Rope
- Humanities Researcher
- I think I have a recipe for that
- Light Reading
- Mim's Muddle
- Misrule
- Pea Soup
- Progressive Dinner Party
- Ramping It Up
- still life with cat
- Stories are light
- Terrible Palsy
- The Bones Remember Everything
- Third Cat
- WoLFi Tales
11 comments:
Have you ever read any D.E. Stevenson? British, mid-20th century, not really romance but romance in plot...very much comfort reading! (If you haven't, Miss Buncle's Book is a good one to start with).
Ooh, where to start...Well, here's a beginning: Any Jane Austen novel, of course. Nancy Mitford's The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate. Dodie Smith's I Capture the Castle. And The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.
Have you considered Lace and Lace 2?
Bet you aren't stealing my comfort.
Ahem:
What Katy Did (& sequels)
Valley of the Dolls.
Beauty (Sheri Tepper)
Anything by Jane A
I Claudius (fondly dubbed I Clav Divs)
Any of Spike Milligan's war memoirs.
They're the one's I'm not too embarrassed to mention. There are others.
Absolute Beginners.
As soon as I smell the pages and read the first few lines, I'm sixteen and home sick from school, drinking soup, with the Rockford Files on in the background. And strangely, as you know, I find that comforting.
I like all of your advice (with possible reservations about yours, Ms GMT+10, if that's your real name).
ThirdCat, my own favourite big fat epic spanning continents and generations is about an orphan from Leeds is adopted by a rich industrialist, marries her adopted brother and then falls in love with someone not unlike the Canadian fellow that Julia marries in Brideshead Revisited. Alas, it's at my mum's house.
I will be looking for Miss Buncle's Book and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society on the grounds that I already love all the other books on those lists. Ms Duck, I'm afraid your list duplicates mine too closely for novelty. But I have already read Clavdivs and the Katy books this year.
I would give you all kisses of gratitude, but am probably still contagious. Tho' feeling much improved.
Also Clan of the Cave Bears, Thomas Convenant chronicles (never finished them, but like starting them), Bridge to Terabithia (never, ever fails me), Animal Farm (I know, but it works), Flowers in the Attic.
ThirdCat: she did say 'comfort reading'. I guess that might mean different things to different people but Thos Covenant doesn't do that for me. It rather stressed me out when I read it.
The others sound good, though.
I'll add one of my favourites: A Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart. Ancient China, detectives, humour, magic, what more could you want?
Another vote for The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Hideous Kinky by Esther Freud (if you loved I Capture the Castle, I think you'll love this)
Meet the Austins by Madeleine L'Engle (the sequels are patchy)
Anything by Anne Tyler, some Alice Hoffman
Jane Eyre
Margaret Atwood's short stories (I admire her novels but I am soothed by her short fiction)
Anthologies of fairy tales, including Caught in a Story which is probably out of print but is an adult anthology of fairytale-like stories.
Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City books
Georgette Heyer, Dorothy L Sayers, Lois McMaster Bujold and Arthur Ransome.
In addition to some others already mentioned...
The Golden Gate, Vikram Seth
Privilege of the Sword, Ellen Kushner
Sabriel, Garth Nix
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