Can anyone recommend a fun book to read, something that would take me about a week if I read for about an hour a day? Nothing too heavy please. Why? I am a little tense these days and need good escape reading to fill my mind with something other than what I am nervous about. So, nothing violent, tragic or cynical. Uplifting, inspirational are good themes, but nothing too sappy. If I were to compare to classics, I'd say something in the vein of Jane Austen, as opposed to something like Tolstoy.

Thanks!

Anything by Jose Saramago or Perez Reverte, both very witty and entertaining.

If you don't mind fantasy and/or fairy tales, I've really enjoyed Mercedes Lackey's Elemental Masters series, and her Five Hundred Kingdoms book. Fire Rose is the first in the Elemental Masters series, it's an interesting spin on Beauty and The Beast. The others in the series are good, light reading too. The most recent Elemental Masters book is still only in hardback, Wizard of London, but it didn't thrill me. (If it's structure is adapted from a fairy tale like the earlier titles in the series, it was lost on me.)

The Fairy Godmother is her first Five Hundred Kingdoms title, it's been in paperback for a while. It's an interesting spin on Cinderella. The next in the series will be out in January.

Also in the fairy tale theme is Robin McKinley's Spindle's End, Sleeping Beauty's story, given a new twist.

Nicholas Sparks's The Gaurdian or The Rescue are sweet books...

I found 'Bergdorf Blondes' to be a bit of harmless fun.

Barry

Anything by David Sedaris - he never fails to make me laugh out loud. Take care - Terry

Go on Amazon.co.uk and order "The Shops" by India Knight, which is a memoir and celebration of shopping. She gives practical advice and is an amusing writer. Nice chapter on perfume and grooming in there. All of the places she reccomends are in Britian or Europe, but trust me, you won't mind even if you're not going there anytime soon.

Also, the Home Cooking books by Laurie Colwin and her novel, Family Happiness, which is perhaps the nicest adultery story ever told.

These all sound like they could do the trick. Headed off to Border's today!

Thanks!!!

Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner.

A very good book, that is lelsurely reading.

Anything by Roddy Doyle.

As dessert, try Alan Bennett's hilarious The Lady in the Van, his memoir of an eccentric old woman who lived in a van in his driveway .... for fifteen years!

Alan Bennett is wonderful. I love everything he writes. He is one of England's finest talents, ever, IMO. His understanding of people is amazing, especially his own Yorkshire folk (and I'm including Prince Barry who is also from Leeds). ;)

Fluke by Christopher Moore is so funny an opthamalogist friend was worried he was going to be tossed off a flight he was laughing so hard. Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove is also great (Moore)

m.

Hotel Babylon by Imogen Edwards Jones and Anonymous is a rib tickler too.

Barry

One more! Map of Bones by James Rollins is so fast and intriguing you'll forget everything...family....friends....lol

LesFleurs, I feel as depressed as I ever have been n my whole life. Anxious, frustrated, worried... you get the picture.

But when I pick up my well thumbed copy of "Make Way for Lucia" by E.F. Benson, I escape worrying, and enter a world of laughter and the zest of human interactions. If you're lucky this compendium of E.F. Benson's novelettes is available at your library. I can't possibly do the books justice, but the Amazon reviewers can and do:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/006091508...=books&v=glance

Tales of a Female Nomad

In this same vein, "The Devil Wears Prada."

If you want something extremely light with humor and some mystery to it, try Janet Evanovich books - either the Stephanie Plum series that starts out "One for the Money" with the latest being "Eleven on Top." She has another sesries she's just started "Metro Girl." Some people like the "Sweet Potato Queen" series.

If you've never read "Winnie The Pooh" or related books by A.A. Milne, they are enjoyable and very funny in a gentle English way.

"A Walk in the Woods" by travel writer Bill Bryson. In fact, ANYTHING by Bill Bryson.

"The Encyclopedia of Country Living: An Old Fashioned Recipe Book" by Carla Emery. This is over 800 pages of anecdotes and advice on every aspect of do-it-yourself farming, not just recipes. I don't know how current the advice is, but you can learn to kill and slaughter large farm animals, raise poultry, make cheese, milk goats, make home-dyed Easter eggs, dry fruits and vegetables,etc. etc. etc. etc. Fascinating stuff, and oddly comforting to read in the middle of a long dark night.

Thank you all! Looks I have some great fun reading ahead of me. Keep 'em coming!!!

The Shopaholic series is funny. Very light hearted. Also, I just finished reading Colette's Prayer by DeVa Gantt and it's a trilogy so even though it looks like it's long, it's really 3 novels in one.

For uplifting but not necessarily funny, I recommend any of the Mitford books by Jan Karon. (Stories of an Anglican priest in a small town in America)

The Harry Potter books (well, maybe not the last one)

Most of Anne Tyler's books

The Shipping News by Annie Proulx

A Year in Provence by Peter Mayles

Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes

All of the Jeeves books by P.G. Wodehouse

The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis

Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham ...

Happy reading!

Oh, oh, oh, I have another - "Uncle John's Bathroom Reader" books. These are thick soft cover tomes found in the humour section, there are several of them. Yes, they are meant to be read in the throne room, but not exclusively. They are full of short articles about, well, just about anything - real names of celebs, what happened to the Spaniards' gold, odd court cases, famous quotations, the real stories behind the stories, all kinda things you never knew. Great fun and informative.

I brought this list to the bookstore, and many of these titles were not there. But I did buy the Devil Wears Prada, and so far, fits the bill. I also bought Le Divorce, but then spoiled it for myself by renting the movie. (but it was just okay, so I'll still read the book).

I'll have to buy some of these books at Amazon or try to find them at the library, they do sound good!!!

Thanks again all!