Books to escape today's world? What would you suggest?

[bobbieinok]

*Some years ago I found Louisa May Alcott's An Old-fashioned Girl very soothing. It does contain the social ideas of the 19th century, so some may not enjoy it.

*Georgette Heyer mysteries.

[madaboutharry]

1. The Nancy Drew Mysteries.

(The original Nancy Drew Mysteries, written in the 1920’s, required some cleanup in the 50’s due to some outrageous racism and anti-Semitism.)

I read every single Nancy Drew book. I loved them.

I recently read a book titled “My Life as an Indian” by James Schultz. It is a beautiful memoir about his life living with the Blackfeet.

[fNord]

2. Calvin and Hobbes......

The Bard is pretty cool too....

Also anything from Robert Antwon Wilson

[First Speaker]

6. Actually, RAW is all-too-relevant to today's world...

...alas. We're living is his universe of reality-is-silly-putty and competing spaghetti conspiracies...

[fNord]

7. I've a copy if "Illuminautas!" On audio.....I like to listen to it on random.....

The chapters are all jumbled up and it always makes more sense as I need it.....lol

Hail Eris, All hail Discordia!

[First Speaker]

8. Ever read the "Cosmic Trigger" trilogy? That's more relevant than ever, too...

[fNord]

9. Oh yes.....

...RAW had fantastic patience for the pace of the rest of us.....not enough to keep him waiting around, but still....he kept trying until he died.....and even then....

[eyeofnewt]

3. Sedaris

Anything by David Sedaris~

[fierywoman]

4. After devouring the two most recent film versions, I listened to the audio book

of Pride and Prejudice: oh my!

[First Speaker]

5. Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie, Jane Austen, Georgette Heyer

[lilactime]

17. Jane Austen is one of my go-to's, too.

[ms liberty]

10. Elizabeth Peters, the Amelia Peabody series. Read in order.

Last edited Wed Mar 27, 2019, 10:09 AM - Edit history (1)

I've done it and it works every time. Anything Georgette Heyer is a good choice, too.

[bobbieinok]

11. Love E Peters. Also the books she wrote under the name Barbara Michaels

[sinkingfeeling]

49. I've read the entire series twice. Once before I visited Egypt and

again after the trip. I even imaged I saw the house at Saqqara and took a picture of 4 people on horseback at Giza (the Emerson family). Loved stepping in the places mentioned in the books.

[lilactime]

12. My all time favorite for that is L.M. Montgomery's books.

She is best known for being the author of the Anne of Green Gables series, but she also wrote several other series and a shit ton of short stories.

I'm also a fan of Louisa May Alcott's books and I read An Old Fashioned Girl several years ago. I read some of her books and short stories as a child but for some reason I could never get into that and Little Women until I was an adult.

I used to read all the Georgette Heyer's regency romances I could find at the library.

[bobbieinok]

15. 2 most favorite LMA books--Little Men and Eight Cousins

In Little Men Jo and her husband Prof Baehr sp? run a boarding school. 1 of best chapters is Patty Pans in which the girls bake on a child size stove. Imagine a child size wood-burning stove! And the boys must wash up and use good table manners in order to eat what the girls made.

The best chapter in 8 Cousins is the one in which the doctor uncle demonstrates why the 'new dress' without corsets, bustle, or tight skirts is the one which allows girls and women to breathe deeply and walk and move easily and quickly.

[lilactime]

16. I've read both of those - when I was a kid I couldn't get past Jo's friendship

with Professor Bhaer - to me he was just an old man - but when I saw the 1990's film version I got it, LOL. Then when I read the book years after that, I found him very appealing and appealing in the 1933/1949 movie versions too.

I remember that scene in 8 Cousins, too!

But my all time favorite LMA story is one about two little wooden dolls - The Dolls’ Journey from Minnesota to Maine - that was in a very old book of her short stories that my aunt owned. I must have read that one a dozen times as a kid!

[bobbieinok]

18. Didn't see 90s film but heard in that the prof was Italian. Totally WRONG

[lilactime]

19. He was played by Gabriel Byrne, who is Irish. In the 1949 version he was

played by an Italian actor, Rossano Brazzi. I loved him as Prof. Bhaer.

[yellowdogintexas]

23. I loved Eight Cousins and the sequel Rose In BLoom

The doctor uncle was way ahead of his time, wasn't he?

I have read it several times

[CharleyDog]

31. L. M. Montgomery!

Emily of New Moon was a childhood favorite that I still think of today.

[lilactime]

35. I didn't discover that series until I came across EONM at a used book sale

as an adult and I was so excited to find it.

[Major Nikon]

13. ...

https://www.amazon.com/Fat-Freddys-Omnibus-Back-April/dp/0861661613

[50 Shades Of Blue]

14. I love LMA and GH! Right now I'm on a Dickens kick.

I read all his books years ago, now listening to them when I walk. Our Mutual Friend is on the current playlist.

Another good escape for me has always been Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books.

[Auggie]

20. Water for Elephants

[Luvapottamus]

21. Swiss Family Robinson

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Swiss_Family_Robinson

I haven't read it since the fifth grade, so it might not be as interesting to adults as it was to me as an eleven year old.

But it's a novel based on a series of bedtime stories written by a missionary for his children.


Dracula and Frankenstein are a must read too if you never read the books.

[backtoblue]

22. The Aunt Dimity series by Nancy Atherton

English cozies with some fantasy and humor.

[avebury]

28. I love cozy mysteries. There are so many series

out there to read. They are great to read just for enjoyment. I am constantly coming across a series to read and many authors may have more then on series.

I am almost caught up with the Cozy Corgi series.

I also like Fantasty/Paranormal. I am currently re-reading the Immortal Guardian series by Dianne Duvall.

While I like to read more series books as well, between what is going on in the country right now and the job from hell that has me mega stressed out, light reading is all I am good for at the moment.

[yellowdogintexas]

24. two little known Shirley Jackson novels:

Life Among the Savages
Raising Demons

Based on her own family and their rambling old house in Vermont.

Both are hysterically funny. I have read them both several times.

[CharleyDog]

32. A favorite Shirley Jackson:

We Have Always Lived in the Castle.

[bobbieinok]

38. Oh yes! Those 2 are real winners!

[yellowdogintexas]

54. Another fan! I first read Life Among the Savages when I was maybe 12

in Reader's Digest Condensed Books. I was ecstatic when I found out there was a bigger, better version!

My mom had the big compendium of Jackson's works and I read those two books on more than one trip to visit her. Now I have them on my Kindle!

[yellowdogintexas]

25. anything by Sir Terry Prachett; Cold Comfort Farm nt

[Kablooie]

26. Fear by Bob Woodward.

You can forget about today and live in the glorious past of last year.

[CharleyDog]

33. I tried reading that, but then thought,

shit, I don't want to go through all this past horror again. It's bad enough every day right now. Every day another atrocity that I have to cope with is bad enough.

[shenmue]

27. Silverlock, John Myers

[DFW]

29. Welllll......how escapist do you want to get?

I know one story about a wannabe-physicist, working as a gofer for a California law firm, who is also a fairly competent wine nerd locked in a loveless marriage. He gets, by an accident of nature, two windows to the past. One is to a Bordeaux vineyard in the year 1860, and the other is to Monticello, Virginia in the year 1818, where he gets to talk about life and politics with a retired President Thomas Jefferson, buy some old vintage wine from both, becomes an instant millionaire. For his trouble, gets visits from his wife's newly hired divorce lawyer, the IRS, and the mafia, hired by a crooked wine dealer to whom he had been selling his incredibly "well-preserved" bottles of vintage wine. Oh, and he also falls in love with a 28 year old French woman who was born in 1832 (I said escapist, not uncomplicated!).

Is THAT escapist enough for you?

[yellowdogintexas]

53. The Time Cellar! That is a neat little book.

I got it as a freebie through BookBub or Robin Reads or one of those.

One of the earliest acquisitions for my Kindle.

It is a delightful read.

[DFW]

57. Glad you agree with my suggestion!

I think "delightful read" expresses exactly what the author had in mind.

[iamateacher]

30. Time and Again by Jack Finney

Outlander series, anything by Eloisa James, and check out the "Smart Bitches, Trashy Books" website. Hundreds of reviews, a great community.
https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com

[DFW]

46. Hey! MY book got a great favorable review comparing it to Time And Again!

As a fan of time travel stories I never thought I'd ever find a novel that could rival the classic "Time and Again" by Jack Finney. I stand corrected.

I can't compare the two stories since they are so very different in nature, but for sheer enjoyment as well as thought-provoking wonder, "The Time Cellar" is quite simply a fantastic companion to Finney.

Which is as it should be; I've seen some stories that hew too closely to Finney's model. It's a treat to read a book with an entirely different approach, but no less excitement and equal plausibility. Every permutation of the time travel paradox is addressed, often brilliantly.
--------------------------------------

I was pretty proud of that one!

[DinahMoeHum]

34. Gulf Coast/Creole/Cajun cookbooks

ie.

George Graham - Acadiana Table

Lucy Buffett - Gumbo Love, Lulu's Kitchen

Carlo Sernaglia/Julia Turshen - Margaritaville: The Cookbook

when/where as Lucy's brother Jimmy would say: ". . .you too can forget the troubles of the day and be a child of the coast. Bon Appetit. . ."

[nolabear]

56. I used to love Lulu's down on the Floribama Coast.

Sitting out under those misters eating fried green tomatoes...🤤

[Cicada]

36. The Ginger Man, Treasure Island

When I was 8 I read Treasure Island. It transported me from my boring life on an army post in western Washington, where my dad was stationed, to immersion in a world of pirates in the exciting South Pacific. After that I read non stop. My parents would catch me under the covers with a flash light when I was supposed to be sleeping. Later, in law school, actually pretty damned exciting, both terrifying because of the intense competition and intellectually and socially thrilling, it was still hysterically funny to read about the crazy and wildly rebellious law school life of J. P. Dunleavy in Dublin. God’s Mercy on the wild Ginger Man.

[quickesst]

37. I have never been more emotionally involved...

... in a book than I was when I read The Masters of Solitude. A 1978 science fiction novel written by Marvin Kaye and Parke Godwin. It didn't take long for me to realize that I was suddenly a part of the group and a character in this adventure. The most engaging book I've ever read in 60 years of reading.

[Harker]

39. I'd heartily recommend John Muir's (1838-1914)

"Story of my Boyhood and Youth."

A wise and gentle soul in touch with Nature recaptures his coming from Scotland to Wisconsin as a small boy, and his arduous life helping to establish and further the family farm.

He won a scholarship to The University of Wisconsin for his ingenuity in making a wooden clock by hand. He walked a great distance to Madison with it. Very inspiring.

His Nature writings are often wonderful.

[UniteFightBack]

40. The Jalna series. About the Whiteoak family saga. Highly recommend. nt

[irisblue]

42. I loved those books.

[yellowdogintexas]

55. So did I. Never read them all though

I think I read maybe a dozen or so. My favorite character was Boney the parrot

[ProudLib72]

41. New books or old? Or does it make a difference?

A newer one that I highly recommend is Less by Andrew Sean Greer.

[irisblue]

43. ...And Ladies of the Club" 1982

I was transfixed.
from the wiki page
"And Ladies of the Club" is a novel, written by Helen Hooven Santmyer, about a group of women in the fictional town of Waynesboro, Ohio who begin a women's literary club, which evolves through the years into a significant community service organization in the town."

[zooks]

44. Any Ian Rankin book. British detective stories are much less

gruesome than American at least that's what I think and more thoughtful. Really smart fiction. You'll be hooked on the first page.

Agatha Christie are a must for anyone who is totally stressed out. There's a reason why she's the most sold author in the world

[Coventina]

45. "The Agony and the Ecstasy" will transport you to Tuscany

and other Italian locations....circa 500 years ago!

[mulsh]

47. Any thing by PG Wodehouse, his stories reside in a dimly but pleasant Edwardian time, even the more

contemporary ones. He wrote 92 novels, a couple hundred short stories. Along with Jerome Kern and Guy Bolton revolutionized musical comedies. And lived a long productive life. Bertie Wooster and Jeeves are his best known creations but I rather like his Mulliner stories and the Emsworth books. An added advantage is pretty much every thing he wrote is still in print and easy to find.

[bobbieinok]

48. Have you read his short story Uncle Fred Flits By? Hysterically funny

[sinkingfeeling]

50. Hope Never Dies by Andrew Shaffer.

[leftieNanner]

51. I loved Georgette Heyer

Victoria Holt is similar. Another name out of my past - Thomas Costain. Not his historicals, though. They are very dry. But Son of a Hundred Kings and The Black Rose are wonderful (guaranteed to make you weep) are fantastic historical novels.

I'm also going to say NOT Atlas Shrugged.

[flyingfysh]

52. The Woman in White, by Wilkie Collins

This is pure escapism at its best. Every chapter ends with yet a new crisis.

The book was originally published in a newspaper, with a new chapter every day. This was guaranteed to keep the readers hooked, and continuing to buy the newspaper to find out what happened next.