Bookish Question – What book can you not live without?
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What book can you not live without?
When I’m stressed, or can’t sleep I read a lot of children’s and middle-grade literature. Books featuring characters like Harry Potter or Nancy Drew. They get me out of my head and help me to relax, which is something I think I might need a lot of soon. Yea heartburn and pregnancy stress! So, this week, I want to ask you – what books help you get through sleepless nights? Any recommendations for a new series I should try?
When I want to switch off, I turn to either classic childrens’ books or golden age mysteries. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read Little Women and Little Men. I dearly love Understood Betsy, and the Green Gables books, particularly the first two or three. Or I go to Gutenberg and type in “orphans” or “child invalids” or such as that. Eleanor Hallowell Abbott has some good stories, but she also has some pretty bad ones.
I go for classics because all of the modern YA/children’s novels I’ve come across in the last few years are so downbeat. Are there no happy stories for kids anymore? Is dysfunctional the new normal? So it would seem. If I want gritty realism all I have to do is open the door; I’ll keep reading escapist fluff, thanks.
For the Golden Agers, you can’t beat Dorothy Sayers! I get tired of Poirot and Marple, but many people haven’t read the Miss Silver novels by Patricia Wentworth. They’re pretty good, and the further down the list the better. (Like so many authors of her day, in the first two or three she was still finding her voice.) I think the only reason she isn’t as famous as Christie, though they were contemporaries, is that she does tend to include a strong thread of romance in each story. “And I don’t see anything wrong with that!” as Sally said when she met Harry.
There are a few imitators of Golden Age style that manage to pull it off. My latest discovery is the Angela Marchmont series. Ignore the “found manuscripts” story–the writer, Clara Benson, is actually alive and well today, and is also known for Jane Austen followons–but don’t let that put you off!