Looking for some good clean fiction

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I’m so bored and reading is one of the few things I can still do right now. Give me the names of some good clean fiction books you’ve read over your life. They need not be new. But fun and distracting is good. I will also gladly read young adult and children’s books. 😃

ETA: I don’t have a Kindle, Nook or any other electronic reading devices, so they have to be available in book format (sorry! 😊)
 
Anything by British humorist P.G. Wodehouse–his Jeeves, Mulliner, Blandings, Golf, and Psmith series are the most popular. Here’s the Project Gutenberg page:

gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/783

I found Jeeves stories to be an excellent analgesic for early labor.

Wodehouse’s stuff is available in hard copy.
 
Convert_in_99 said:
I’m so bored and reading is one of the few things I can still do right now. Give me the names of some good clean fiction books you’ve read over your life. They need not be new. But fun and distracting is good. I will also gladly read young adult and children’s books. 😃

ETA: I don’t have a Kindle, Nook or any other electronic reading devices, so they have to be available in book format (sorry! 😊)
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Have you ever read Brideshead Revisited?

The miniseries is also good.

Your library probably has a lot of classics on audiobook, which can be nice to listen to while doing mindless chores.
 
I recommend anything by Adriana Trigiani.

One of her books is being made into a movie with Ashley Judd. The Big Stone Gap series is really lovely. Her books are fast reads. Nothing too deep, just good enjoyable stories.

The author is Catholic, I think, or at least has a good enough Catholic foundation to incorporate it into her stories.

FWIW, I suggested this book for a book club and the women all hated it because they prefer books like Fifty Shades of Grey- which I took to be a ringing endorsement of Trigiani’s books.🤷
 
heidi_storage said:
Anything by British humorist P.G. Wodehouse–his Jeeves, Mulliner, Blandings, Golf, and Psmith series are the most popular. Here’s the Project Gutenberg page:

gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/783

I found Jeeves stories to be an excellent analgesic for early labor.

Wodehouse’s stuff is available in hard copy.
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Yes! I agree wholeheartedly. *Pigs Have Wings *is, I think, my favorite novel in the whole of world literature.

Do you like spy thrillers, Convert99? If so, my top recommendation would be *The Little Drummer Girl *by John le Carré. Most of his novels are about the Cold War but this one is different, Israel vs. Palestinian terrorists, with the action taking place in a string of European countries, mainly Greece, Britain, and Germany…

Finally, a historical novel with a decidedly Catholic tilt: Helena by Evelyn Waugh. It’s very short, less than 200 pages in my very old Penguin edition .

Good luck with your reading!

Regards
Bart
 
Everything by Charles Dickens
Everything by Mark Twain including his life of Joan of Arc
The Herries chronicles (first volume entitled Rogue Herries) by Hugh Walpole
The Jalna and Whiteoaks series by Mazo de la Roche - vivid and refreshing
 
If you like mysteries & horses, Dick Francis is a good choice. Very clean.

Also, anything by Nevil Shute.

I read a lot, but I have a hard time coming up with titles & authors. So I’ll add to this later.
 
BartholomewB said:
Yes! I agree wholeheartedly. *Pigs Have Wings *is, I think, my favorite novel in the whole of world literature.

Do you like spy thrillers, Convert99? If so, my top recommendation would be *The Little Drummer Girl *by John le Carré. Most of his novels are about the Cold War but this one is different, Israel vs. Palestinian terrorists, with the action taking place in a string of European countries, mainly Greece, Britain, and Germany…

Finally, a historical novel with a decidedly Catholic tilt: Helena by Evelyn Waugh. It’s very short, less than 200 pages in my very old Penguin edition .

Good luck with your reading!

Regards
Bart
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I love Pigs Have Wings! Yes, Helena, Brideshead Revisited, as suggested earlier, or really anything by Waugh is great.
 
Convert_in_99 said:
I’m so bored and reading is one of the few things I can still do right now. Give me the names of some good clean fiction books you’ve read over your life. They need not be new. But fun and distracting is good.** I will also gladly read young adult and children’s books**. 😃

ETA: I don’t have a Kindle, Nook or any other electronic reading devices, so they have to be available in book format (sorry! 😊)
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Harry Potter? 😉

I actually really liked Dandelion Wine and Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury. They’re oldies but goodies. Anything by Bradbury is pretty good honestly.
 
Bonnie said:
If you like mysteries & horses, Dick Francis is a good choice. Very clean.

Also, anything by Nevil Shute.

I read a lot, but I have a hard time coming up with titles & authors. So I’ll add to this later.
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A lot of mysteries are clean…it seems there are a lot of very proper people out there committing cold-blooded murders! I think I like Fr. Brown the best. He is a very astute judge of human nature.

I thought Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis was one of the most clever things I’d ever read, too–also very astute.
 
If you have a computer or smart phone (and I guess you do have a computer since you are using it to post :)) You can download a kindle reader or app.

So you don’t need the actual Kindle, just an amazon account.
 
What’s your definition of clean? Another vote for the Chesterton mysteries— if you’re okay with murder mysteries. And if you’re okay with murder mysteries, give Dorothy Sayers a try. 🙂

I recently got finished reading “The Diamond in the Window”. Very nice multi-layered story [reminiscent of how the Narnia books have multiple layers] that has stuck with me since reading it in junior high, and made me hunt it down again now that I have kids to share it with.

Heck, I also liked The Mysterious Benedict Society [loved the puzzles] and The Hollow Kingdom trilogy [the goblin king’s gotta kidnap himself a non-goblin bride; excellent worldbuilding and enjoyable characters] and the 12 Kingdoms series [an excellent fantasy adventure in worldbuilding through a Chinese/Japanese cultural lens].
 
Wow thanks everyone! There are lots of authors here to explore. 🙂

Mary Gail thanks I didn’t know you could get that for free!

BlueRose that’s so cool you are an author! Thanks for those links. I can’t afford books right now, do they have some sort of “swap/exchange program” ?

I guess I should have mentioned that historical fiction and mysteries are my favorite. Oops! 😊
 
Oooooooh, former bookseller here. 😃 My favorite part of that job was matching people with books, woot!

Could you list for us five books or authors you really liked? They can be completely diverse, or somewhat similar…just give us an idea. 🙂
 
If you like historical fiction, you could try Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset. It’s actually three books (The Wreath, The Wife, The Cross). It takes place in medieval Norway and has some really interesting information about the Church (the author was a convert). I’d recommend the translation by Tiina Nunnally - it’s very readable and has good notes about the various historical events and customs of that time period.
 
I was going to recommend Kristin Lavransdatter also. The author won the Nobel Prize in literature.

Christy by Catherine Marshall is really good.

Anything by Regina Doman. I read the Midnight Dancers and liked it
chestertonpress.com/fairy-tale-novels/

All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot. Not Catholic, but good especially if you like animals 🙂

This is nonfiction, but there are several authors who’ve written about angel encounters. Joan Wester Anderson and Elaine Elias Freeman are two of them. They write from a Catholic rather than new age perspective.

good luck 🙂
 
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