There are some novels I open again and again, and always enjoy reading. These are ones I always have downloaded on my Kindle, always ready, just in case I have a stressful day or I’m stuck waiting somewhere unpleasant. Self-medicating through fiction.

Candace Bushnell‘s One Fifth Avenue and Trading Up.  Her other books are fine, with a few moments of brilliant insight in Lipstick Jungle, but I could read those two over and over. I reread them at least once or twice a year. While the TV show Sex And The City occasionally skirted this intensely human question of what makes us happy and why it’s often so hard to find happiness even when things look good from the outside, these two novels jump right into it.

Also, in my MFA program, almost every class opened with the professor asking everyone their favorite writers, and I’d always say Candace Bushnell.  This is a great way to avoid the Guys In My MFA who were quick to assure me that although they hadn’t read any of her books or seen the TV show, they had very strong feelings that it shouldn’t be considered real literature (because pretty women like it).

Almost anything by Maeve Binchy, but especially Circle of Friends, Light a Penny Candle, and The Glass Lake.  These are wonderful novels of developed characters having complex relationships, and of young women maturing.  Even though characters experience grief, worries, and life setbacks, and not everything works out for them by the end of the book, these are never tragic, gritty emofest novels. They’re warm, realistic stories of multifaceted friendships and complicated family ties. These novels are like meeting up with friends.

(Yes, I would also mention this in my MFA classes. This author shouldn’t be considered real literature because older women like it.)

Harry Potter, except for Order of The Phoenix. I do not need any meddlesome, self-important school bureaucrats in my escapist reading, thanks!

I haven’t been very interested in the the spinoffs and prequels and backups, but if there’s ever a novel set in the Hogwarts staffroom, I’d be first in line.

Of course, Pride and Prejudice. My first year in China, a pirated version of P&P was one of the 4 books in my school’s “English library,” so I probably read it most frequently in Yantai, but I still reread it about once a year. If I only had 4 books, this would be one of them. Maybe not in the Chinese pirated version, with typos and onionskin paper, though.

I love the original Austen characters and the basic beats of the story lend themselves to other retellings. I’ll also read pretty much any P&P spinoff.

There are some newer books that have already gotten a reread, like Sarong Party Girls, Crazy Rich Asians, and Call The Midwife, and might become staples over the next couple years.  As I list all my favorites in this post, I’m seeing a real theme  — I just like friendship and sharp observation.

What about you? What books do you find yourself drawn to reread?