Fiction with smooth writing

I’ve just had two DNF’s in a row and would like some recommendations.

I tried The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George – couldn’t get over the MC mourning about an adulterous affair with a married woman almost 2 decades later. I thought it was going to be about a man taking a book barge through Paris and helping people find the perfect reads….it wasn’t.

Dear Edward – just bad writing and noticeable within the first chapter

I loved the premises of both – minus the adultery in the first one. I typically love slice of life (and have exhausted the Japanese fiction at my library) and also love Wallace Stegner.

Please no recs for Fredrik Backman or Amor Towles