What books or authors should I look for that write about people just living their lives? Not looking for any tightly wound story or message, but I like to read about the interactions between people or more so a narrators thoughts on them. Dry bits of wisdom below the surface is a plus.
So far my favorites in this category are Lives of the saints by Nancy Lemann and a couple things I’ve read by Mary Robison.
by Redwoods1313
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Modernist movement is big on this. Virginia Woolf is great, Joyce is similar but more impenetrable. Proust if you’re looking for something insanely long and/or know French for the bonus original language points.
Barbara Pym wrote a string of very low-key, very enjoyable (if you’re into that stuff), satire on the British “gentlefolk” demographic after (between?) the world war(s?). sort of Agatha Christie era, without the murders. excellent women is hilarious. quartet in autumn is sobering, and so pitch-perfect it hurts. some tame gazelle was good too.
my north American touchstone for “ordinary people” novels is Anne Tyler. I love her.
Most of Anne Tyler’s stuff.
Zorrie by Laird Hunt