The Forsythe Saga. Long but gripping!
I would save suitable Boy for when you go to India. It is soo good to read when you're there in the middle of it all!

Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. It's been in my bag for train reading for months!

Thank you so much for all of the wonderful recommendations. I KNEW all of you would help.

Looks like my reading list has just gotten much longer.

Keep the recommendations coming!

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry, Shogun if you haven't read them. Gone With the Wind is great. The Michners and Rutherfords are good but never held me like the three above.

How about Barbara Tuchman's "A Distant Mirrot - The Calamitous 14th Century"?

If I only want to take one book, I take something by Dickens or one of Trollope's political novels. Little Dorrit would be good, as part of it is set in Italy.

Or how about some slow going Henry James? Anything in Italy would be good: Portrait of a Lady; The Wings of the Dove.

The Way We Live Now, by Anthony Trollope

tuscanlifeedit, we were posting at the same time!

Here are a some of my favorites for extended reading: Les Miserables - Victor Hugo. The Rabbit novels by John Updike (Two volume set). Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann. A Night of Long Goodbyes - Paul Murray (This might not qualify as a long read - but it is funny yet moving).

Just so you know, it's not impossible to buy English language paperbacks in Italy. A lot of hotels have a place where you can take a book and leave a book.

There are so many wonderful selections so far. How will you ever chose?


A couple of oldies:
Mists of Avalon (I'm revisiting that one now.)
Far Pavillions
Atlas Shrugged

Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand. Excellent book, but oh so long...

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts, just a shade under 1,000 pages. Had trouble putting it down on vacation.

2nd the rec of The Way We Live Now, excellent story.

Though it's not about Italy, you might like "Birds Without Wings" by Louis de Bernieres, who also wrote "Corelli's Mandolin." It's quite long (500+ pages) and is a mulitlayered story about the Greeks and Turks at the time of the Ottoman Empire. It's well done, but takes time to get through. He's a great writer, because he works the history in, but also tells a great story.
Have a great trip!

I'll be contrarian here...

- take a handful of paperbacks - find expats and give them the books when completed (they'll be thrilled!).
- then fill space with souvenirs :)
- take books that your DH or friends will read and share amongst everyone
- don't take something 'too good', instead, put your book done and people watch! (I get wrapped up in a book and can't put it down...)

enjoy!

I agee with surfmom. Well what I mean is that is what I do. Even my friends in Italy love to have me leave them my English language paperback books. I just put some in my check in luggage. They get read along the trip as I love to read too. And not bringing them home makes room for purchases etc. That is what works for me.

A second vote for Luigi Barzini's "The Italians". Even though I read it years ago I still recall its insights. I wish I stil had it on my bookshelf, but I seem to have thrown it away - unusual for me!

Although I already made my recommendation, I personally usually don't take a long book. In fact, I usually take several small "fluff" books. Nothing so gripping that I'd rather read than "do" or that keeps me up at night so I'm tired the next day.

Since I travel alone, I like to always keep a book in my purse to read at lunch or while waiting for trains, etc.

A few small books are just like one big one. I usually pick them up at a 1/2 price used book store. Since they aren't keepers, I keeping ripping off what I have read, that way, I have less and less book in my purse as I read. When I'm done, I throw away the last bit and take out a new book.

Mushashi --
by Yoshikawa
The epic Japanese novel which inspired all the cool Japanese samuri movies with Toshiro Mifune, many by Akira Kurasawa, but other directors have also dipped into that huge volumee for stories. It is written in "episodes" so that you can read a portion and set it down at a clear "ending point" and pick it up again when you feel like reading some more.

Gone with the Wind - it's about 1,200 pages.

(Although I do rememer reading it all the way throughh in about 3 days when I was 12.)

I do the same thing - take a bunch of books - but throw out the ones I didn;t enjoy that much - and maik the others home to myself.

And if in England I buy tons - since you can get a lot there (at leasat of my favorite British mysteries) not available in the US. (Sometimes I'm reduced to ordering from the UK web site of amazon.)