This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
The beginning of the year is a perfect time for a to-do list. I know I've got one. So here are ten books inspired by lists.
1. The Life List by Lori Nelson Spielman – Brett is 34, with a great job, great loft and a handsome boyfriend. Then her beloved mother dies. This is devastating for Brett but there's a twist. In order to receive her inheritance, Brett has to fulfill all her life goals written as a list at the tender age of 14…
2. The Pile of Stuff at the Bottom of the Stairs by Christina Hopkinson – Mary, married with two young sons, is finding that the housework is becoming a real struggle. She works part-time, but feels like a full-time maid to her husband, Joel, and children. Something has to change. So she makes a list over the course of six months of all the things Joel does or doesn't do.
3.The List by Joanna Bolouri – Out in paperback in April, The List is about Phoebe, who found her boyfriend in bed with someone else a year ago. She's done the wine and relationship analysis – it hasn't helped, so now she has to take action of a different kind. This comes in the form of a list. Ten things she has always wanted to do in bed. One year of pleasure.
4. Mr Rosenblum's List: Or Friendly Guidance for the Aspiring Englishman by Natasha Solomons – Jack Rosenblum, a German Jew is compiling a list – a guide to the manners, customs and habits of an Englishman. He has arrived in England with his wife, eight years after the war finished, and is trying to blend in.
5. The Wish List by Jane Costello – Emma will be thirty in six months and has achieved nothing she thought she would. So, she resolves to make a change and starts on the list her fifteen year old self wrote. The next six months are going to be exciting.
6. The List of My Desires by Gregoire Delacourt – A gorgeous little novel where Jocelyne runs a dressmaking shop in a small, French, provincial town. Her life is very ordinary and she wonders what has happened to her 17 year old dreams. Then something happens and she has the opportunity to change her life completely. But is ordinary so bad?
7. A Brand New Me by Shari Low – Not so much a list as a resolution. It is a brand new year and Lori, feeling rather dejected, resolves to find a perfect job, a perfect man and a perfect life.
8. The Single Girls To-Do List by Lindsey Kelk – Rachel loves a to-do list. So far her life is going pretty well to plan on her master list. Tick, job. Tick, house. Tick, man. Only this man, her long-term boyfriend, has decided it is time to call it quits on their relationship. Emilie and Matthew, Rachel's best friends, can no longer bear to see Rachel heartbroken. So they devise her a single girl's to-do list…
9. The To-Do List by Mike Gayle – Mike might be nearing forty, but he is appalled at his lack of maturity. So he writes himself a to-do list of all the things that need doing. And this one will get done.
10. Hannah's List by Debbie Macomber – Michael's wife has been dead a year. On the anniversary of her death, he receives a letter from her, written before she passed away. She tells him she loves him and that she doesn't want him wasting his years mourning her. So, she gives him a list of three women to consider marrying.
Do you have a favourite book about lists? Or a favourite New Year read?