I checked out the ebook version of I’ll Be There for You: The One About Friends from my library, and it was the PERFECT distraction from These Unprecedented Times. Maybe if you don’t care for Friends it would be less perfect, but I DID like Friends and still watch episodes on occasion and I really enjoyed the book.
In places – okay, a lot of places – it seemed like the author had just read all possible media content about the show and its actors, and was compiling it all in one place – like, maybe this book has no actual newinformation. But… I liked it anyway. I thought the author did a great job of finding fun facts about the actors and interesting behind-the-scenes tidbits. And I WASN’T going to go read all articles on the topic, so I was pleased that she’d done it for me and summarized the best parts.
Another thing I liked was that the author did not shy away from some of the more discomfiting aspects of the show – like how it can be blatantly homophobic and how nearly everyone is white – which I appreciated.
What I liked most, perhaps – and this is probably a feature of the times we live in – is that she explained why Friends has such staying power, particularly as “comfort fare.” It grew even more popular in the wake of 9/11, for instance, and I can definitely see myself turning to the show for comfort and distraction even now.
But now I’m done reading it, and I’m looking for the same kind of warm, cozy comfort it brought me.
My usual go-to in reading material is detective novels, which are diverting but certainly not warm and cozy or comforting. I am reading the fourth Joe Ide mystery, Hi Five. I have Long Bright River by Liz Moore on my nightstand and an Agatha Christie book on my Kindle. I already own all of the Sue Grafton Alphabet mysteries, and might reread them for the millionth time – the exploits of Kinsey Millhone in the carefree eighties can be oddly soothing.
But I want more books like I’ll Be There for You. I don’t really know how to categorize it though, in order to seek out similar titles. Nonfiction books about beloved TV shows? Pleasant and familiar and uncontroversial subject matter? Some combination of benign facts and nostalgia and fun-but-not-salacious celebrity gossip? I read Bachelor Nation: Inside the World of America’s Favorite Guilty Pleasure a while ago, and that SEEMS like it would be exactly the same, but I don’t think it would give me the same kind of comfort. (It was a fun read, though.) The book about Gilmore Girls (Talking As Fast As I Can by Lauren Graham) seems closer, but I found that almost too cheery. Maybe it’s in its own category, but I feel like there have to be other books along the same lines as I’ll Be There for You. Maybe not, though.
If you know EXACTLY what I’m talking about, and what I should read next, let me know.
What are you reading when you need distraction from the news?
Yay, good topic, books!! I didn’t know there was such a book about Friends — I will have to look for it! It sounds similar to one I got for Christmas a few years ago, and loved: As You Wish, by Cary Elwes, about his experience with The Princess Bride. https://www.amazon.com/As-You-Wish-Inconceivable-Princess/dp/1476764042 SO good, especially if you love that movie as much as i do.
Right now I’m reading Ken Follett’s World Without End, which is huge and a complete distraction from the current news (unless something comes up in the next 800 pages about a plague… it IS set in 1337, after all.
Ooooh… I am going to see if that’s available as an ebook!! Thanks!
Follett’s entire Kingsbridge series, starting with The Pillars of the Earth, is absolutely riveting. If someone had told me that I’d enjoy 900 pages on building a church, I might not have believed them, but those books are SO good. It’s like a soap opera! (World Without End is about the Black Plague, so that one might not exactly distract…)
I loved As You Wish so much! I heartily second this recommendation.
As If!: The Oral History of Clueless by Jen Chaney – If you like Clueless, this was great.
HOW HAVE I NOT READ THIS
I took out four books from the library before it closed and I wish I’d had the foresight to check out forty instead. The waits for ebooks from the library seem to range from a few weeks to six months. I could just buy books on my Kindle, but it seems frivolous to spend money right on non-necessities right now.
Street Gang is the complete history of Sesame Street. It was a bit too much on children’s television with puppets history for me, but if you like that kind of thing, maybe it’s for you?
Thanks! Sounds intriguing!
I just finished the first Louise Penny mystery, which is actually fairly cozy and comforting a la Agatha Christie, I can’t wait to read more. I have heard that you should read them in order though so that will complicate things with library wait times a bit.
For soothing, comforting books, I turn to Elizabeth Berg. I absolutely adore her! I also really enjoyed a book called Here For It by R. Eric Thomas. It’s a collection of essays, mostly hilarious, and I loved it. I just started Station Eleven yesterday, because why not read about a flu pandemic during a current pandemic?!
WENDY! You are reading a pandemic book?!?! You are so brave! I have been reluctant to finish the third book of The Passage even though it is about vampires because it is vaguely plague like!
I just now saw this comment, LOL! I’m juuust about done with Station Eleven and oh, it is so good! It’s actually making me feel better about the current pandemic in a “wow, at least this pandemic isn’t wiping out 99% of humanity” kind of way. 🙂
I have I’ll Be There for You on my bookshelf. I really need to pick it up.
Other good books that can be a distraction: Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes, the Lady Sherlock series by Sherry Thomas, The Boston Girl by Anita Diamant. Bad Blood by John Carreyrou is a great nonfiction book about Elizabeth Holmes. For more romance-y reads (not sure if you’re into that or not!), I’d go with Lucy Parker or Katherine Center. Oh, and Anne of Green Gables for a reallllllly comforting read that will take you far, far away from the news. (But may be a little TOO cheery for you, haha.)
You know, I a) noticed that we have all the Anne books on a shelf in the basement, waiting for my daughter to be old enough to enjoy them, but why not ME? and b) have the second half of the limited Megan Follows series to watch, because I have been saving it, but why not NOW?
Thanks for the Friends book recommendation, I’ve just very excitedly ordered it. How was I Friends’ biggest fan and I haven’t heard of it until now! I’m just finishing the Jojo Moyes Me Before You trilogy, which is very comforting.
I had not heard of the Friends book either. That sounds fun. I do not have a kindle so I will wait for it. I have plenty of projects and grocery conundrums to keep me busy so I only read a bit here and there. I just read ‘the News of the World’ by Paulette Jiles. It is not about any television show, but it is a very heart warming story set 1800’s- the dialogue/wtiting style took me a bit to get used to but I ended up really enjoying it. I think it will take you far away. No pandemic. I am currently reading ‘the Widows of Malabar Hill’ for my next book club. It is good so far. Set in Bombay.
Last week I finished a collection of Nathaniel Hawthorne short stories I’d been reading for about a month, not exactly light reading, but it was really nice to slip off to the 19th century for a little bit every day, because it’s not now.
Noah and I are reading A Gentleman in Moscow, which is about a man under house arrest in the early days of the Soviet Union. It seems strangely apt, though he got it for Christmas, so we didn’t pick it with its theme in mind.