Judy Finnigan: My six best books
EXPRESS columnist JUDY FINNIGAN, 66, is best known for co-hosting This Morning and Richard And Judy with husband Richard Madeley. Her second novel I Do Not Sleep (Sphere, £16.99) is out now.
JANE EYRE by Charlotte Brontë (Penguin, £6.99)
Almost the perfect prototype as a woman’s novel. Jane is a poor orphaned child but she’s not a victim. She eventually becomes a governess and the romance starts with Mr Rochester, the archetypal sexy hero. Then you get the drama of his mad wife. The passion is extraordinary. I try to read it once a year.
REBECCA by Daphne du Maurier (Virago, £8.99)
I’ve loved Du Maurier for a long time but especially since we got our home in Cornwall near where she lived.
I adored this for a similar reason to Jane Eyre: a mousy woman bags a glamorous rich man, who is in some ways unpleasant but is redeemed by the heroine's love.
JONA THAN STRANGE & MR NORRELL by Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury, £9.99)
This is more than a straightforward novel and I love the fact Clarke believed she could create a world where magic existed. Set in the Napoleonic war it’s an erudite tome about relationships and about good and evil.
THE TIME TRAVELER ’S WIFE by Audrey Niffenegger (Vintage, £8.99)
The story of a man who has a genetic component that means he can travel through time but can’t control it. It’s really a love story. It had me in floods of tears.
AMERICAN WIFE by Curtis Sittenfeld (Black Swan, £7.99)
The story of Laura Bush, a librarian who marries a man who becomes US president. She doesn’t agree with a lot of his decisions and you can’t help but love her.
By the end, I liked George too despite what I thought of him before.
DUMA KEY by Stephen King (Hodder, £9.99)
Written after King had a terrible car accident and was hooked on painkillers.
Clearly the main character is meant to be him. It’s the spooky story of a man who loses his arm and goes to live in Florida.
