Teachers Recommend
We all know that teachers are avid readers. Many of us are English majors known for our consumption of Shakespeare, Chaucer and Brontë, among many others. It may be refreshing to know that teachers are not just about the classics — we have guilty pleasures as well.
ESGI and ThinkFives surveyed hundreds of teachers — and whether for the beach, a vacation, or after a hard night of classroom prep – these are the authors that they recommend for “guilty pleasures.”
Stephen King
The legendary storyteller Stephen King is prolific (64 novels), popular (350 million copies) and spellbinding (have you read The Shining, Pet Seminary, It?). The “King of Horror” has been putting a chill in our collective spines since he published his first novel, Carrie, in 1974.
Stephen King has received numerous awards including the Bram Stoker Award, World Fantasy Awards, and National Book Foundation Awards. He’s also been the recipient of the National Medal of Arts. Those awards may assuage our guilt from reading his books, but we all know it’s not about the literature; it’s about the scare.
His latest novel is due out this September and will be called Fairy Tale. It’s a story about a boy, his dog, and a portal to another world. 17 year old Charlie inherits the keys to a parallel world, where good and evil are at war.
James Patterson
One of the more popular and prolific novelists in the US at the moment is James Patterson. His books have sold more than 300 million copies and he was the first person to sell 1 million eBooks.
Known for his works like Alex Cross, Michael Bennett, Women’s Murder Club, Maximum Ride, and NYPD Red, he started his career as an advertising executive but soon developed a strong interest in writing.
His prolificness may be thanks to the fact that many of his books are co-authored, for which, at times, he has received criticism. But when you sell and entertain as many readers as he has, his fans don’t seem to mind.
Nora Roberts
Nora Roberts is a best-selling author of more than 200 novels including Shelter In Place, Year One, Come Sundown and many more. She is also the author of the best-selling death series written under the pen name J.D. Robb.
Nora was a young stay-at-home mom with two small boys when she picked up a pen and started writing a romance novel. She shared, “I was desperately searching for a creative outlet and as soon as I started, I knew that was it.“
Nora’s style takes many forms: from the futuristic cop stories of J.D. Robb to the post-apocalyptic horror of Year One to suspense stories and romance. She’s prolific and rises early each morning at 8 AM to start her writing. And with that hard work, it’s not surprising she has two new novels due out this upcoming fall.
Kristin Hannah
Coming in #2 on our list is Kristin Hannah, the New York Times best-selling author with over 20 novels including international blockbusters like The Nightingale, Winter Garden, Knight Road and Firefly Lane.
Kristen is a former lawyer turned writer who lives in the Pacific Northwest and has won many awards for her writing. Kristen is a master at capturing the essence of historical events and developing strong women protagonists who live and breathe in that time period. The Nightingale brought us war-torn France while Wintergarden spans 65 years from the fighting in Leningrad to modern-day Alaska.
Her latest book, The Four Winds, was released last year and tells the emotional story about efforts to organize migrant workers in California.
Nicholas Sparks
Coming in as the #1 Guilty Pleasure for Teachers is Nicholas Sparks, an American novelist and screenwriter who has published 21 novels including The Notebook, The Best of Me, The Choice and The Return.
Sparks is known for his wrenching emotional love stories that often look at faith, destiny, and romance. An international publishing phenomenon, Nicolas graduated from the University of Notre Dame as a finance major and ran track & field. But even then, he had an interest in writing and knew authorship was in the works.
His school experience led him to develop an interest in supporting others and he funds generous scholarships at Notre Dame for creative writing as well as other charities focused on providing affordable education for children.
And this fall we’ll get to read his next novel Dreamland, a poignant love story about risking everything for a dream.
Honorable Mentions
Diana Gabaldon, Danielle Steel, J.K. Rowling, Jodi Picoult, Mary Higgins Clark
Who is your Favorite Guilty Pleasure Author?
Other Resources
https://www.panmacmillan.com/blogs/fiction/kristin-hannah-books
This post is exposing all of my guilty pleasures!!
These are still my all-time faves!
I loved Rick Riordan and the Percy Jackson series. Those were such great page-turners.
I’m a huge Diana Gabaldon reader! They definitely aren’t quick reads at about 1000 pages each, but I love the Outlander series so much (even before it became a TV series)! ❤️
John Grisham
I love the nightingale!