My mother roasted her Thanksgiving turkey overnight on such a low setting it’s a wonder we all survived, but it was deliciously moist. I always rose at the crack of dawn to start my feast, but today cooks know how to plan.  Articles from Bon Appetit and Real Simple magazines urge making the sides ahead and uncomplicated.  If pumpkin pie is too scary for its crust or soggy middle, I found a recipe for cookies to replace it – click here to see it.

Perhaps you will find yourself with time as you wait for the big bird to finish roasting this Thanksgiving.  Let the others watch football; you can read a short book to put you in the mood to feast.

Click on the titles to find my reviews for seven books under two hundred pages – maybe you’ll finish more than one:

1. Girl in the Green Raincoat  by Laura Lippman (158 pages)
2. Mrs. Dalloway  by Virginia Woolf ( 108 pages)
3. The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald (192 pages)
4. The Uncommon Reader  by Alan Bennett (128 pages)
5. The Sense of an Ending  by Julian Barnes  (150 pages)
6. Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka (144 pages)
7. The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa