The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

A Short Stay in Hell by Steven L. Peck

When a Mormon man dies, he discovers that the god in charge of the afterlife is not the God he believed in and now finds himself in a seemingly never-ending library containing every book that has ever or could ever exist. His task, and his only route to Heaven, is to find the one book that contains the story of his own life. At first, Hell doesn't seem so bad. He can have whatever food and drink he wants, there are other people to talk to who are searching for their own books. But what does this new life, inspired by Borges’s ‘The Library of Babel’, turn into if the search takes hundreds, thousands or even more years?

The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso by Dante Alighieri

Dante finds himself lost in a dark wood and begins a journey through the afterlife, guided by the Roman poet Virgil. Told across three books, they descend through the circles of Hell, where sinners endure punishments that reflect the lives they led on Earth, before climbing Mount Purgatory where souls undergo purification as they prepare to enter Heaven, until finally travelling through the celestial spheres of Paradise with Beatrice, the woman he loved.

Damned by Chuck Palahniuk

Thirteen-year-old Madison discovers that she has been sent to Hell. Far from the fiery landscape she expected, she finds herself navigating a bizarre afterlife populated by demons, monsters and the newly dead. As Madison tries to understand this strange new world, she has to come to terms with the possibility that this is where she will spend eternity.

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Katabasis by R.F. Kuang

At Cambridge, postgraduate students Alice Law and Peter Murdoch study Analytic Magick under Professor Jacob Grimes, an influential but deeply difficult academic. When Grimes dies in a magical accident that may have been caused by Alice, she is left without the recommendation she needs from him to secure the academic position she has been working towards. Determined to get it by any means necessary, she sets out to find him, in Hell, and her academic rival Peter has the same idea.

No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre

Three strangers arrive in a room from which there is no way out and gradually realise that they have been placed together in Hell. There are no flames or torture chambers waiting for them, instead, they are forced to spend eternity in one another's company. This classic existentialist play explores the uncomfortable idea that Hell may not require physical torture at all, but can be found in the way we see ourselves through other people.

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previously on the reading list…

This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through my Bookshop.org links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

The year is 2044 and most people would rather spend their lives inside the ‘OASIS’, a vast virtual reality world, than deal with the bleakness of the real one. Wade Watts is one of millions searching for an Easter egg hidden somewhere inside it by the OASIS’s late creator, who has promised his entire fortune to whoever finds it first. When Wade unexpectedly uncovers the first clue, he becomes part of a global race where players are willing to do almost anything to win.

The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin

During China's Cultural Revolution, a young astrophysicist becomes involved in a secret military project that could change humanity's relationship with the universe forever. Decades later, a series of unexplained events begins to unsettle the scientific community, leading to the discovery of an extraordinary secret that has been hidden for years. As the truth begins to emerge, humanity is forced to confront the possibility that it is not alone.

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

Darrow is a Red, part of the lowest class in a society that has colonised the solar system and divided humanity according to colour-coded ranks. He believes he is mining beneath the surface of Mars to help make the planet habitable for future generations, until he discovers that the world he knows has been built on a lie. When given the chance to infiltrate the ruling Golds, Darrow enters their brutal academy, determined to bring down the system from within.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Diary of Samuel Pepys

Written throughout the 1660’s, Pepys’s diary offers an extraordinarily candid account of everyday life in London. He writes about his work as a Naval administrator, his daily life, marriage, and ambitions, we also get to read his firsthand account of major events such as the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London which has made the diary particularly famous. Pepys watched the fire spread across the city and recorded his attempts to understand what was happening, giving us a remarkable personal account of one of the most famous disasters in London’s history.

Patricia Highsmith: Her Diaries and Notebooks

Beginning in 1941 when Highsmith was a student at Barnard, these diaries follow her through her twenties as she tries to establish herself as a writer in New York. By day she writes comic books to pay the bills, while her personal life takes her through Greenwich Village’s bohemian and queer social scene. In 1948, she begins working on Strangers on a Train, giving us a glimpse of the writer before the success that would make her famous.

The Diaries of Franz Kafka

A glimpse into Kafka’s life in Prague as he his spends his days working for an insurance company while trying to make a life as a writer. His diaries, spanning 1910 to 1923, capture his frustrations with his job, his difficult relationship with his father and his uncertainty about marriage and relationships, alongside dreams and ideas that would later appear in his fiction. They offer an intimate glimpse of the man behind some of the most influential and unsettling literature of the twentieth century, including his own doubts about whether his writing was worth pursuing at all.

Reborn: Early Diaries 1947-1963 by Susan Sontag

The first of three volumes of Susan Sontag’s diaries, Reborn follows her from the age of fourteen into her early thirties, as she grows from a precocious teenager into the writer and intellectual she would become. Sontag records her voracious reading, ambitions, relationships and early experiences of marriage and motherhood, constantly questioning what she wants from her life and what kind of person she wants to become. The result is an extraordinarily revealing portrait of a young woman deliberately constructing an intellectual and creative life for herself.

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

Anne Frank’s diary begins as the private record of an ordinary teenage girl, but becomes something far more significant when her family goes into hiding from the Nazis in Amsterdam. Alongside her observations of life hidden in the attic , Anne writes about her family, friendships, fears and ambitions, giving an intensely personal perspective on one of the darkest periods of European history.

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The Diary of Virginia Woolf

This first volume of Woolf’s diaries covers her life from 1915 to 1919, beginning during the First World War and the period when she and her husband Leonard were establishing their life at Asham House. Alongside the ordinary details of daily life, Woolf records her writing, friendships, visits from fellow writers and artists and the development of her ideas about literature. It offers an intimate glimpse of Woolf before she became the celebrated novelist we know today, capturing her life as she was finding her voice and shaping the work that would define her career.

The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

Spanning the final twelve years of Plath’s life, these journals follow her from her student days through her marriage, motherhood and the development of her career as a poet and writer. She writes candidly about her ambitions, relationships, travels and everyday life, alongside the darker struggles that increasingly shaped her experience. Earlier published editions were heavily edited, whilst this volume brings together the surviving journals in a much fuller form, offering a more complete record of the years in which Plath was writing some of her most important work.

The Diary of Anais Nin

Anaïs Nin was a writer living in 1930’s Paris, moving through a bohemian circle of writers, artists and intellectuals while trying to establish herself as an author. The first volume begins as she prepares to publish her first book and follows her through her marriage, friendships and complicated romantic life, alongside her ambitions as a writer and her fascination with the people around her. It concludes as Nin leaves Paris for New York, capturing the end of an important period in the life of a woman who would become famous for the extraordinary candour of her diaries.

Madly Deeply: The Alan Rickman Diaries

By the time Alan Rickman began keeping these diaries in 1993, he was already a respected stage and screen actor. Across the years that follow, he writes about his work in theatre and film alongside his friendships, politics, travel and the practical frustrations of being an actor. The diaries offer another side to the man who played so many iconic roles, including his experiences of making Harry Potter and becoming one of Britain's most recognisable actors.

The Andy Warhol Diaries

By the time Andy Warhol began keeping these diaries in 1976, he was already one of the most famous artists in America, at the centre of New York's art, fashion and celebrity worlds. Dictated to his assistant Pat Hackett, the diaries record the people he meets, parties he attends, films and exhibitions he works on and the often mundane details of his daily life. They continue until the final week of Warhol's life in 1987, offering a detailed record of the final decade of his life.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

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As long as I’ve taken reading “seriously” I’ve kept track of it in one way or another, what I’ve read, what I want to read, books I own, books I want to buy, the list goes on. I truly get so much satisfaction from organising my reading life in this way.

Over the years I feel like I’ve developed a tracking system that’s easy to use, requires minimal effort and helps me understand my reading habits. I use a combination of apps and lists which cover everything I feel I need, although that’s not to say it won’t evolve in the future.

Three separate areas for organising my books and reading may seem excessive but they each serve a unique purpose and it’s almost become second nature to me at this point, from

Goodreads

This app was my entry into keeping track of books and my reading. It allows you to make lists, look at different editions of books and see what your friends are up to.

Although I loathe Amazon and it’s interface is outdated, I do really enjoy the social aspect, I love seeing what my friends are reading and their thoughts on books, for me there’s just no other app that has all my friends in one place which is why I remain faithful to it and because I’ve been on it for so many years it also has a plethora of data, from my previous yearly reading challenges to years of additions to my ‘want-to-read’ list.

The reading challenge features on many apps but as I’ve been using this one for so long I’ve stuck with it. It is severely humbling watching it remind you how far behind you are…

(If you’re interested, I wrote an entire post on why I make a yearly reading goal)

Aside from the social aspect, it’s also my go-to for searching up book descriptions and logging each book as I start and finish it, which is something I look at more often than you would think!

But my primary use of Goodreads is keeping track of all books I want to read. A list which currently sits at 906 books…

I like having this list in one centralised place as opposed to spread over or repeated in multiple apps. I can look at this list from date added, to publication year, to average rating, to page count. When I’m building my monthly TBR I may be looking for a particular book, one that’s short if I’ve already got a hefty list, maybe one with a high rating if I’m needing a win.

StoryGraph

This is the only other app I use and as I said before, I don’t really see a need to have duplicates of information across apps so I use this one with different intentions.

The first is that I actually update this daily with what I have read, with either the page I’m on, the percent I am though with the e-book or the time stamp I’m up to on the audiobook and because of this will specify how I’m reading a book when selecting my edition — physical, digital or audio, don’t ask me why but this is just not something I do on Goodreads.

I also like that this app has ‘Page Goal’ option alongside the yearly reading goal, it’s so interesting to track from year to year and to compare it to the number of books read too.

StoryGraph has a handy ‘owned’ feature which I do keep pretty up to date as I only have a small collection of books. I find this comes in extremely handy when I’m in a second-hand book shop with a beautiful edition of Howards End trying desperately to remember if I already own a copy or not. It’s also great to be able to reference when I’m building my TBR’s as I am really trying to make an effort to read the books on my shelves and not just borrow from the library!

My absolute favourite part of using the StoryGraph is the statistics. They compare mood, pace, genres, format and so much more!

I genuinely love sitting down in December and looking at my reading year, it plays a big part in how I plan and make goals for the next year as I can clearly see the gaps in my reading, what worked and what didn’t. I’ll also look at which months I was reading more than others and working out why that might be, like I know I’ll usually read less in January as December is when I’m usually racing towards my yearly goal but then in Summer when I’m travelling more and the days are long my reading picks up. Knowing this means that I can look at the app telling me I’m behind and not worry too much.

Notes App

My beloved Apple notes…

I have an entire folder dedicated to reading so I’ll take you through each note one by one, why I keep it and how it’s useful to me.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Factory by Hiroko Oyamada (Translated by David Boyd) - Japan

We are introduced to three characters beginning work somewhere simply named ‘The Factory’, one employee researches moss, another spends their days shredding documents and a third proofreads seemingly irrelevant texts. All three work within this sprawling, often eery site that operates according to its own strange logic, where meaningless tasks become part of an endless system and the boundary between work and everyday life begins to disappear. And what’s going on with the birds? A surreal novel exploring the absurdity of modern working life and the ways people adapt to worlds that no longer seem to make sense.

Lies and Sorcery by Elsa Morante (Translated by Jenny McPhee) - Italy

When Elisa’s parents suddenly die, she is taken in by a mysterious and severe woman who becomes the keeper of her family’s stories. Growing up, Elisa creates an elaborate fantasy around the people she has lost, transforming their lives into something larger and more romantic than reality. As she begins to uncover the truth behind her family’s history, she must confront the gap between the stories she has believed and the lives they actually lived. Set in Sicily at the beginning of the twentieth century, this is a sweeping novel about how one girl uses memory and illusion to reshape her past to try and make sense of herself.

Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck (Translated by Michael Hofmann) - Germany

In East Berlin in 1986, a chance encounter brings together Katharina, a young art student, and Hans, a much older writer. Their connection becomes all-consuming, and moments of tenderness live alongside manipulation and emotional turmoil. As their relationship develops, East Germany itself begins to fracture, with the country moving towards the collapse of a regime that has been a constant in their lives. An intimate novel detailing a destructive relationship which mirrors the collapse unfolding in the wider world around them.

A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende (Translated by Amanda Hopkinson) - Chile

As the Spanish Civil War reaches its devastating conclusion, thousands of refugees are forced to flee their homeland, amongst them are Roser, a pregnant widow and Victor, the brother of her deceased love. They find passage on the Winnipeg, a ship organised to carry Spanish exiles to Chile, and arrive in a country where they must build a new life while carrying the memories of the one they left behind. Spanning decades of political change and personal upheaval, this sweeping novel follows two people shaped by war and exile, searching for somewhere to belong, whilst keeping hope of one day returning to Spain.

Greek Lessons by Han Kang (Translated by Deborah Smith) - South Korea

After losing her ability to speak, a woman begins attending Greek lessons in the hope of finding her way back to language. Her teacher, a man who is gradually losing his sight, understands the fragility of communication in a different way, and the two form a deep connection through the words they study together. The story moves between their separate experiences of loss and isolation and the tenderness of their new found, very human connection. A beautifully written novel which explores two people who feel separated from the world around them understanding one another.

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City Like Water by Dorothy Tse (Translated by Natascha Bruce) - China

In a city inspired by Hong Kong, a young woman looks back on a place that has almost completely disappeared. As familiar streets sink and classmates vanish, memories become increasingly difficult to separate from reality, she tries to piece together what happened to the world she once knew. Her family is gradually pulled apart by strange and unsettling events, from her mother’s protest against government deception to her father’s mysterious absorption into a state-sponsored television world. Capturing the feeling of watching a city’s identity slowly disappear, this nightmarish novel blends political satire with dreamlike imagery and folklore.

Woman at Point Zero by Nawak El Saadawi (Translated by Sherif Hetata) - Egypt

On the eve of her execution, Firdaus agrees to tell her story to a visiting psychiatrist from her prison cell in Cairo. She recounts a life shaped by poverty, abuse and exploitation, from her childhood in rural Egypt to her experiences as a woman, describing the ways she has suffered at the hands of the men around her. After becoming a prostitute, she begins to understand the different ways power and control operate around her, leading her to make choices that ultimately bring her to prison. This powerful novel offers an unflinching portrait of a woman determined to reclaim ownership of her own life.

Pink Slime by Fernanda Trias (Translated by Heather Cleary) - Uruguay

In a coastal city a mysterious ecological crisis has transformed everyday life. The nearby river has become filled with algae, while strange winds from the sea leave people sick and force many to abandon the area. As food becomes increasingly scarce, a secretive corporation produces a cheap pink paste that becomes one of the only affordable sources of nourishment. Against this unsettling backdrop, an unnamed woman remains in the city, caring for a child affected by the crisis while reflecting on her fractured relationship with her mother and the life she has left behind. A haunting vision of a world shaped by environmental collapse, this novel explores how people adapt when their surroundings become almost unrecognisable.

Three Summers by Margarita Liberaki (Translated by Karen Van Dyck) - Greece

This novel follows three sisters as they grow up over the course of three summers. Set in the countryside near Athens just before the Second World War they navigate the transition from childhood towards adulthood and begin to discover who they are. The sisters have similarities but distinctive personalities, they both keep and share secrets from one another, and fall in and out love. Filled with the warmth of the Greek landscape, it captures a fleeting period of freedom before the world around them begins to change.

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The conversation continues in the subscriber chat — paid members can start new threads and shape the conversation. I’d love to see you in there.

previously on the reading list…

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh

Told through a series of interconnected stories and set against the backdrop of 1980s Edinburgh, this novel follows a group of young friends as they drift between addiction, unemployment and dead-end ambitions. Written in the distinctive Scottish dialect, it captures both the humour and raw brutality of lives that are shaped by heroin, whilst exploring the friendships and betrayals that bind these unforgettable characters together.

Atonement by Ian McEwan

On a sweltering summer's day in 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony misinterprets a series of encounters between her older sister Cecilia and the housekeeper's son Robbie. When a shocking crime takes place later that evening, Briony's testimony changes the course of all three of their lives, setting in motion consequences that unfold over the decades that follow, including the turmoil of the Second World War. Moving between romance, historical fiction and psychological drama, it is a deeply moving novel about love, guilt and the devastating consequences of a single mistake.

Close Range: Wyoming Stories by Annie Proulx

The short story Brokeback Mountain from this collection inspired the film of the same name. It follows two young ranch hands in the summer of 1963 who are hired to spend the season tending sheep on the remote slopes of Brokeback Mountain. Isolated from the outside world, an unexpected relationship develops between them, one that neither man can leave behind once the summer ends. Over the next two decades, as they attempt to build separate lives through marriage, work and family, they are repeatedly drawn back together. A short story set against the vast landscapes of the American West, this is a quietly devastating tale about love, identity and the cost of living according to other people's expectations. The collection as a whole looks beyond the traditional image of the American West to reveal the complexities of the people who call it home.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Whole Picture: The colonial story of the art in our museums & why we need to talk about it by Alice Proctor

What stories are museums not telling us? Taking readers on an alternative tour through some of the world's most celebrated galleries, art historian Alice Proctor looks beyond the labels to uncover the histories of colonialism, slavery and empire behind many of their most prized collections. From looted artefacts to the wealthy benefactors who shaped museum collections, she reveals how objects can carry histories that institutions have often chosen to soften or overlook. Provocative and meticulously researched, The Whole Picture invites readers to rethink not just what hangs on museum walls, but the stories we choose to tell about the past.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing

In 1914, explorer Ernest Shackleton set out to make the first crossing of the Antarctic continent. Before his expedition could even reach land, their ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice, eventually leaving Shackleton and his crew stranded thousands of miles from civilisation. Drawing on diaries, letters and first-hand accounts, Alfred Lansing reconstructs their extraordinary fight for survival as they endure months on drifting ice, perilous sea voyages in tiny lifeboats and one of the most remarkable rescue missions in history. Widely regarded as one of the greatest true survival stories ever told, Endurance is a testament to resilience, courage and exceptional leadership.

Alexandria: The City That Changed the World by Islam Issa

Tracing more than two thousand years of history, Islam Issa explores the many lives of Alexandria, from its founding by Alexander the Great and the rise of its famous library to its place as a centre of learning, religion and cultural exchange. Alongside the city's history, he examines how writers, artists and historians have continually reimagined Alexandria, blurring the line between the city itself and the myths that surround it. Blending history, literature and cultural criticism, Alexandria reveals how one city has been shaped as much by stories and memory as by the events of its past.

Big Meg: The Story of the Largest, Fiercest and Most Mysterious Shark by Tim Flannery and Emma Flannery

For millions of years, Megalodon ruled the world's oceans as the largest predatory shark ever to live, yet despite its immense size, much of its life remains a mystery. Drawing on the latest fossil evidence, Tim Flannery reconstructs the story of this extraordinary predator, exploring how it hunted, how it evolved and what ultimately led to its disappearance. Along the way he reveals what Megalodon can teach us about ancient oceans, the evolution of sharks and the changing climates that have shaped life on Earth. Both a biography of one of history's most formidable animals and an exploration of the prehistoric world it inhabited, Big Meg brings a long-lost predator vividly back to life.

The Possibility of Life: Searching for Kinship in the Cosmos by Jaime Green

Are we alone in the universe? Jaime Green approaches one of humanity's oldest questions by bringing together astronomy, biology, philosophy and science fiction to explore what life beyond Earth might actually look like. Along the way she examines everything from exoplanets and alien ecosystems to the ways our own assumptions shape the search itself. Wonder-filled without losing its scientific rigour, the book expands our understanding of both the cosmos and ourselves.

Vanished: An Unnatural History of Extinction by Sadiah Qureshi

Across history, the disappearance of animals has fascinated scientists, collectors and the public alike. Sadiah Qureshi explores the stories of extinct species and the people who documented, collected and mourned them but rather than presenting extinction as a simple scientific story, she examines the cultural, political and imperial forces that shaped which species vanished and how they came to be remembered. Thought-provoking and deeply researched, Vanished explores what extinction reveals about humanity as much as it does about the natural world.

This is For Everyone by Tim Berners-Lee

When Tim Berners-Lee created the World Wide Web in 1989, he imagined a system that would allow people everywhere to share information freely and connect with one another. In This is For Everyone, he traces the story of how the web was built, from its origins at CERN to the global network it became, while reflecting on the choices that shaped its development. Looking at issues including online privacy, misinformation and the growing power of major technology companies, Berners-Lee examines how the web has moved away from some of its founding principles and considers what it will take to build a more open and accessible internet for the future.

An African History of Africa by Zeinab Badawi

Travelling across the continent and drawing on conversations with leading historians, archaeologists and local experts, Zeinab Badawi tells Africa's history through African perspectives rather than colonial narratives. Spanning ancient kingdoms, trade networks, scientific achievements and resistance movements, she reveals the extraordinary diversity and complexity of the continent's past. Accessible and ambitious, the book offers a powerful rethinking of world history.

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Living on Earth: Life, Consciousness and the Making of the Natural World by Peter Godfrey-Smith

Peter Godfrey-Smith explores the history of life on Earth through the remarkable ways living things have adapted, evolved and experienced the world around them. Spanning from the earliest forms of life to the present day, he examines how evolution has shaped the diversity of creatures that inhabit our planet and the different ways they interact with their environments. Blending biology, philosophy and reflections on the natural world, Living on Earth considers how life has changed over billions of years and what this long history reveals about our own place within it.

Destroyer of Worlds: The Deep History of the Nuclear Age: 1895-1965 by Frank Close

When scientists first unlocked the power of the atom, they transformed both modern physics and the future of humanity. Frank Close traces the scientific discoveries that led to the creation of the atomic bomb, the people behind them and the moral dilemmas that followed. Combining accessible science with compelling history, Destroyer of Worlds examines one of the most consequential breakthroughs of the twentieth century.

The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper by Roland Allen

For centuries, notebooks have been used to collect knowledge, record observations and develop ideas, becoming essential tools for scientists, writers, artists and thinkers. Roland Allen traces the history of this deceptively influential object, exploring how notebooks have held everything from practical information and personal reflections to sketches, experiments and discoveries that changed the world. Through the stories of the people who filled their pages, The Notebook reveals how these private records have shaped creativity, innovation and our understanding of human curiosity, while making a case for why keeping a notebook remains a valuable practice today.

The Age of Melt: What Glaciers, Ice Mummies, and Ancient Artifacts Teach Us about Climate, Culture, and a Future without Ice by Lisa Baril

As glaciers and ice fields shrink around the world, they are revealing a hidden record of the past preserved for centuries beneath the ice. Lisa Baril explores the discoveries emerging from these melting landscapes, from ancient remains and lost environments to clues about how humans and ecosystems have adapted over time. Blending science, archaeology and cultural history, The Age of Melt examines what these newly exposed worlds can teach us about the planet’s past, the communities connected to these landscapes and the future we are moving towards.

On A Sea of Glass: The Life & Loss of the RMS Titanic by Tad Fitch, J.Kent Layton and Bill Wormstedt

Drawing on decades of research, eyewitness testimony and newly uncovered evidence, this definitive history reconstructs the story of the Titanic from its design and construction to its final hours in extraordinary detail. Rather than focusing solely on the disaster itself, the authors examine the passengers, crew and wider historical context that shaped the voyage. Comprehensive without losing its narrative momentum, it remains one of the most authoritative accounts ever written about the ship.

The Craft: How the Freemasons Made the Modern World by John Dickie

A centuries-old secret brotherhood, built around rituals, symbols and networks of members across the world, the Freemasons have been linked to some of history’s most influential figures, from revolutionaries and politicians to writers, scientists and monarchs. In The Craft, John Dickie traces the rise of Freemasonry from its origins in early modern Europe to its global spread, exploring how its ideas of brotherhood, knowledge and social connection helped shape the modern world. Moving beyond the myths and conspiracy theories that have surrounded the organisation, he examines the real influence of the Freemasons and the role they played in politics, culture and society.

Bring No Clothes: Bloomsbury and the Philosophy of Fashion by Charlie Porter

Through the lives and wardrobes of six members of the Bloomsbury Group, Charlie Porter explores the connection between clothing, creativity and identity in early twentieth-century Britain. Looking at figures including Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant, he examines how these writers and artists used dress to express their ideas, challenge social conventions and shape their public and private lives. Blending fashion criticism with cultural history, Bring No Clothes reveals how clothing can reflect changing attitudes towards class, gender and self-expression, offering a new way of looking at one of the most influential creative circles of the twentieth century.

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previously on the reading list…

This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through my Bookshop.org links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

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Reading seasonally has become one of my favourite ways to plan what I read. There really is something special about reading a book that echoes the world around you. I often find that certain genres, settings and storylines naturally lend themselves to different times of the year. It has become another way for me to mark the passing of the year, paying attention to the changing seasons through the books I choose. Reading a Russian classic during the depths of winter or a book about the natural world as everything begins to bloom in spring just seems to enhance the atmosphere of the story.

The changing seasons become part of the reading experience, helping me feel more connected to both the book and the season itself. It's a simple habit, but one that has completely elevated my reading experience. Plus, with an ever-growing TBR and so many incredible books to choose from, this way of planning gives me a simple and enjoyable way to narrow down what I’m reading next.

I also love that reading seasonally encourages me to embrace each part of the year. Instead of wishing away the colder months or feeling like the seasons blur into one another, I find myself leaning into what makes each season unique.

Of course, there's no right or wrong way to choose your next read, but if you've ever felt overwhelmed by your TBR or simply want to make your reading feel a little more immersive, reading with the seasons might be worth trying. In this post, I'll be sharing the kinds of books I reach for throughout the year and why I think they suit each season so well.

Winter (January-March): Stillness and Depth

1. Russian Classics — There’s something about the long winters and philosophical nature of many Russian novels that makes them feel inseparable from the season.

   • Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

   • Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak

   • War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

2. Atmospheric Thrillers — Reading about unforgiving, isolated settings on a dark evening naturally heightens the tension, making thrillers feel even more immersive during winter.

   • The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley

   • In The Woods by Tana French

   • The Last by Hanna Jameson

3. Big Books — Winter always feels like the right time to commit to longer books. The slower pace of the season and the motivation that comes with a new year make it easier to dedicate yourself to something you've been putting off.

   • Middlemarch by George Eliot

   • Les Miserables Victor Hugo

   • David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

4. Philosophical and Introspective Fiction — The colder months always feel particularly apt for slower, more reflective reading, making it the ideal time for books that ask bigger questions.

   • The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

   • Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

   • Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse

Spring (April-June): Renewal and Growth

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss

When a Swiss family is shipwrecked during a voyage to Australia, they find themselves stranded on a remote tropical island with only the supplies they can salvage from the wreck. Rather than waiting to be rescued, they set about building an entirely new life, constructing elaborate homes, domesticating animals and learning to live from the island’s extraordinary natural resources. Written as a story for his children and inspired by Robinson Crusoe , the novel transforms the desert island narrative into an imaginative celebration of ingenuity, cooperation and the possibilities of starting again.

The Murderess by Alexandros Papadiamantis

Set on the impoverished Greek island of Skiathos, The Murderess follows Hadoula, an elderly woman living on the fringes of society, whose knowledge of herbs and traditional remedies makes her the person other women turn to in times of need. Having witnessed a lifetime of hardship under a deeply patriarchal society, she comes to a devastating conclusion while comforting her newborn granddaughter, setting in motion a story that is as shocking as it is profoundly human. Papadiamantis asks uncomfortable questions about morality, desperation and the crushing expectations placed upon women, creating a novel that is as psychologically complex as it is unsettling, that invites readers to question whether Hadoula is a villain, a victim or something far more complicated.

The Island of Doctor Moreau by H.G. Wells

After surviving a shipwreck, Edward Prendick washes ashore on a remote island where the brilliant yet deeply unsettling Doctor Moreau conducts secret experiments far from the scrutiny of civilisation. At first, the island appears almost idyllic, but Prendick soon becomes aware of strange inhabitants and disturbing rules that govern life there. As he uncovers the true nature of Moreau’s work, the novel evolves into a chilling exploration of scientific ambition, morality and what it really means to be human.

Utopia by Thomas Moore

When a seasoned traveller recounts his visit to the distant island of Utopia, he describes a society unlike any found in sixteenth-century Europe. Its laws, customs and political system challenge accepted ideas about wealth, religion, justice and the organisation of everyday life, inviting readers to question whether a better society might truly be possible. First published in 1516, the novel sparked centuries of debate over whether its perfect society should be admired or questioned, while serving as a remarkably sharp satire of the social and political failings of Renaissance Europe. More’s fictional island became one of literature’s most enduring thought experiments, giving the world a word that still shapes how we imagine the ideal society.

Galápagos by Kurt Vonnegut

What begins as an ordinary cruise takes an unexpected turn when a small group of passengers becomes stranded on the Galápagos Islands, cut off from the rest of the world. Set against a vast timescale that stretches far beyond the moment of their isolation, the novel follows what happens to humanity long after civilisation has collapsed elsewhere, tracing the evolution of their descendants over a million years. As the story moves between the immediate crisis of survival and a future shaped by chance and adaptation, Vonnegut blends satire with speculative fiction to imagine how fragile and unpredictable human development can be. The islands become the starting point for an audacious, darkly comic exploration of where we come from and where we might be headed.

The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares

Recorded as the journal of a fugitive hiding on a deserted island, The Invention of Morel begins as the account of a man convinced he has finally escaped the authorities. His solitude is shattered when a group of mysterious visitors suddenly appears, returning each day to the same places and repeating the same routines. Captivated by one woman in particular, he becomes determined to uncover who they are and what secret the island is hiding. Part philosophical novel and part literary mystery, Bioy Casares gradually transforms an impossible premise into one of fiction’s most ingenious and unforgettable puzzles.

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The Tempest by William Shakespeare

Shipwrecked on a mysterious island, a group of nobles find themselves at the mercy of Prospero, a man who has spent years in exile learning to control the strange forces of the island. Living there with his daughter Miranda and served by Ariel, a spirit bound to obey him, and Caliban, the island’s original inhabitant whose resentment towards him runs deep, Prospero watches as these new outsiders are brought into his carefully constructed world, where nothing unfolds by chance. As relationships begin to shift and old wrongs resurface, the island becomes a place where illusion and reality blur and every encounter feels shaped by unseen hands. One of Shakespeare’s most atmospheric plays, The Tempest explores power, control, revenge and forgiveness in a world where nothing is quite as it seems.

The Island by Ana María Matute

Told through the eyes of the rebellious young Matia, The Island follows her time on the sun-drenched island of Mallorca after she is sent to live with her grandmother during the Spanish Civil War. As she spends long, languid days exploring the island with her cousin and experiences the uncertainties of first love, she begins to see the prejudice, fear and quiet cruelties that lie beneath its idyllic surface. Although the war remains beyond the horizon, its divisions shape every relationship, marking Matia’s gradual loss of innocence. Lyrical and psychologically rich, Matute infuses the novel with an almost mythical atmosphere, weaving together memory, morality and childhood into a haunting coming-of-age story.

Island by Aldous Huxley

After a shipwreck leaves journalist Will Farnaby stranded on the remote Pacific island of Pala, his original mission to investigate the island's oil reserves on behalf of powerful outside interests takes an unexpected turn. Instead of finding an isolated nation ripe for exploitation, he discovers a society that has spent generations cultivating a radically different way of life, drawing together scientific thinking and Eastern philosophical traditions in pursuit of a more balanced and compassionate world, an almost paradise. As he recovers and is welcomed into the island's communities, Will finds himself increasingly captivated by the people and their values, forcing him to question both the purpose of his visit and the assumptions he has long held about progress, freedom and happiness. Set against mounting pressure from those determined to claim Pala's natural resources, Huxley presents a fragile utopia whose future hangs in the balance.

The Magus by John Fowles

Nicholas Urfe accepts a teaching post on a small Greek island, hoping a change of scenery will bring purpose to his drifting life. Instead, he becomes fascinated by a reclusive millionaire whose secluded estate becomes the setting for a series of strange encounters, psychological games and theatrical deceptions that blur the boundaries between reality and illusion. As the lines between performance and truth begin to disappear, Nicholas finds himself caught in a world that grows ever more unsettling, where every choice is manipulated and the stakes become increasingly dangerous. Rich in atmosphere and psychological suspense, The Magus transforms its idyllic island setting into a place where certainty is impossible and every answer leads to another question.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

Cursed Bread by Sophie Mackintosh

Set in a quiet French village during the summer of 1951, the novel follows Elodie, the baker's wife, whose life has settled into a dull, predictable routine. Her world shifts with the arrival of Violet, the glamorous wife of the newly appointed ambassador, whose confidence and freedom fascinate Elodie and draw her into a world far removed from her own. But beneath the heat of the summer and the routines of village life, something unsettling is building and when the community is struck by a mysterious poisoning suspicion spreads and the village begins to fracture. Inspired by the real-life Pont-Saint-Esprit mass poisoning, Mackintosh transforms the event into a haunting exploration of desire, envy, obsession and the stories people tell when they are trying to make sense of something they cannot explain.

The Hole by Hiroko Oyamada

When Asa follows her husband to the countryside for his new job, she expects a slower pace of life. During the hot summer, she finds herself drifting through long, empty days until a strange encounter with an unfamiliar creature leads her into a hidden hole in the landscape. From that moment on, the ordinary world begins to feel quietly distorted as odd neighbours, unexplained events and subtle inconsistencies accumulate around her. Oyamada turns the everyday into something dreamlike, creating a novel that feels both deeply familiar and impossible to pin down.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Summer Book by Tove Jansson

On a tiny island in the Gulf of Finland, six-year-old Sophia spends the summer with her grandmother, an ageing artist whose curiosity and imagination match her own. Together they explore the shoreline, weather storms, debate life's big questions and find adventure in the smallest details of island life. Across a series of interconnected episodes, their conversations move between the playful and the profound, capturing the unique bond between a child discovering the world and an older woman reflecting on it. Jansson brings the island vividly to life, from its rocky landscapes and windswept beaches to its long summer days, creating a novel that feels like an escape to a place both remote and deeply cherished.

Circe by Madeline Miller

After discovering she possesses a dangerous form of magic, Circe is banished to a remote island and is forced to begin a new life far from the intrigues and power struggles of Mount Olympus. As the years pass, visitors arrive on her shores and become woven into the fabric of her story, bringing new challenges, relationships and choices. Her exile slowly develops into something more complex as Circe begins to build a life of her own and discovers what she is willing to fight for. Miller reimagines Greek mythology through Circe's eyes, creating an island setting that feels at once enchanting and dangerous, the island’s hidden coves, wild forests and vast surrounding sea become the backdrop to a story about independence, belonging and protecting the things that come to matter most to her.

Outline by Rachel Cusk

This novel is as much about atmosphere as plot, it balances immersing the reader in the heat, light and reflective pace of a Greek summer, whilst quietly examining the stories people construct about themselves. Arriving in Athens to teach a summer writing course, a woman spends her days moving through the city, meeting strangers and listening to their stories. Conversations on writing, the desire to create and the mystery of creativity itself unfold in cafés, apartments, ferries and along the coast, gradually building a portrait not only of the people she encounters but of her own life.

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Swimming Home by Deborah Levy

A holiday villa on the French Riviera becomes the setting for a tense and unsettling summer when a young woman unexpectedly appears at the family's swimming pool. What begins as an awkward intrusion slowly alters the dynamics between the guests, exposing hidden resentments, desires and vulnerabilities. Levy contrasts the beauty of the Mediterranean setting with the emotional undercurrents running beneath the surface, creating a novel where the dazzling heat, sea views and languid atmosphere make the unfolding drama feel even more charged.

The Beautiful Summer by Cesare Pavese

Set in Turin during the 1930s, the novel follows sixteen-year-old Ginia as she begins to move beyond the sheltered world of her childhood and into the city's artistic circles. Drawn to a glamorous young woman named Amelia and the painters, models and bohemians who surround her, Ginia finds herself captivated by a world that feels exciting, sophisticated and entirely new. As she spends more time among this group, she begins to experience the uncertainties of first love, shifting friendships and the complicated realities that lie beneath the surface of the life she admires. Pavese captures the intensity of adolescence and the feeling of a summer when everything seems on the verge of changing, while bringing the streets, studios and cafés of northern Italy vividly to life.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

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We live in a world that is constantly competing for our attention. Where your phone is designed to deliver the fastest possible hit of stimulation and so, our brains have been trained to expect constant stimulation and instant rewards. Scrolling gives you a hit every few seconds, but a book asks you to be patient, and to trust that the payoff is coming. Is it any wonder so many of us struggle to sit with one for longer than a few pages?

I used to read ferociously as a child, I could sit all day reading and it was no big deal to me to finish a book in a day. Partly because there wasn’t much else competing for my attention (unless you count keeping my Nintendogs alive and building my dream house on The Sims), but also because I was reading above my age level, which made books feel almost effortless.

Then two things happened, firstly, I got older and my reading level began to actually match the books I was reading, and secondly, I got a phone. Suddenly books required effort in a way they never had before, and my phone was always right there offering something easier, the idea of picking up a book always seemed like the harder choice.

The good news is that this problem is fixable.

So, whether reading was once your favourite thing or something you've never quite managed to get into, struggling to focus on a book is not just the way you're wired. In a world designed to constantly pull your attention elsewhere, finding it hard to sit with a book for any length of time makes complete sense.

Here is everything that helped me get back to being a ferocious reader.

1. Choose the Right Book

This sounds obvious but if you’re trying to build up your reading stamina, the last thing you want is a book that feels like homework.

Forget what you think you should be reading. The right book is simply the one you are genuinely excited to pick up.

If a long book feels intimidating, read a short one. If committing to a series feels like too much, start with a standalone. There are no rules here. The goal at this stage is to remind your brain that reading is something it enjoys, and that is a lot easier to do when you’re gripped by something you actually want to read, maybe it’s a book one of your favourite films is based on or a non-fiction that covers a topic you want to learn about.

A good test of whether you've chosen the right book is that you're thinking about it when you're not reading it, and when you put it down, you're already looking forward to picking it back up again.

2. Build a Reading Routine

Remember, you are training yourself, and, like any form of training, showing up consistently matters far more than occasionally having a perfect session. You have to use the muscle if you want it to get stronger.

The best way to do that is to attach reading to a specific time of day rather than fitting it in whenever you can, because “whenever you can” has a way of never quite happening. For you it might be on your lunch break or when you get home from work, but you have to choose what works for you. I read on the sofa in the morning before my work day starts and in bed before I go to sleep, this works for my lifestyle and means that reading is built into my day rather than just an afterthought. On top of this, I read whenever else I feel like, on my commute, lunch break, at the weekend day outside, you just want to set yourself a baseline.

I got into a routine by setting myself a 12 week challenge. I committed to reading in the morning and evening every day for 12 weeks. I didn’t always manage it, and that’s fine. The point isn’t perfection, it’s consistency. Everyday I had these two things to tick off and by doing so I knew I was working towards my goal of becoming a more consistent and better reader. By the end of those 12 weeks it had stopped feeling like a challenge and had just become part of my day.

12 weeks sounds like a long time but it goes by quickly, and what you’re left with is a habit that feels natural rather than forced. Pick your moment, show up for yourself as often as you can, and trust the process (even when it feels difficult).

3. Start Small and Build Up

If you currently can’t get through half a page without reaching for your phone, sitting down for a 30 minute reading session is going to feel impossible, and setting yourself up to fail just isn’t helpful. The key is to start so small it feels almost too easy, and build from there.

My suggestion would be to start with two 10 minute sessions a day, one in the morning and one in the evening. That’s it. Don’t try to push beyond that in the beginning, the goal at this stage isn’t how much you read, it’s the consistency of showing up.

An example that could work for you might look like this:

• Weeks 1-2: Two 10 minute sessions a day

• Weeks 3-4: Two 15 minute sessions a day

• Weeks 5-6: One 20-25 minute session and one 10 minute session

• Weeks 7-8: Two 20-25 minute sessions

• Weeks 9-12: Two 30 minute sessions

If you’d rather track pages than time, here’s an equivalent progression, but do bear in mind that page counts vary hugely depending on the book, so don’t be hard on yourself if a particularly dense read slows you down:

• Weeks 1-2: 2-3 pages per session

• Weeks 3-4: 5 pages per session

• Weeks 5-6: 8 pages per session

• Weeks 7-8: 10-12 pages per session

• Weeks 9-12: 15-20 pages per session

These are just examples and the most important thing is that you start where feels genuinely easy for you, not where you think you should be. There is no prize for pushing yourself too hard in week one. It is far better to think you’ve set the bar too low than to burn out before the habit has had a chance to form. Build slowly, be patient with yourself, and trust that everything you’re doing is working towards being able to read without getting distracted.

Two 30 minute sessions isn’t the only way to structure a sustainable reading habit. Depending on your lifestyle you might find one of these works better for you:

• One longer 60 minute session once a day

• Three shorter 20 minute sessions spread across the day

• One 30 minute session on weekdays and a longer session at the weekend when you have more time

The structure matters less than the consistency. Find what works for your life and stick to it.

4. Use Background Noise

Complete silence might seem like the obvious environment for reading but in my experience it can actually work against you. Too much quiet leaves too much space for your brain to wander, and before you know it you’re reaching for your phone without even really deciding to.

What I’ve found works for me is background noise, specifically brown noise or ambience. Our brains have a certain capacity for processing information, and when we’re trying to focus, the parts not being used by the task at hand can start to wander, so background noise at the right level occupies just enough of that spare mental capacity to keep your mind from drifting, without being demanding enough to compete with what you’re reading. This know as cognitive load theory, and can offer an explanation as to why a small amount of noise can actually improve concentration.

Brown noise specifically is worth trying too, it’s thought to have a calming effect on the nervous system while also masking sudden changes in sound that would otherwise pull your attention away.

My go-to is the background sounds feature on my iPhone, brown noise is built in and takes two seconds to switch on but if you don’t have an iPhone there’s plenty on YouTube, this is where I also find ambience as well, my favourite right now is “cafe ambience” (this one specifically!), try a few out and see what work for you! In winter I usually opt for the sound of a crackling fire, which feels particularly cosy paired with a good book.

I personally find music too distracting, especially anything with lyrics, as it competes with the words on the page in a way that ambience sounds don’t. I’ve also tried film scores, but again, it just didn’t work as well for me as brown noise or ambience. That said I know plenty of people who read just fine with music on, so it’s worth experimenting to find what works best for you.

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5. Use a Timer App

One of the biggest things I’ve changed about my reading habit is removing the temptation of my phone entirely rather than relying on willpower alone. Willpower is finite, and when you’re trying to build a new habit the last thing you want is to be fighting yourself every few minutes.

This is where a timer app that blocks access to other apps comes in. I set mine at the start of my 30 minute session and that’s it, my phone becomes a reading timer rather than a distraction. The simple reminder of it when you pick up your phone and the act of having to actively cancel the session to do anything else on there is often enough to stop you doing it, because reaching for your phone while reading is rarely a conscious decision. It’s a reflex. The app just gives you a moment to catch yourself.

My current favourite is Focus Friend, your character knits socks while you read, which you can then swap for items to decorate their home and unlock new rooms. It sounds like a small thing but having something to look forward to at the end of a session is a surprisingly effective motivator. I’ve also used Flora in the past and loved that too, so it’s worth trying both and seeing which one you prefer.

6. Stop Backtracking

When I first decided to be more intentional about my reading I was constantly backtracking, rereading sentences, sometimes whole paragraphs, convinced I hadn’t properly taken in what I’d just read. It would take me forever to get through a single page and it made reading feel exhausting rather than enjoyable. I was genuinely googling “how to become a better reader”, and it wasn’t until then that I came across the concept and realised it even had a name. Understanding what it actually was changed everything.

Backtracking is known in reading psychology as regression. It’s incredibly common, and it tends to develop as a form of anxiety rather than genuine comprehension failure. Your brain convinces you that you haven’t absorbed what you’ve read when actually you have. Reading comprehension doesn’t work the way we think it does, we don’t need to consciously remember every sentence to follow a narrative. Our brains are remarkably good at building meaning cumulatively, and most of the time if you push through, everything makes sense in context.

I never remember backtracking as a child, which makes sense in hindsight. When reading felt effortless my brain had no reason to second guess itself. As the books got harder and other things started competing for my attention, a kind of anxiety crept in about whether I was really taking it all in. Regression was the response to that anxiety, not a sign that I actually wasn’t understanding what I was reading.

Once I understood that, the fix was surprisingly simple: trust yourself and keep going. If something was truly important and you genuinely missed it, the story will make it clear. You are not being tested on this, just push through.

If you find it hard to resist the urge to go back, try using a pen or finger to track the line you’re reading and physically guide your eyes forward. I actually remember doing exactly this with my bookmark and it really helped in the early days. This also covers up the upcoming sentences to stop you jumping ahead, which is another thing I found myself doing and made the my reading experience much more laborious.

If any of this has made you think about your reading technique more broadly, I’d really encourage you to look into it. There is absolutely no shame in it (I had an above average reading level as a child and still had to work on this as an adult). A little time spent understanding how you read will make the whole experience so much more enjoyable and it is absolutely worth it.

7. Stop Even When You Want to Keep Going

This one feels counterintuitive but it is an absolute must. When you’re building up your reading stamina, how you feel at the end of a session matters just as much as how long the session was.

Think about it this way: if you push yourself to sit and read for 30 minutes before you’re ready and you get to the end feeling like it was an absolute slog, the idea of picking your book up again tomorrow or later in the day doesn’t sound very appealing. But if you finish your 10 minutes thinking “I could have kept going” or “I really want to know what happens next”, you’ve ended on a positive note and that feeling is what brings you back.

It creates a positive loop. You finish a session feeling good, you look forward to the next one, you show up again, you finish feeling good again. Over time that loop is what builds the habit and gradually extends your stamina.

This is also why choosing the right book matters so much. A book that makes you genuinely want to keep reading is the best possible tool for building this kind of positive association with sitting down and reading. The two go hand in hand.

Reading is a journey, and it will look different for everyone. There was a point where I genuinely questioned whether I was even a reader anymore, and now, I read every single day. That didn’t happen overnight, and it didn’t happen by accident. It happened because I showed up consistently, set myself a 12 week challenge, and trusted that it would get easier. And it did.

Your reading life doesn’t need to look like anyone else’s. We all have different brains, different circumstances and different starting points and none of that makes your progress any less valid.

What I will say is this: be patient with yourself. You are quite literally training your brain, and that takes time. There will be sessions where it feels hard and days where you don’t show up at all, and that’s okay. What matters is that you come back. Every time you push through and choose your book over your phone it gets a little bit easier, your stamina grows a little bit stronger, and reading starts to feel a little more like the pleasure it’s supposed to be.

Start as small as you need to. Don’t rush. Don’t compare. Just show up for yourself as often as you can and trust that it adds up, because it does.

Do you listen to anything while you’re reading?

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Wall by John Lanchester

In a future Britain reshaped by rising seas, the country has built a vast concrete barrier around its coastline and turned defence of it into compulsory national service. The story follows Joseph Kavanagh, one of many young men stationed on the Wall, whose job is to prevent the desperate ‘others’ from crossing and where failure to do so may result in death, or worse, being made an ‘other’. Life there becomes a rhythm of patrols, exhaustion and routine fear, where the threat is constant but strangely monotonous, leaving Joseph thinking about what would happen if the ‘others’ did arrive. As time passes, the psychological toll of the work becomes inseparable from the political reality it enforces, and the novel gradually reveals a society that has normalised exclusion as survival.

Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton

A guerrilla gardening collective begins illegally planting crops on unused land across New Zealand, convinced they are reclaiming space from systems of neglect and profit. Their work brings them into contact with a billionaire who has purchased land near a disaster-prone region, ostensibly for survival planning, but with motives that are far from transparent. As the group becomes entangled in his plans, the novel shifts into a slow collision of ideology, ambition and environmental opportunism. What begins as idealistic activism turns into something far more compromised, where land, money and survival strategies all blur together.

The Disaster Tourist by Yun Ko-eun

A travel company specialises in sending clients to sites devastated by environmental catastrophe, packaging flood zones, sinkholes and disaster zones as curated experiences. When an employee is sent to inspect a failing destination, she finds that the place is not quite what it claims to be, and that the idea of disaster itself has become a form of business infrastructure. The story unfolds with a dry, unsettling tone as tourism, exploitation and environmental collapse fold into one another. What emerges is a world where crisis is not only endured but marketed, priced and rehearsed.

How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

A series of interconnected stories traces the aftermath of a climate-triggered epidemic and the technologies, rituals and industries that develop in response to it. A grieving father works in a facility processing the dead, an amusement park opens with attractions designed around memory and loss, and scientists search for ways to adapt human life to increasingly unstable conditions. The novel moves across decades and continents, gradually building a picture of a world reorganised by catastrophe rather than defined by a single event. Each story reframes the same crisis from a different angle, creating a cumulative sense of adaptation and dislocation.

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Borne by Jeff VanderMeer

In a ruined city shaped by failed biotech experiments and environmental collapse, a scavenger named Rachel survives by collecting materials from the wreckage left behind by a corporation called the Company. One day she finds a strange, shape-shifting organism and brings it home, unsure whether it is weapon, animal or something entirely new. As it grows, it begins to change the space around it, pulling Rachel into a world where biology, technology and landscape are no longer distinct. The city itself feels unstable, as if ecology has turned inward and started rewriting its own rules.

The High House by Jessie Greengrass

On a stretch of English coastline slowly being reshaped by rising seas and environmental collapse, a remote house becomes a place of preparation rather than refuge. Two teenagers are taken in by the people who have begun quietly stockpiling supplies and learning how to live with the expectation that ordinary life will not continue as it once did. As time passes, the outside world becomes increasingly unstable, but much of the novel remains focused on the rhythms inside the house: routines of maintenance, waiting and small attempts at care in the face of an approaching absence. Rather than centring on dramatic catastrophe, the story traces what it feels like to live in the long build-up to it, where uncertainty becomes the dominant condition and survival is as much emotional as practical.

Weather by Jenny Offill

A librarian working in a Brooklyn university juggles daily life with an increasing awareness that the world is entering a period of environmental breakdown. Her thoughts drift between emails, family responsibilities and fragments of apocalyptic prediction she encounters through her work, creating a narrative that feels fractured and constantly interrupted. Climate anxiety becomes part of ordinary consciousness rather than a distant fear, shaping how she interprets everything from small conversations to global events. The novel builds its effect through accumulation rather than plot, mirroring the slow pressure of a world that is changing faster than it feels.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

Vanished: An Unnatural History of Extinction by Sadiah Qureshi

Rather than telling the story of extinction through vanished animals alone, this book examines how humans came to understand extinction as a concept in the first place. Beginning with the discovery of fossils and the growing realisation that entire species had disappeared, it follows the scientists, collectors, explorers and institutions that shaped the modern idea of loss in the natural world. Along the way, Qureshi explores the connections between extinction, empire, museums and scientific ambition, showing how questions about disappeared creatures became entangled with wider debates about humanity's place in history. It is as much a history of ideas as it is a history of animals, revealing how extinction transformed the way people viewed both the past and the future.

The Quantum Universe: Everything That Can Happen Does Happen by Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw

Quantum physics has a reputation for being impenetrable, but this book approaches it through the central questions that have puzzled scientists for more than a century. Starting with familiar ideas about atoms, light and matter, it gradually introduces the strange principles that govern the microscopic world, explaining how physicists arrived at conclusions that often seem to defy common sense. Rather than relying on oversimplified analogies, Cox and Forshaw guide readers through the logic behind quantum theory itself, building an understanding of how modern physics explains everything from chemical reactions to the behaviour of stars. The result is a surprisingly accessible journey into one of science's most challenging subjects.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

Strega by Johanne Lykke Holm (Translated by Saskia Vogel)

A group of young women arrive at an isolated mountain hotel to train as waitresses under the watch of a mysterious older woman, settling into routines that begin to feel increasingly ritualistic and strange. The hotel itself seems suspended outside ordinary time, with endless corridors, formal dinners and rules that are never fully explained. As the women grow closer, tensions and dependencies begin to form within the group, while disappearances and unsettling details quietly disrupt the surface order of daily life. The novel moves like a fever dream, blurring the line between fairy tale and nightmare, with prose that is cold, hypnotic and deliberately disorienting, making the reader feel trapped inside the same uncanny atmosphere as its characters.

Open Throat by Henry Hoke

Narrated by a mountain lion living in the hills above Los Angeles, this novel follows a creature observing the city from its edges while struggling with hunger, displacement and a growing awareness of the humans moving through the landscape below. The lion watches hikers, overhears fragments of conversation and drifts closer to urban spaces as wild territory continues to shrink around it. Told in sparse, fragmented prose without conventional punctuation, the narrative moves through instinct, memory and observation in a voice that feels both animal and painfully human. The result is strange in a deeply intimate way, turning the perspective of a predator into a meditation on isolation, survival and the uneasy boundary between civilisation and wilderness.

Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder

A former artist now spending her days at home raising her young son becomes convinced that she is slowly turning into a dog. What begins as exhaustion and frustration starts to take on a physical dimension as strange changes appear in her body and behaviour, pushing her further away from the version of herself she once recognised. The novel follows her growing fixation on this transformation alongside the relentless demands of motherhood, blurring the line between metaphor and reality in increasingly bizarre ways. Funny, unsettling and occasionally grotesque, the book uses its strange premise to explore rage, identity and the feeling of disappearing inside domestic life.

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Mrs Caliban by Rachel Ingalls

Dorothy lives a quiet suburban life shaped by routine, disappointment and emotional distance, until a sea creature escaped from a nearby laboratory appears in her kitchen asking for food. Instead of reacting with horror, she gradually begins to build a relationship with him, folding this impossible presence into the rhythms of her everyday life. The novel follows the strange intimacy that develops between them against the backdrop of ordinary domestic pressures, allowing the absurd premise to unfold with complete seriousness. What makes the book so unsettling is the calmness of its tone, treating the bizarre not as spectacle but as something that exposes the loneliness and dissatisfaction already sitting beneath the surface.

Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung (Translated by Anton Hur)

This collection of short stories takes familiar genres such as horror, folklore and speculative fiction, then twists them into stories that feel unsettling in ways that are difficult to predict. A seemingly harmless object becomes the centre of a generational curse, bodies transform in disturbing ways, and everyday situations slide gradually into nightmare logic. What makes the collection so compelling is how matter-of-factly these impossible events are treated, allowing the emotional consequences to land with surprising force. Bora Chung shifts constantly in tone and style, moving from dark satire to outright horror while keeping a sharp focus on power, exploitation and resentment simmering beneath ordinary life.

The Doloriad by Missouri Williams

Set after an unspecified catastrophe, this novel follows a family living in isolation in a ruined landscape where generations of incest have reshaped both their bodies and their understanding of the world. At the centre of the household is an overbearing matriarch who rules through fear, ritual and control, maintaining a fragile order within a family bound together as much by dependence as by violence. The story focuses on one daughter beginning to push against this oppressive structure, creating tensions that threaten the balance the family has built around survival. Missouri Williamswrites in dense, unsettling prose filled with grotesque imagery and dark humour, creating a world that feels claustrophobic, bizarre and impossible to look away from.

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One way to navigate the overwhelming landscape of literature is to follow literary prizes. At their best they can introduce readers to books they might never have picked up otherwise and even when I disagree with the winners, their short and longlist often lead me to books I would have never found on my own.

They are of course imperfect, and winning a major award does not automatically make a book universally loved, but they remain one of the best ways to branch out from your usual reading habits and can still serve as reliable starting points for discovering ambitious, acclaimed and widely discussed authors.

Over time, literary prizes have also become part of literary culture itself, shaping publishing trends, launching careers, and influencing what gets read around the world. This guide looks at some of the major literary awards, how they work, where they came from, and my recommendations of prize-winning books that I think are especially worth exploring.

The Nobel Prize in Literature

Awarded by the Swedish Academy since 1901, and the only one here given for a body of work rather than a single book, novelists, poets, dramatists, and essayists are all eligible, in any language, from anywhere. Announced each October, it carries the most international prestige but is also the least predictable, the Academy has its own particular tastes, tending to favour writers with a serious moral or political dimension, and frequently goes to writers little known in English. There’s no shortlist made public, just the announcement of the winning writer who is awarded a handcrafted diploma as well as an 18-carat recycled gold medal and around 10-11 million Swedish krona (SEK) or approximately $1.2 million USD, the amount, which is set annually by the Nobel Foundation, fluctuates.

Most Recent Winner: László Krasznahorkai

My recommendations: Ernest Hemingway (1954), Annie Ernaux (2022), Albert Camus (1957), John Steinbeck (1962)

Other Notable Winners: Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez, George Bernard Shaw, Kazuo Ishiguro

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

In the Woods by Tana French

When a young girl is found murdered on the outskirts of a small Irish town, detective Rob Ryan is assigned to the case alongside his partner, yet the investigation quickly begins to echo something from his own past. Years earlier, two children disappeared in the same woods, and Rob was the only one found, with no memory of what happened. As the case unfolds, the narrative moves between the present investigation and the lingering gaps in his past, with each new discovery tightening the connection between the two. The story follows the strain this puts on both the case and Rob himself, as professional detachment becomes harder to maintain and the search for answers starts to feel personal in ways he cannot fully control.

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters

Set in Victorian England, this novel follows Sue Trinder, raised among thieves in London, who is recruited into a scheme involving a young heiress living in isolation. The plan seems straightforward at first, with Sue sent to gain the girl’s trust and play her part in a carefully arranged deception. As she enters the house and takes on her role, the narrative settles into the routines of this enclosed world, where relationships begin to shift in ways that were not part of the original design. The story unfolds through changing perspectives and competing accounts, gradually revealing how much of what seemed certain is open to question, creating a sense of constant recalibration as each new layer comes into view.

Angels and Demons by Dan Brown

This novel begins with the murder of a scientist at a Swiss research facility, drawing symbologist Robert Langdon into a fast-moving investigation that leads him to Vatican City at a moment of intense transition. A powerful group thought to be long gone appears to be acting again, leaving behind symbols that point to a larger plan unfolding over the course of a single day. As Langdon follows a trail of clues hidden in art, architecture and coded messages, the narrative moves rapidly through churches, secret locations and historical references, each step revealing part of a pattern that suggests an imminent threat. The structure keeps the pressure high, with the story advancing through a sequence of discoveries that must be interpreted quickly before time runs out.

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides

Alicia Berenson shoots her husband and then stops speaking entirely, refusing to explain what happened or to engage with anyone afterward. She is placed in a secure psychiatric facility, where her silence becomes as central to the case as the crime itself. The story follows Theo Faber, a psychotherapist determined to work with her, convinced that he can break through where others have failed. As he begins sessions with Alicia, the narrative moves between his growing fixation on her story and fragments of her life before the incident, slowly building a picture of what might have led to that night. The tension comes from what is withheld as much as what is revealed, with each interaction raising new questions rather than settling them.

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Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

On the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary, Nick Dunne reports that his wife Amy has disappeared, and what begins as a missing person case quickly turns into something far more complicated. The narrative alternates between Nick’s account of events as suspicion begins to fall on him and Amy’s perspective through entries that trace the history of their relationship. As both versions of the story develop, contradictions begin to emerge, challenging the reader’s understanding of what is true and what has been constructed. The novel builds its tension through this shifting viewpoint, turning the investigation into a deeper examination of marriage, performance and the stories people tell about themselves.

The Decagon House Murders by Yukito Ayatsuji

A group of university students travel to a remote island to stay in a strangely designed house built by an eccentric architect, intending to spend their time discussing classic detective fiction. Not long after they arrive, a series of murders begins, unfolding within the closed setting of the house. At the same time, events on the mainland begin to suggest a connection that complicates what seems at first like an isolated case. The novel plays with the conventions of classic whodunits, structuring the story around clues, alibis and the logic of deduction, while gradually widening the scope of the mystery beyond the immediate setting.

Snap by Belinda Bauer

The story begins when a mother leaves her three children in a broken-down car by the side of the road and does not return. The narrative then follows the children, particularly the eldest, as they try to manage the situation on their own, drawing attention from authorities and setting off a chain of events that stretches over time. Alongside this, a detective becomes involved in a case that gradually links back to that initial moment. The novel moves between these threads, showing how a single incident can ripple outward, affecting lives in ways that are not immediately visible, and building tension through the slow convergence of past and present.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

Journalist Mikael Blomkvist is hired by an ageing industrialist who remains obsessed with the decades-old disappearance of his niece, Harriet Vanger, who vanished from a family gathering on a remote island and was never seen again. Believing someone within the powerful Vanger family knows more than they have admitted, he asks Blomkvist to reopen the investigation and examine the family’s history from the inside. As he works through old photographs, records and conflicting accounts, the case begins to reveal patterns that had gone unnoticed for years. He is eventually joined by Lisbeth Salander, a brilliant and deeply unconventional investigator whose skills push the inquiry into far more dangerous territory. Together they uncover layers of secrecy within the family, turning what first appeared to be a cold case into something much darker and more immediate.

The conversation continues in the subscriber chat — paid members can start new threads and shape the conversation. I'd love to see you in there.

previously on the reading list…

This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through my Bookshop.org links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Trial by Franz Kafka

“Someone must have been telling lies about Joseph K, for without having done anything wrong he was arrested one fine morning.”

Josef K., a bank official in an unnamed city, is told one morning that he is under arrest. No charge is given and he isn’t held, he carries on working while trying to engage with a court that operates out of attics and tenement rooms by procedures no one will explain. The book follows his attempts to find out what he’s accused of and how to respond. Kafka died before finishing it, and it reads more like a sustained anxiety dream rather than a legal story, with a strain of absurd comedy running through it.

Brighton Rock by Graham Greene

“Hale knew, before he had been in Brighton three hours, that they meant to murder him.”

1930s Brighton. Pinkie is a seventeen-tear-old gang leader who becomes involved in covering up a crime that threatens to expose him. As he works to control the situation, he forms a connection with a young waitress who holds information that could be dangerous to him. Their relationship develops under pressure, shaped by his need to maintain power and her uncertain understanding of what she has become part of. At the same time, others begin to take an interest in the events surrounding the crime, creating a tightening circle around Pinkie. The narrative follows his attempts to stay ahead of these threats as the consequences of his actions begin to close in.

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The Reading List is a weekly newsletter that sends out a new list of book recommendations every Sunday, plus, a monthly guide on how to enrich your reading life.

The Man Who Changed the Way We Read: The Story of Allen Lane and Penguin Books by Jeremy Lewis

This biography gets into the mechanics of how publishing actually works, and how Allen Lane pushed against them. It follows him from his early career inside established firms through to the founding of Penguin Books, showing how he challenged the idea that serious literature had to be expensive and inaccessible. The book looks closely at practical decisions; standardised cover design, strict pricing, print runs on a scale that felt risky at the time, and how each one disrupted the industry. There’s also attention to the negotiations with authors, the tensions with traditional publishers, and the financial pressure of trying to keep ideals intact while building something sustainable. Alongside Lane himself, it introduces the editors, designers and collaborators who helped shape Penguin’s identity, giving a clearer sense of how much coordination sat behind what looked like a simple innovation. Rather than treating it as a success story in hindsight, it stays with the uncertainty of the process, making the outcome feel far less inevitable.

Shakespeare and Company by Sylvia Beach

This memoir traces the founding and running of Shakespeare and Company, the English-language bookshop opened by Sylvia Beach in early twentieth-century Paris. It follows her decision to establish the shop, the challenges of keeping it afloat, and the community that gradually formed around it. Writers, readers and travellers move through its rooms, turning the shop into a hub where manuscripts are discussed, borrowed and sometimes supported into publication. Beach writes about the practical realities; stock, logistical challenges, financial strain, as well as the relationships that sustained the shop through difficult periods. The narrative also reflects the wider literary culture of the time, showing how closely connected publishing, bookselling and writing could be. It offers a grounded view of what it meant to create a space dedicated to books, shaped as much by risk and persistence as by idealism.

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa

At the centre of this novel is Takako, whose life stalls abruptly after a painful breakup, leaving her withdrawn and unsure how to move forward. With few options, she accepts an offer to stay above her uncle’s small secondhand bookshop in Tokyo’s Jimbocho district, a place she had never paid much attention to before. Living there brings her into the slow, repetitive rhythm of the shop opening each morning, watching customers drift in and out, spending long stretches surrounded by books she has never read. What begins as a temporary arrangement gradually becomes something more grounding as she starts to read, first out of boredom and then with growing interest, finding that certain books echo her own thoughts in ways she didn’t expect. At the same time, she begins to understand more about her uncle, whose own past and connection to the shop add another layer to the space she now inhabits. The story follows this period of adjustment rather than a dramatic arc, tracing how her days shift from avoidance to engagement, and how the bookshop becomes gradually tied to her sense of direction.

84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff

Told entirely through letters, this book follows the long-running correspondence between Helene Hanff in New York and the staff of Marks & Co., a specialist antiquarian bookshop. It begins with Hanff writing to request specific out-of-print titles she cannot find in the United States, but over time the exchanges widen to include personal updates, gifts of food parcels sent across the Atlantic, and glimpses into each other’s lives. The structure allows the relationship to develop gradually, shaped by gaps between letters and the changing circumstances on both sides. There is a strong sense of post-war Britain in the background, contrasted with Hanff’s more casual tone, and the book becomes as much about this transatlantic connection as it is about books themselves. It captures how a shared literary interest can grow into something more personal, built entirely through written words.

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The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald

Set in a small, insular seaside town in late 1950s England, this novel follows Florence Green, a widow who decides to open a bookshop despite having little experience and even less local support. She chooses an old, damp building that has stood empty for years. The early part of the story focuses on the practical effort of getting it running; sourcing stock, dealing with suppliers, trying to attract customers in a place that isn’t especially interested in books. As the shop begins to take shape, it also begins to draw attention, not all of it welcome. Certain figures in the town take an interest in what Florence is doing, and the narrative tracks how polite opposition, social pressure and quiet manoeuvring start to affect both the business and her place in the community. Penelope Fitzgerald keeps the tone restrained, letting the tension build through small exchanges and shifting attitudes rather than overt conflict. The book stays closely with Florence’s attempt to hold onto her idea, showing how something as simple as opening a bookshop can become entangled in the expectations and hierarchies of a place that resists change.

The Diary of a Bookseller by Shaun Bythell

Structured across the course of a year, this diary follows the day-to-day reality of running The Bookshop, Scotland’s largest secondhand bookshop. Each entry records sales, weather, online orders and the steady stream of customers who pass through, from serious collectors to baffled tourists. Shaun Bythell documents the unpredictability of the trade, days with no sales at all, sudden rare finds, the constant negotiation between keeping stock and letting it go. Alongside this is the ongoing dynamic with staff, particularly his assistant, whose presence adds a thread of tension and humour that runs throughout. The book builds a detailed picture of what it takes to sustain a physical bookshop in the present day, balancing affection for the work with a clear-eyed view of its frustrations, making it feel less like a romantic ideal and more like a lived-in reality.

The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett

This short novel begins with a chance encounter where the Queen of England finds herself borrowing a book from a mobile library, setting off a new and unexpected habit. From there, the story follows how reading begins to take up more of her time, subtly altering her daily routine and the way she engages with the world around her. Alan Bennett explores the practical consequences of this shift, missed appointments, changes in conversation and a growing impatience with surface-level interactions. The narrative pays close attention to the act of reading itself, how it draws the reader inward and reshapes perspective without announcing itself as a major transformation. It’s less about plot than about accumulation, tracing how a series of small decisions builds into a noticeable change in outlook.

The Bookseller’s Tale by Martin Latham

This book takes a thematic approach to the history of bookselling, moving across different periods to explore how the trade has evolved and who has shaped it. Martin Latham draws on specific examples of early street sellers, pioneering publishers and eccentric shop owners to show how books have been bought and sold under changing conditions. It looks at practical elements such as pricing, distribution and censorship, alongside the personalities who influenced what readers had access to. The structure allows it to shift between anecdotes and broader developments, giving a sense of continuity without following a strict timeline. What emerges is a detailed picture of bookselling as a profession that has always adapted to new challenges, driven by individuals who often operated on instinct as much as strategy.

Welcome to Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum

This novel centres on Yeongju, who leaves behind a demanding corporate career to open a small neighbourhood bookshop in Seoul, hoping for a quieter and more meaningful way of living. The story follows her as she establishes the shop from scratch, choosing stock, setting routines, learning how to run a business that doesn’t immediately succeed. Around her, a group of regular visitors begins to form, each arriving with their own reasons for seeking out the space, whether it’s uncertainty about work, creative frustration or simple exhaustion. The narrative moves between these perspectives, showing how the shop gradually becomes a place where people pause and reconsider the direction of their lives. Rather than focusing on major events, it traces the process of building something slowly, from empty shelves to a lived-in environment shaped by conversation and repetition, giving a clearer sense of how the bookshop comes to matter to those who return to it.

The conversation continues in the subscriber chat — paid members can start new threads and shape the conversation. I'd love to see you in there.

previously on the reading list…

This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through my Bookshop.org links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.

— W. Somerset Maugham

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“I wish I could get into the habit of reading regularly”

The one thing I hear more than anything else from people is that they love reading, but they just can’t seem to make it a habit.

I spent my childhood flying through books and as I got older, although my love for reading remained, the habit dwindled.

Through my teen years and into early adulthood I would maybe average 5-10 books a year, give or take. Fast forward to now, my 2026 reading goal is 55 books and I don’t have to worry about choosing books strategically so I make my goal or give up my social life and other hobbies. I just know I will get there.

For a long time, I cycled through the usual advice, a chapter a day, ten pages in the morning, a book a week. On paper, these goals sound perfectly reasonable, and for plenty of people they work beautifully. They just never worked for me.

The problem with pages and chapters

On paper, page goals and chapter goals make perfect sense. They’re concrete, countable and they give you a satisfying sense of progress.

The trouble is that not all pages are created equal. Ten pages of a gripping thriller can disappear in maybe ten minutes. Ten pages of a dense classic, where you’re rereading sentences and pausing to actually think, can easily take thirty.

So a “ten pages a day” goal isn’t really one goal, it’s a different goal every time you change books, and on some days it’s a much bigger ask than others.

Which leads you to maybe avoiding the books that require more focus and concentration (which is a shame because they can often be the ones with the most impact) or, you push through them resentfully, and begin to detest the habit and you start picking up your book less and less.

Chapter goals have the same problem, only worse. Some authors write chapters that last two pages, others write chapters that last forty. So setting “a chapter a day” as your goal means your reading life is completely at the mercy of whichever writer you happen to have picked up.

The worst thing I noticed was that when I was reading to hit a goal like this, I read differently. I would constantly be counting the pages had left. It was always in the back of my mind that I had the rest of my day to get on with, all the tasks I should be doing instead of reading were floating around my head or I’d check the clock and get annoyed because I should have gone to sleep ten minutes ago. Rather than just reading, which is not the way it should be.

I realised my main issue underneath all of this was the nagging feeling of guilt.

Reading felt like a frivolous use of my time. That I needed to be getting on with other things. When my goal was tied to a page count or a chapter, and the book was taking more time, I’d feel this low-level guilt creep in. I’ve got a to-do list as long as my arm, and here I am still on page four.

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