Rather to my surprise, people have been asking me to recommend books for lockdown reading. Virtual strangers, some of them. I suppose they think a writer reads more than other people. Well, to keep abreast of the competition, if nothing else.
Now, I like talking about books. And I am congenitally incapable of ignoring a request for help.
Finding a story that somebody else might like, especially someone I barely know (not to mention that someone’s son, daughter or grandchild) is hard. To be honest, it has left me with eyeballs swishing about, looking for the escape hatch.
With a very uncertain Christmas coming, I thought I’d try to be a bit more disciplined.
New Lockdown Bookworms?
The Reading Agency has been trying to persuade us to read more for years. They tell us that in England 31% of adults don’t read in their free time. This rises to 46% for people aged 16-24. Now, that really scared me. It was only reading that got me through the horrors of adolescence.
According to Nielsen, provider of ISBNs and source of much book research, two fifths of adults are reading more during lockdown. The reasons they give include more time to read and a desire to escape from the coronavirus crisis. Unsurprisingly, they seem to have turned against dystopian fiction (often brutal and/or gloomy) towards crime and thrillers and popular fiction.
I’m not a great believer in age-appropriate reading, so I’ve included at least one book advertised as “for children”. So sue me.
Reading in Lockdown Because of Loneliness?
I’ve certainly escaped into books to alleviate both in the past.
Dickens does it for me, though I know people who call him “claustrophobic”. Try Nicholas Nickleby or David Copperfield, if you’re cautious. They have great stories, cracking villains and a great resolution where the good end happily. They’re also completely absorbing – I know at least one person who regularly rewrote a seduction scene in Nick Nick.
And there are the massive single titles too: A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth, Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries. Both will take you into a completely other world and hold you there. (Luminaries is a horribly slow start, but by golly it picks up once you get out of the Gentlemen’s Club.) But both are full of family tensions and impossible situations – with just a touch of the supernatural and Chinese gold miners in Luminaries – that anyone can relate to.
Reading in Lockdown Because of Anxiety?
For anxiety, I turn to PG Wodehouse. He reads very well aloud, too, if you’re sharing your house and even your anxieties.
My comfort reading shelf also has favourite detective series: Lesley Cookman’s Libby Serjeant, Sara Paretsky’s V.I. Warshawski and Ellis Peters’ Cadfael, as well as her less well known Inspector George Felse.
I think The House of Green Turf might just be my favourite detective novel of all time. The hero is just fabulous. And the moment he falls in love and knows it’s hopeless… wish I could write like that.
Step away from the Time of Lockdown?
This is based on the real mystery of what happened to the Ninth Legion, which disappears from history, having been quartered in York. The hero, Marcus, is the son of one of the missing officers, now in York himself, wounded and feeling useless. (Sound familiar?) He goes on the most tremendous adventure, seeking the missing legion north of the border.
This is a book about courage and sorrow and loss – and wonderful, inspiring friendship, found in the most unlikely places. Will lift your heart.
In this uneasy world our cool, fabulous hero is a spy, as well as a Duke. And our heroine is, if possible, even more elusive – and based on a real person. Their encounters are full of suspense and the world of London balls and visiting royals is both elegant and utterly believable. And it, too, is the first of a series, in this case The Aikenhead Honours.
T
NB Very sorry, I cut this whole section on historicals inadvertently while I was trying to get pictures and live links to work. Didn’t check until much too late. So here it is, at last.
Prefer Entertainment?
OK, this is where I include people who are busier during lockdown than normal. I’m thinking particularly of parents who have to try to home school children because of self-isolation requirements, while also working for home. One solution could be short stories, as in Blandings Castle and Elsewhere.
Longer and denser is Robin McKinley’s Rose Daughter, which I’ve been re-reading recently. It’s her second go at retelling Beauty and the Beast. And it’s blissful. Beauty’s sisters, bullies in prosperity, turn into truly good eggs under adversity. Magic sense of magic is a source of equal threat and protection, dreaded confrontation and somehow the best possible opportunity to test yourself. Hopeful and deeply comforting.
Reading in Lockdown for Unexpected Delight
The narrator is a perceptive, much younger woman, who becomes their “little Greek translator” . What we see of her life is intriguingly woven around her intense encounters with Wilder’s world. Powerful stuff – the research is amazing – and beautifully told. Ultimately hopeful too.
Reading in Lockdown: Pure Romance
A question on facebook reminded me of a delightful mature romance that has kept its place on my bookshelf since I first read it. Some lovely characters and a thoroughly believable impossible situation which you can’t imagine ever being resolved. Julie and Romeo by Jeanne Ray is an absolute delight.
And finally, one of my all time favourite novels from Mills and Boon. Published in 1985 it is on my Keeper Shelf and likely to stay there.
The story is classic. Woman out of her comfort zone and fighting back, expecting to be dumped at any moment. Theseus and Ariadne. Eros and Psyche. The film world, just touched on, is teeth-achingly shallow. Every character makes mistakes and no one is wholly in the right. And it’s beautifully written. Happy sigh. The Driftwood Dragon by Ann Charlton.
So what would you recommend as Lockdown Reading, either to a new Bookworm or an old lag?
What a choice! You’ve tempted me with the Wilder novel and Julie and Romeo. I’m a diehard Bertie fan from PG Wodehouse and my very favourite Pratchett is Small Gods. Never read Ellus Peters other detective. May have yo look into that. Cadfael is a favourite.
I do agree with you, Liz. An amazingly varied choice. I can strongly recommend Julie and Romeo which I read some years ago on Sophie’s recommendation. And I agree with her about David Copperfield too. It’s a real page-turner of a story. Shall give the other Ellis Peters chap a go, I think.
And — though I don’t pretend to be in the same league as Sophie’s recommendations — I should mention that book one of my own Aikenhead Honours series, His Cavalry Lady is a FREE download for Kindle, until midnight PST Monday (that’s 0800 GMT Tuesday). Anyone interested can find it here on their local Amazon. Enjoy 😉
AAARGH. I am a cyber disaster. Paragraphs on historicals, including His Cavalry Lady now restored. Really I shouldn’t be allowed near a keyboard without a minder.
The House of Green Turf is something really special, Liz. Utterly fabulous love story that you don’t think could possibly work…. And marvellous on music and also that time, just after the War, when people were starting to travel in Europe again. So hope you enjoy it.
I started reading it on Amazon and snapped it up! Thanks for flagging it up as it hooked me from the off.
Beaming here, Liz!
*Fans blushing cheeks* Thank you, Sophie! I can return the compliment – On the shelf in what is currently a son’s room is my only selection of Mills and Boon – you and Catherine George. I agree about PGW, of course, and I really must have another go at Pratchett. But my main comfort reading has been my old favourite detective/mystery stories: the whole of Ngaio Marsh’s canon, a good few Carter Dickson and John Dickson Carr, and currently Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe, as Bertie might say – from soup to nuts. And I shall probably get to Heyer when I run out of Stout – they are shelved next to one another, along with Marsh and PGW. Luckily, I have a houseful of books, and it’s a delight to be on a re-reading marathon.
I never really got on with John Dickson Carr. If he’s one of your keeper reads, I must try again. (And thank you for the compliment, too! Blushing here.)
A great selection. I agree with the starter Dickens you’ve chosen, Sophie, although my first was A Tale of Two Cities – at just about the same time as I saw Dirk Bogarde in the film. 🙂 I loved Julie and Romeo, which I read when it first came out. Isn’t Jeanne Ray the mother of Anne Pachett? I’ve struggled with Terry Prachett, but maybe his children’s books would be a good way in. I recently read The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, also a children’s book, and loved that. And Bertie is always a treat.
His children’s book are a bit more forgiving of his characters, Liz.
Johnny Maxwell is a real hopeless hero. I love him – and there are two sequels, too. They read very well aloud, if you have a willing audience. All ages seem to enjoy the experience.
Thank you so much for adding the historicals section, Sophie. Am honoured to be included. I love both the Rosemary Sutcliffe and the Ariana Franklin books.
Sadly Franklin (who also wrote under her real name, Diana Norman) completed only 4 books in the Aguilar series because she died in 2011. However, I see on Amazon that Diana Norman’s daughter Samantha has completed book 5. It was published last month. For some reason, books 1 & 2 of the Aguilar series are not available for Kindle which is a great shame.