Reading List of Friendly Books
Every day since we’ve been together as a household and isolated from others, we have an hour or so devoted to reading as a family. It doesn’t happen at any particular time. I try to be responsive to our moods and needs and just roll with it. To sit in the living room surrounded by my children and just read together is such a gift. I hear them giggle and guffaw at their stories and it simply makes my heart flutter. My husband and each of our daughters have their own Kindle. My younger daughter received hers as a birthday gift from her uncle and my eldest saved for hers dollar by dollar-so sweet! While we do not purchase many e-books, we are avid users of our local library system’s e-book catalog. It has been utilized heavily this past week and we are sure to continue to rely on it as school closures extend out before us indeterminately. Personally, I still prefer a book with pages to turn in my hand. Something about the smell of paper and ink…
Reading a good book has also given me a moment’s repose when we are all feeling that generalized air of anxiety. It can be very tempting to shut down my emotions with unhealthy habits, particularly with social media and online shopping a few finger twitches away. Having a bit of an escape that doesn't actually numb my own emotions and state of mind is one of the healthiest practices I’ve got. Along with handcraft, kitchen dance parties, and yoga, reading has been indispensable.
I’m careful to choose what I like to call “friendly” books. These are books that can serve as a bit of a catalyst for my feelings without dragging me into a grey mood, which happens to me very easily while reading certain types of fiction. Please, don’t ask how long I lived under the low clouds of Forks, Washington after reading Twilight…should I be embarrassed by that? Probably. Am I? Probably not.
In this season, however, the clouds around us are all too real, even if they are figurative. In literature, I need something sunny but meaningful, something quirky without being too dark, something with pluck and whimsy and hope. Here is my friendly book list for social distancing, and beyond:
1) The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
I read this book last year, and I so thoroughly enjoyed it, it is going back on my reading list. It is such a charming, hopeful, and touching novel. It also feels so appropriate for our current state, lifting up a story of a groups of people leaning on one another to thrive and live fully in uncertain circumstances.
2) The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
I first read this book in high school, as many of us did, but my ten year old daughter recently read it for the first time, and I dove back in with her. Oh my goodness, if you haven’t read this in many years, like me, pick it up again! It is such an adventure, and you just fall so hopelessly in love with every character.
This book is very much in the same vein as “Guernsey”. I don’t know that it has been adapted for film, but I wouldn't be at all surprised. It reads like a film you just have to love. The characters are so delightful, you think you must actually know them somehow. A story about friendship and human connection, it is simply an uplifting story written with a kind of infectious energy.
4) The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
In full disclosure, I haven’t yet read this book, but I honestly feel like it is hand tailored to what I love most about books. I’ve read it described at “Gosford Park” meets “Groundhog Day” by way of Agatha Christie, so, obviously, sign me up immediately. I am waiting in line for digital loaner, but I might just have to spring for my own copy…
5) Matilda
Read this book, I don’t care how old you are! There is a reason it is so beloved and has had such amazing longevity. I read this approximately eleventy billion times from the ages of eight to eleven. I have no shame in reading it again. It is hilarious, whimsical, heartwarming, and exciting. I love this book.
6) Emma
Another absolute classic you simply have to read, Emma has been made and re-made in film and dramatic versions. Nothing compares to the wit and charm of the original Jane Austen novel. I can’t read this book without being simultaneously annoyed with and charmed by the title character. How Emma has stood the test of time as both a story and a character is truly remarkable.
This book reads almost like a folktale, it so full of magic and larger than life characters. At its heart, it’s a transcendent story about the dauntless, ageless power of the human spirit and the search for purpose and meaning. Probably the most serious novel on the list, though I wouldn’t characterize it as heavy at all.
8) The Importance of Being Earnest
I have an intense, deep, abiding affection for Oscar Wilde. He is the definition of wit and sparkle. This play is just about as farcical and zany as it gets, poking fun at social trappings that feel both far removed and all too familiar. Such a fun read.
Another book I only picked up for the first time last year, and so worth the read! It is a true escape, to a world that is both more romantic and more true and raw than most. It is laugh out loud funny at times, as well as being tenderly poignant. I adore this novel!
10) Charlotte’s Web
My all time favorite book, forever and ever. Reading this book has moments of pure wholesome poetry, hidden right in plain sight of a simple story of friendship, and within a complex story of self-sacrifice.
If you have any friendly books you’d like to suggest, please, please do!! I can’t wait to see what your favorites are!
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