I feel like there isn’t a lot I can usefully do at the moment, but if there’s one thing I do know it’s book recommendations for basically any situation – including lockdown. There’s no two ways about it: reading is a great way to take your mind off things. I’ve been taking advantage of the lack of social plans to really up my reading time, and I’ve been finding it pretty useful for countering all the stress and anxiety!

Depending on precisely what you’re looking for out of your lockdown reading, I’ve got some recommendations for you.

If you want to be transported

If you’re looking for a whole other world, you can’t do much better than Laini Taylor’s ‘Daughter of Smoke and Bone’ trilogy. Her writing is immersive and engrossing, the characters are brilliant and the plot will tie you in knots. In a good way.

If you want something a little sillier, but still immersive and not-of-this-world, I’d also suggest checking out ‘The 13 ½ Lives of Captain Bluebear’ by Walter Moer. This book is an absolute riot, whisking you through a dizzying number of new scenarios. Great fun, and guaranteed to divert you from whatever’s going on in the ‘real’ world.

If you want to be kept guessing

Perhaps you’re a fan of books that keep you on your toes, with twists and turns and mysteries to dig into. In that case, you could try ‘Gone Girl’ by Gillian Flynn. A deeply suspenseful book with some great character observations.

Another good option would be Big Little Lies, by Liane Moriarty. Excellent pacing and plotting, and I just think the way Moriarty builds up her narratives, piece by piece, is consistently excellent. Definitely one that’ll keep you thinking, start to finish.

If you want to laugh

Maybe you just want something funny! In which case, allow me to suggest ‘Can Everyone Please Calm Down?’ by Mae Martin. It’s funny and forthright, and there’s a story about Christmas that made me laugh so much I had to put the book down for a moment to recover.

Now, I actually don’t read much comedy, so next up is the only one on the list I haven’t read. I have heard great things though! It’s ‘Dear Girls’, by Ali Wong. Letters to her daughters to fill them in on everything they’ll need to know in life. Ali Wong is notoriously uninhibited (and hilarious, obviously), so this sounds like a winner to me! This was the winner of the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Humor Book of 2019. Quite the endorsement!

If you want to be comforted

Book recommendations are always going to be quite subjective, but I think this category is more so than most. I usually turn to books I know really well for this. Particularly things that I read when I was young that I still find appealing now. I’ve chosen a couple of these that I think are also just objectively quite soothing reads. That’s not to say they’re plain-sailing from start to finish, just that I promise more good than bad if you pick up one of these.

If you want something guaranteed not to stress you out, ‘The Dreamfighter and Other Creation Tales’, by Ted Hughes, should do the trick. It’s a collection of short origin stories for a bunch of different animals. They’re sweet, funny, sometimes sad and frequently silly, but they’re all resolved within a handful of pages and most of the endings are happy ones.

Also surprisingly soothing, especially for a book where basically all the characters are dead, is ‘Elsewhere’ by Gabrielle Zevin. Okay, that doesn’t do much to sell it. How about this: in Elsewhere, everybody ages backwards, and dogs and humans can talk to each other. Convinced yet? Plus, Zevin’s writing just has a really relaxing way about it.

If you want to be educated

Maybe you’re using your lockdown time to learn something new! In which case, here are a couple of educational book recommendations for lockdown perusal!

‘Lean Analytics’, by Alistair Croll and Benjamin Yoskovitz, is great if you’re interested in using data in business, particularly from the perspective of a small business or startup. Basically, if you own a small business, or think you might one day want to start one, this is a really useful book to check out. And hey, a lot of us have some extra free time right now, why not start a business?!

More narratively entertaining, but equally interesting, is Ron Chernow’s ‘Alexander Hamilton’. It’s a big ol’ book, but it needs to be to cover the astonishing life of the man in question. It’s obviously now ridiculously famous for the Lin-Manuel Miranda musical! But whether you’ve seen that or not the book is a great read.

What are you reading at the moment?

I’ve been powering through my to-be-read list, so I’m definitely collecting ideas. What have you read and loved recently? Do you have any book recommendations specifically for lockdown? Let us know in the comments!