I’ve been keeping a mental list of books about books for some time now, and it’s only now that I’ve turned it into pixels.

From The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek to Ruth Shaw’s memoir of her wee bookshops in the deep south of New Zealand, recently there have been so many books that have made me think, “yes! that will go in the books post!”

So without further ado, here are my favourite books about readers, librarians, bookshop owners, and, of course, books…

The best books about books for people who love reading

1. Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

“As I gaze at the vacant, birdless scene outside, I suddenly want to read a book – any book. As long as it’s shaped like a book and has printing, it’s fine by me. I just want to hold a book in my hands, turn the pages, scan the words with my eyes.”

Kafka on the Shore, a fan favourite from Murakami (and one of my all-time favourite books), is an immersive and otherworldly book to get lost in when you want an escape from everyday life.

It’s also a wonderful book about books, and contains one of my favourite libraries in literature. 

Comprising two distinct but interrelated plots, the narrative runs back and forth between the life of fifteen-year-old Kafka Tamura, who has run away from home, and an aging man called Nakata.

2. The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan

The Bookshop on the Corner is a wonderfully cozy book about books, packed with musings on the joys of reading.

It’s also a book about librarians: namely, Nina, a literary matchmaker and librarian with the gift of finding the perfect book for her readers.

However, after losing the job she loves, Nina must make a new life for herself. Nervous but determined and ready for a new start, Nina moves to a sleepy village in Scotland where she buys a van and transforms it into a mobile bookshop.

She drives her bookmobile from neighborhood to neighborhood, changing one life after another with the power of storytelling. With every new reader she meets, Nina slowly realises that this place might just be where she can write her own happy ending.

3. The Bookseller at the End of the World by Ruth Shaw

The Bookseller at the End of the World, one of my favourite new books for 2022, is Ruth Shaw’s immersive, heartbreaking, yet charming story of running two wee bookshops in the remote village of Manapouri in the deep south of New Zealand.

In this beautiful book for booklovers (that is sure to make you want to read even more books), Shaw weaves together stories of the characters who visit her bookshops, musings on the books that have shaped her life, and bittersweet stories from her full and varied life of adventure.

4. The Secret History by Donna Tartt

The Secret History is one of my all-time-favourite books about books; 30+ of them, in fact (if I counted correctly), from The Iliad to The Great Gatsby.

It’s an excellent novel to spark a hunger for classics and mystery-solving, beginning with some of my favourite opening lines in literature: “The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation.”

(For more book inspiration for fans of The Secret History, I’ve also curated a list of Donna Tartt’s favourite books.)

5. The Velocity of Being by Maria Popova

Like everything else from Maria Popova, the mind and heart of The Marginalian (formerly Brain Pickings), The Velocity of Being is a gorgeously curated book celebrating the joys of discovery.

Here, Maria Popova brings together some of the most wonderful culture-makers – writers, artists, scientists, entrepreneurs, and philosophers — to reflect on the joys of reading, how books broaden and deepen human experience, and the ways in which the written word has formed their character. 

A beautiful illustration accompanies each letter about how books have shaped a contributor’s life, with stories from figures as diverse as Jane Goodall, Neil Gaiman, Shonda Rhimes, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Elizabeth Gilbert.

6. The Library Book by Susan Orlean

On the morning of April 28, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. The fire reached two thousand degrees and burned for more than seven hours, consuming four hundred thousand books and damaging seven hundred thousand more by the time it was extinguished.

More than thirty years later, the mystery remains: did someone purposefully set fire to the library—and if so, who?

Weaving her lifelong love of books and reading into an investigation of the fire, The Library Book is Susan Orlean’s love letter to libraries and a dazzling reflection on their past, present, and future in America.

7. The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson

Inspired by the true blue-skinned people of Kentucky and Roosevelt’s Pack Horse library service of the 1930s, The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek is a story of raw courage, relentless kindness, and one woman’s belief in the transformative power of books.

In this historical fiction novel (which I loved listening to as an audiobook), the hardscrabble folks of Troublesome Creek have to fight for everything. However, what they do have is their very own travelling librarian.

Cussy Mary Carter travels by packhorse to bring books – including Peter Pan, Doctor Doolittle, and The Call of the Wild – to the Appalachian community she loves. But with her skin a shade of blue unlike most anyone else, Cussy has to contend with prejudice and suspicion as old as the Appalachias.

8. The Diary Of A Bookseller by Sean Bythell

If you’ve always dreamed of owning a bookshop, The Diary of a Bookseller is the perfect book to indulge your bookish fantasies.

Shaun Bythell owns The Bookshop, Wigtown – Scotland’s largest second-hand bookshop. It contains 100,000 books, spread over a mile of shelving, with twisting corridors and roaring fires, and all set in a beautiful, rural town by the edge of the sea.

In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in booklover’s paradise, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff.

Along the way, he recommends books and evokes the charms of small-town life in delightful detail to inspire your own literary self-care and reading rituals.

9. The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams

The Reading List is a wonderfully heartwarming book about books and connection. In this debut, a chance encounter with a list of books in the back of To Kill a Mockingbird helps forge an unlikely friendship between two very different people in a London suburb.

Mukesh lives a quiet life in Wembley after losing his beloved wife, now worrying about his granddaughter, Priya, who hides in her room reading. Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library and trying to escape the painful realities she’s facing at home.

Slowly, as the reading list brings these two lonely souls together, fiction becomes their key to escape their grief, forget about everyday troubles, and even, with time and gentleness, find joy again. 

10. The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman

The Bookish Life of Nina Hill is a marvellously laid-back and joyful book about books to get lost in.

Shortlisted for the Comedy Women in Print Prize, Abbi Waxman’s charming and quirky romance follows introvert and bookworm Nina Hill as she discovers if real life can ever live up to fiction.

Nina has her life just as she wants it: a job in a bookstore, an excellent trivia team and a cat named Phil. And plenty of time for reading.

So when the father she never knew existed dies, leaving behind innumerable sisters, brothers, nieces, and nephews, Nina is horrified. And if that wasn’t enough, Tom, her trivia nemesis, has turned out to be cute, funny and interested in getting to know her.

11. Ex Libris: 100+ Books to Read and Reread by Michiko Kakutani

What are your five-star reads, the books that shaped who you are and how you see the world?

Ex Libris is literary critic Michiko Kakutani’s personal selection of over one hundred works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, sharing passionate essays on why each has had a profound effect on her life.

From Homer’s The Odyssey to Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Ex Libris covers a rich and vast range of old and new classics, accompanied by gorgeous illustrations from lettering artist Dana Tanamachi.

12. What Writers Read: 35 Writers on their Favourite Book by Pandora Sykes

What do writers read? In this captivating, beautiful collection curated by the author of How Do We Know If We’re Doing it Right, a host of beloved authors from Elizabeth Strout to Derek Owusu and Ruth Ozeki to Elif Shafak reveal their favourite books.

Available as a gorgeous hardcover, What Writers Read is a stunning book about books and the joy of reading that’s perfect to gift to booklovers.

Still looking for new books to read? For more books to retreat into, complement this with the coziest books to read on a quiet night in.

The post 12 of the best books about books that capture the joy of reading appeared first on Tolstoy Therapy.

Since writing my review, I’ve been pondering the book and asking some questions about my own reading habits. First and foremost, why am I not reading as much fiction these days?

To start addressing this, I recently read – and absolutely loved – Elephant Moon by John Sweeney and The North Water by Ian McGuire. Both books reminded me of how much I enjoy (and need) regular doses of fiction.

Reading fiction is how I wind down, escape from work and worries, and become a better me. The business and self-improvement books I can sometimes gravitate towards don’t cut it.

To help keep this in mind, I’ve compiled some of the many quotes I highlighted, underlined, and applauded in Will Schwalbe’s Books for Living. I hope that other keen readers will enjoy these too.

– – – – –

The best quotes for book lovers about the therapy of reading

1. On looking to books for answers

“I believe that everything you need to know you can find in a book.”

2. On being a librarian, bookseller and reader

“At home, I’m a librarian, forever curating my collection. Outside of my apartment, I’m a bookseller – hand-selling my favorite books to everyone I encounter. There’s a name for someone who behaves the way I do: Reader.”

3. Reading makes us feel less alone

“By comparing what you’ve done to what others have done, and your thoughts and theories and feelings to those of others, you learn about yourself and the world around you. Perhaps that is why reading is one of the few things you can do alone that makes you feel less alone; it’s a solitary activity that connects you to others.”

4. Talking about books is the greatest gift

5. Searching for books to help us make sense of the world

6. On accidentally discovering books that change your life

“Especially when I’m at my happiest, I’m unlikely to search for a book to make me happier. But it’s often during those periods of nonseeking that I’ve stumbled across a book that has changed my life.”

7. One question we should ask more often

“There’s one question I think we should ask of one another a lot more often, and that’s ‘What are you reading?'”

8. Don’t ignore book recommendations from the universe

“Every now and then the universe tells you what book you need to read; it does this by placing the name of that book and author in front of you in various contexts, until you can’t help but take note. You ignore book recommendations from the universe at your peril.”

9. The best part of interrupting a book with a nap

“The best thing about a nap that interrupts my reading is that it often enriches my experience of a book by allowing my subconscious to place me in it. During these naps I might find myself galloping across the moors with Heathcliff or spending Mondays and Wednesdays with Morrie.”

10. Let others nap

“‘Would you like a nap?’ is one of those questions we should ask of one another more often. It’s easy. And it costs exactly nothing.”

11. Books improve us without us trying

“But much of fiction’s effect is, I think, subliminal. It changes us even though we don’t know we are being changed… I would like to think that even with inconsistent effort on my part, I’m not less proud and prejudiced than I was when I first met Lizzy Bennet, even though I’m still plenty proud and prone to prejudice. (Must read again.)”

12. Books and people are bound together

“Books and people are bound together. I can’t think about certain books and not about certain people, some living and some dead. The joy I’ve had from these books and from these people, and all I’ve learned from them, merge into one stream in my mind.”

13. Every book changes your life

“I’m not the same reader when I finish a book as I was when I started. Brains are tangles of pathways, and reading creates new ones. Every book changes your life. So I like to ask: “How is this book changing mine?”

14. The love of reading is greatest when we forget we’re reading

“To live reading is to want to achieve the state where you don’t know you are reading, where your communion with what you are reading is absolute.”

15. Reading is an art

“Reading is an art we practice our whole lives. It’s not like tying a shoe – it’s like ink painting or flower arranging.”

16. Books don’t need to be thick enough to stop bullets

“A book doesn’t need to be think enough to stop bullets.

17. Reading brings with it responsibility

18. On beautiful endings

19. Reading widely is a way to become more fully human – and more humane

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“When you are free you don’t have such a painful desire to read as you have in prison. You can get any book at home, in the shops or from the internet. In prison books become the air. Your body needs air to breathe. No books – you cannot breathe. And if you cannot breathe there is no life.”
– Belarusian journalist Iryna Khalip, who was detained for criticising her country’s regime, now contributing to the campaign against banning books in UK prisons

Leo Tolstoy, an author committed to education and literacy for all, would certainly condemn the UK restrictions on prisoners receiving books.

Over the last few months, countless artists, writers and readers have spoken out against ‘book bans’ in UK prisons. New rules, which came into force last November, now prevent prisoners from receiving parcels from outside, including books and magazine subscriptions, unless for ‘exceptional circumstances’.

In an article by The Guardian, one prisoner, who was about to start a distance learning course, states: “A friend of mine has done all these courses and is fully qualified and was going to send me all his books but we can’t have books sent in any more.”

When thinking about this unfathomable decision by the British prison system, Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy can be seen as key reading.

It’s perhaps not a surprise that Tolstoy believed firmly in the redemptive qualities of reading for prisoners, what with the school he set up on Yasnaya Polyana, his estate, in order to increase literacy among peasants, and the work he did to reform Russian education and literacy rates.

The protagonist of Resurrection, Nekhlyudov, a character keen to find redemption by helping others, is forbidden from giving textbooks to a political prisoner for the sake of furthering his education. In protest, his argument with the prison general goes as follows:

‘He needs textbooks. He wants to study.’
‘Don’t you believe it.’ The general paused. ‘They’re not for studying. This is trouble-making.’
‘But surely they need something to pass the time in their awful situation,’ said Nekhlyudov.
‘They never stop complaining. […] They have comforts here that are not usually available in prisons.’

The general goes on to say by way of an excuse,

‘They are given books with a spiritual content, and old periodicals. We have a library of suitable books. But they don’t read much. At first they show some sort of interest, but very soon you’ll find new books with half the pages uncut, and old ones with the pages unturned. We once ran a test,’ said the general with something distantly resembling a smile, ‘by inserting slips of paper. They never got moved. […] Anyway, they soon settle down. They start off by being a bit restless, but it’s not long before they’re putting on weight, and they end up quite placid,’ said the general, totally unaware of the sinister significance of his words.

Tolstoy wasn’t the only author aware of the importance of books in prisons. Think of the well-read Abbé Faria in The Count of Monte Cristo, one of the greatest mentors in literature, who writes his masterwork, the Treatise on the Prospects for a General Monarchy in Italy, while imprisoned.

Brooks from The Shawshank Redemption: a character who reinforces the crucial role that books play in prisons.

The post Tolstoy on the Importance of Books and Literacy in Prisons appeared first on Tolstoy Therapy.

“Why didn’t I buy the paperback edition?” is the question that I seem to be forever asking myself these days. It generally happens after I read something remarkable and I want to share it with everyone. The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe, a wonderfully bibliotherapeutic memoir, is one such book.

If you love reading as much as I do – and I know most of you do – then I’d love for you to get a copy and let me know what you think. It’s best classed as a memoir, in which Will Schwalbe celebrates his mother’s life and their shared relationship with literature; something which becomes most prominent following his mother’s diagnosis with pancreatic cancer.

His mother, Mary Anne Schwalbe, truly deserved to have a book written about her life. In fact, I think it was necessary. She spent a great deal of her life in education, teaching and overseeing admissions (including some time at both Radcliffe and Harvard University), but during her last two decades she dedicated herself to working with refugees worldwide.

She spent six months in Thai refugee camps, was shot at in Afghanistan, and was an electoral observer in the Balkans. She founded the Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children, and persuaded the International Rescue Committee to set up a UK office. Towards the end of her life, her work to fund a library project in Afghanistan reflected her love of reading and her belief in its power to change.

Will Schwalbe describes Mary Anne as the ‘air traffic control’ in their family, as the person who would automatically assume responsibility and control over others. You notice this characteristic of hers throughout the book, not least in how ‘Will’s’ blog posts about her health are in fact written by her. In some reviews people criticise this side of her character, but I appreciated how Will wrote so accurately and honestly about his incredibly philanthropic and kind, yet always on the go, mother.

The ‘End of Your Life Book Club’ described in the title encompasses the literary bond between Will and Mary Anne that is strengthened with Mary Anne’s deterioration of health. Before her check-ups and chemo appointments, the mother and son discuss the books they have both been reading. As they choose to read (or reread) the same books together, their book club of two people is formed.

I love that there was a balance between classic texts and new fiction in their book club. Thomas Mann’s tomes and Tolkien’s The Hobbit are discussed at length, but so are novels such as Muriel Barbery’s The Elegance of the Hedgehog and Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Will and Mary Anne both provide their own insights into each text, and in the case that I’d read the book too, I also considered my own thoughts.

By reading this book you’re invited into Will and Mary Anne’s book club, and this is perhaps what I enjoyed most about it. Not only could I join their discussions of great books, but I could also find recommendations of novels I’d perhaps enjoy as much as they did.

After finishing The End of Your Life Book Club this morning, I’m going to send an email to my local village bookshop asking them to stock The Lizard Cage by Karen Connelly and Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro in time for my trip back home next weekend. I’m in need of some real, tangible books, and Will Schwalbe’s remarkable book has provided me with the perfect ideas to start with.

The post A Book About Books: The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe appeared first on Tolstoy Therapy.

Mad Men has quickly become a favourite television show of mine, and I loved the reference to Frank O’Hara in episode one of the second series.

Don sees another man reading Meditations in an Emergency in a bar, and asks if it is any good. The man replies that Don “would not enjoy it”, which inevitably influences Don to read it for himself and find out. Don appears to see something of himself in the book, but he is also reminded of somebody else. He writes a dedication to this person in the book’s inlay pages, and walks to the postbox to send it. Meanwhile, we hear Don’s recital of the verses above (you can watch this scene here on Youtube).

While the scene is so beautiful produced, I think this poem is a fitting choice for Mad Men for various reasons. There’s the obvious mention of modernity that reflects the nature of the show, but there’s also the connection between Don’s personal struggle and that of the poem’s speaker. Don is struggling with issues that regard family, love, and identity, and we can only wait for the inevitable culmination of his anxiety and anguish. In other words, for the “catastrophe of [his] personality”. Perhaps Don’s reading of this poem marks the peak of his troubles, and everything will soon be “beautiful again”, although I’m not convinced. I’m sure those of you who also watch Mad Men will have more insight.

I’d like to memorise the first stanza of the passage that I have quoted above: I think it would help me during difficult moments, and reminds me of the proverb “this too shall pass”. The second stanza, in its description of laughter and beauty “always diminishing” is such an accurate depiction of depression, and I’m sure many can find familiarity in it. As for the final stanza, I’m sure we can all relate to the confusion of who we are and what we think. This is a reading very centred on bibliotherapy, but I think the inclusion of the poem in Mad Men has a similar purpose. Don, having felt confused and divided for some time, finds reassurance in a poem.

After some research, I’ve found that O’Hara’s book reappears at various points throughout the second series. I’m looking forward to this, and I’ll be sure to post any other reflections I have. Why didn’t I start watching Mad Men before?!

As always, do comment if you have anything to agree with, disagree with, or add. Mad Men appreciation will certainly be accepted in the comments box. Also, I always enjoy hearing about poems and books that have helped you through similar situations.

If you liked this post, do check out Angeliki’s post “What do Mad Men read” over at Reading Psychology. If you’re anything like me, it’ll fill up your to-read list!

Don Draper reading Frank O’Hara’s Meditations in an Emergency.

The post Bibliotherapy and TV’s Mad Men: Frank O’Hara’s ‘Mayakovsky’ and Meditations in an Emergency appeared first on Tolstoy Therapy.

I first read Man’s Search For Meaning a few months ago, but I’ve only just felt ready to write about it. It’s such an immensely provoking piece to read, and as a reader you feel quite unsettled after reading some sections. However, it is powerfully moral and philosophical, to say the least, and it must be one of the most obviously bibliotherapeutic (I’ll declare that a word) books I can think of.

Goodreads provides the following summary:

Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl’s memoir has riveted generations of readers with its descriptions of life in Nazi death camps and its lessons for spiritual survival. Between 1942 and 1945 Frankl labored in four different camps, including Auschwitz, while his parents, brother, and pregnant wife perished. Based on his own experience and the experiences of others he treated later in his practice, Frankl argues that we cannot avoid suffering but we can choose how to cope with it, find meaning in it, and move forward with renewed purpose. Frankl’s theory – known as logotherapy, from the Greek word logos (“meaning”) – holds that our primary drive in life is not pleasure, as Freud maintained, but the discovery and pursuit of what we personally find meaningful.

Logotherapy is something that I can deeply relate to, yet also something that I’ve done most of my life without ever giving it a name (rather like bibliotherapy). When I surround myself with meaningful relationships, experiences and activities, my mental health is considerably better than if not.  I’m sure that a lot of you will have similar attitudes. Art is so important to me – particularly literature, as you may expect from my blog, but also the visual arts and music – and I couldn’t imagine a life devoid of it. A few years after my parents’ divorce I’d listen to music that both helped and hindered my state of mind: some songs allowed me to re-live negative memories, whilst others gave me the willpower required to distance myself from the event. More recently I’ve become able to realise this distinction, and therefore favour the latter trait in music and literature. But primarily, I’ve intentionally made an effort to pursue meaning and beauty. Doing this can aid almost any type of suffering, as Frankl demonstrates in this quote:

As the inner life of the prisoner tended to become more intense, he also experienced the beauty of art and nature as never before. Under their influence he sometimes even forgot his own frightful circumstances. If someone had seen our faces on the journey from Auschwitz to a Bavarian camp as we beheld the mountains of Salzburg with their summits glowing in the sunset, through the little barred windows of the prison carriage, he would never have believed that those were the faces of men who had given up all hope of life and liberty. Despite that factor–or maybe because of it–we were carried away by nature’s beauty, which we had missed for so long.  

When writing about surviving life in a concentration camp, echoes of stoicism seems inevitable. Frankl quotes Dostoevsky’s declaration that man is a being who can get used to everything, and later states the following:

In spite of all the enforced physical and mental primitiveness of the life in a concentration camp, it was possible for spiritual life to deepen. Sensitive people who were used to a rich intellectual life may have suffered much pain (they were often of a delicate constitution), but the damage to their inner selves was less. They were able to retreat from their terrible surroundings to a life of inner riches and spiritual freedom. Only in this way can one explain the apparent paradox that some prisoners of a less hardy makeup often seemed to survive camp life better than did those of a robust nature.

Retreating into a “life of inner riches and spiritual freedom” greatly resounds with Marcus Aurelius’s teachings, a philosopher whom I seem to perpetually discuss on my blog. The extent of the trauma described in Frankl’s text is unimaginable to most of us, as is his survival of the experience and his ability to write about it. Nonetheless, this “inner retreat” can be utilised in so many situations in order to ease anxiety, low mood and the experience of difficult situations. We can pay attention to nature around us, recall pleasant memories, or create imagined places and experiences. To remind me to do this, I particularly like the following quote:

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

Although Man’s Search For Meaning is full of philosophical guidance, here are the three concepts that I’ve primarily dealt with in this blog post.

1. Life needs meaning – whether love, art, nature, or something else profound – for survival and mental health. 
2. Regardless of the situation, your emotions cannot be removed from your control. 
3. Similarly, you can retreat into a “life of inner riches and spiritual freedom” at any time.

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