"I think books are like people, in the sense that they’ll turn up in your life when you most need them."
Emma Thompson
The Reading List 2023
Small Pleasures
Never before had she considered that all these experiences that had nearly demolished her had built her into something better
Clare Chambers
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
If I could find a real-life place that made me feel like Tiffany’s, then I’d buy some furniture and give the cat a name
Truman Capote
Lonely Castle in the Mirror
Within the castle the Wolf Queen was free, vibrant and full of life.
Mizuki Tsujimura
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
Evelyn Hugo is one of the biggest movie stars of all time. She doesn’t even have to have something to say for people to listen
Taylor Jenkins Reid
Twisted Games
To her becoming queen wasn’t a dream; it was her worst nightmare
Ana Huang
The Haunted Hotel
sir, what am I - a demon who has seen the avenging angel? or only a poor mad woman, misled by the delusion of a deranged mind?
Wilkie Collins
Twisted Hate
You’re one of the few people I trust...even when we couldn’t stand each other, I could always count on you to be honest with me
Ana Huang
Five Little Pigs
The accepted version of certain facts is not necessarily the true one
Agatha Christie
Loves Labour’s Lost
Love is a familiar. Love is a devil. There is no evil angel but love
William Shakespeare
Twisted Lies
If my thoughts were chaos, she was my anchor. They always went back to her
Ana Huang
The American Roommate Experiment
You deserve so much better. Whether it’s an experiment or not, you deserve more.
Elena Armas
The Peony Pavillion
I have sought you everywhere,
And at last I find you here
Tang Xianzu
Before the Coffee Gets Cold
At the end of the day, whether one returns to the past or travels to the future, the present doesn't change
Toshikazu Kawaguchi
The Unfriend
“But how do you put it? There’s no etiquette for this - there’s no thing people always say in these circumstances. ‘please don’t come to our house, we think you’re a murderer”
Stephen Moffat
Three Letters from the Andes
Safe in the mess-tent the beginners listened wide-eyed to tales of thunderstorms in the high arêtes where the electricity makes one’s hair stand literally on end and the ice-axe hisses in one’s grasp like a snake…
Patrick Leigh Fermor
Book Lovers
“Nora” He just barely smiles. “You’re in books. Of course, you don’t have a life. None of us do. There’s always something too good to read”
Emily Henry
Prima Facie
‘Every winner might be the one who loses the next day’
Suzie Miller
They Came to Baghdad
You seem to be a sensible young woman and I don’t suppose you’ve thought much about world politics which is just as well, because as Hamlet very wisely remarked, ‘There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so
Agatha Christie
I’m Glad My Mom Died
“A little girl shouldn’t have to worry about her entire family”
Jeannette McCurdy
The Love Hypothesis
“You ooze moodiness”
“I do not”. he sounded indignant, which struck her as oddly endearing
Ali Hazelwood
A Court of Thorns and Roses
“I threw myself into that fire, threw myself into it, into him, and let myself burn”
Sarah J. Maas
Love on the Brain
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a community of women trying to mind their own business must be in want of a random man’s opinion
Ali Hazelwood
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
What are lies but attempts to conceal some sort of weakness?
Suzanne Collins
The Changeling
She that in life and love refuses me,
In death and shame my partner she shall be
Thomas Middleton/ William Rowley
Love, Theoretically
Have you considered that maybe you’re already the way I want you to be? That maybe there are no signals because nothing needs to be changed
Ali Hazelwood
Haunting Adeline
When you make someone fall in love with the darkest parts of you, there’s nothing you can do that will scare them away. They will be yours forever because they already love all the fucked up bits and pieces of you
H. D Carlton
Hunting Adeline
I don’t care if I need to set this world on fire until there’s no one left but you and me. The world will burn around us, and I’ll gladly live in chaos with you as long as the only person that is a danger to you is me.
H. D Carlton
Red, White and Royal Blue
Thinking about history makes me wonder how I’ll fit into it one day, I guess. And you too. I kinda wish people still wrote like that. History, huh? Bet we could make some
Casey McQuiston
Mansfield Park
Her own thoughts and reflections were habitually her best companions
Jane Austen
Bonded by Thorns
A mate bond is very rare and sacred. It’s said to be the calling out of your soul for another; the melding of hearts; the quintessence of life itself
Elizabeth Helen
How to be a Renaissance Woman
“It’s not surprising that there was no one way of being a woman in the Renaissance”
Jill Burke
Loathe to Love You
“Men were a mistake,” Sadie says. “Big mistake,” Hannah adds. “Huge.”
Ali Hazelwood
Hooked
“Just remember that whenever things feel bleak, all situations are temporary. It’s not your circumstance that determines your worth, it’s how you rise from the ashes after everything burns'“
Emily McIntire
Pied Piper
“Finally, he got up, feeling uncommonly well. It did not occur to him that this was because he had a job to do, for the first time in many month”s
Nevil Shute
The Fine Print
You’ll learn that the best rewards come with the biggest consequences. Because nothing that great is given for free
Lauren Asher