This Month’s Recommended Reads | What To Read Now

Spread the love

The Song of the tree, book

My children loved this magical book. It has a wonderful story and beautiful illustrations.

A lyrical, heart-warming new tale from the award-winning designer and creator of The Fox and the Star

Bird loves to sing in the towering tree at the heart of the jungle. It feels like home.
When the season changes she must say goodbye, but she isn’t ready to let go.
As she listens to the other animals, Bird learns to sing a new song.

The Song of the Tree is available here.

This is the book we all need during these stressful times. Just breathe in, breathe out, and let this book help you relieve all of your worries. 

The secret to living mindfully. Just don’t breathe a word of it…

You breathe 22,000 times every day. How many are you really aware of?

International bestselling and award-winning author Dr Danny Penman provides a concise guide to letting go and finding peace in a messy world, simply by taking the time to breathe.

Known side effects: You will start to smile more. You will worry less. Life won’t bother you so much.

Dissolve anxiety, stress and unhappiness, enhance your mind and unleash your creativity with these simple exercises. And with each little moment of mindfulness, discover a happier, calmer you.

It really is as easy as breathing…

This is a fantastic idea. This book takes you on a journey around ten of the top London galleries. One hundred pieces of art are in this clever book. Essential for art lovers. I take my copy out every now and then for a dose of art. 
A Taste of Art – London takes the reader on a journey around ten of the city’s galleries, exploring ten significant artworks at each location and offering an insightful ‘taste’ of art – the ultimate antidote to museum fatigue. The paintings, sculptures and objects selected from each gallery focus on a different time period in the history of Western art – beginning with pieces from an ‘Emerging Britain’ at The British Museum and concluding with contemporary portraiture at the National Portrait Gallery. ‘Tasting notes’ offer an engaging, narrative look at each work, accompanied by a quotation to whet the reader’s appetite; whilst an illustrated ‘key ingredient’ unlocks the meaning and encourages the reader to not only look but more fully explore all one hundred pieces. The book also includes a map, a checklist to tick off what you see and specially commissioned illustrations throughout.

This book from Jessica Ryn is a modern classic. In turns uplifting and sad- because you cannot have one without the other- it is a book that leaves you satisfied and entertained. Dawn Brightside is a complex and lovable character. The Extraordinary Hope of Dawn Brightside covers mental illness, homelessness and the capacity of the human spirit. This is a book that tells the story of people who do not have their voices heard enough and does so perfectly. 

Dawn Elisabeth Brightside has been running from her past for twenty-two years and two months, precisely.

So when she is offered a bed in St Jude’s Hostel for the Homeless, it means so much more than just a roof over her head.

But with St Jude’s threatened with closure, Dawn worries that everything is about to crumble around her all over again.

Perhaps, with a little help from her new friends, she can find a way to save this light in the darkness?

And maybe, just maybe, Dawn will finally have a place to call home….

The utterly charming feel-good debut novel of 2020 to curl up with.

The Extraordinary Hope of Dawn Brightside is available here.

We Just Clicked is a fun and fizzy novel. Perfect for millennials, and those who want to understand them. This is a romantic novel with a clever take. I fell in love with the main character, Izzy, even if she frustrated me sometimes. This book also serves as a cautionary tale on social media addiction. 

Izzy’s always played by the rules. But now, it’s time to break them…

Izzy Brown has always dreamed of making it big on Instagram, but her followers just aren’t growing. So when her colleague and fellow ‘influencer’ Luke suggests they fake date to boost their profiles, Izzy says yes – against her better judgement. Now Izzy’s profile shows a confident, glamorous thirty-something with the perfect boyfriend, and her followers are shooting up by the thousands.

So what if behind the scenes, things are a little different? Izzy can’t stop bickering with Luke, his habit of checking his quiff in EVERY SINGLE mirror is driving her insane, and she’s hiding a secret heartache. But everyone tells a few fibs on social media, right?

Then Izzy runs into Aidan, the mysterious stranger who saved her the day her world fell apart two years ago – and major sparks start to fly. Izzy’s sure she can have the online success she’s always dreamed of, whilst falling in love in real life. After all, Aidan doesn’t use social media… what could possibly go wrong?

We Just Clicked is available here.

Sophia Money-Coutts. What happens now?

What Happens Now? is the second novel from Sophia Money-Coutts. Sophia has a way of writing that is raw, honest and brave. After having a one-night stand with a handsome aristocratic mountaineer Lil ends up pregnant, because her pill did not work after she had a dodgy tummy- it does actually happen! Cautionary note. What happens next – see what I did there?- is a fun and sometimes embarrassing journey where two strangers now realise they must co-parent a child. Will they end up together? Read the book to find out, there are plenty of funny lines along the way. 

‘No question about it, there are two little purple lines. I’m pregnant.’

After eight years together, Lil Bailey thought she’d already found ‘the one’ – that is, until he dumped her for a blonde twenty-something colleague. So she does what any self-respecting singleton would do: swipes right, puts on her best bra and finds herself on a first date with a handsome mountaineer called Max. What’s the worst that can happen?

Well it’s pretty bad actually. First Max ghosts her and then, after weeing on a stick (but mostly her hands), a few weeks later Lil discovers she’s pregnant. She’s single, thirty-one and living in a thimble-sized flat in London, it’s hardly the happily-ever-after she was looking for.

Lil’s ready to do the baby-thing on her own – it can’t be that hard, right? But she should probably tell Max, if she can track him down. Surely he’s not that Max, the highly eligible, headline-grabbing son of Lord and Lady Rushbrooke, currently trekking up a mountain in South Asia? Oh, maybe he wasn’t ignoring Lil after all…

What Happens Now is available here.

This book is like a cup of tea on a rainy Sunday. Comforting and just what you need. Brilliant. 

The Wronged Daughter by Mary Wood is an emotional and moving novel that reunites old friends and heals old wounds.

Mags has never forgotten the friendship she forged with Flora and Ella, two fellow nurses she served with at the beginning of World War I. Haunted by what she experienced during that time, she fears a reunion with her friends would bring back the horror she’s tried so desperately to suppress.

Now, with her wedding on the horizon, this should be a joyful time for Mags. But the sudden loss of her mother and the constant doubt she harbours surrounding her fiancé, Harold, are marring her happiness.

Mags throws herself into running the family mill, but she’s dealt another aching blow by a betrayal that leaves her reeling. Finding the strength the war had taken from her, she fights back, not realizing the consequences and devastating outcome awaiting her.

Can she pick up the pieces of her life and begin anew?

The Wronged Daughter is available here.