6 books I loved reading this year

As I found the joy of reading again.

As my brain fog and concentration started to come back, after what feels like a few years away, my love of reading came back too. It’s calm and how the imagination or wisdom sticks to me. I didn’t feel like being numbed or distracted by the tv, I felt like sitting in silence and enjoying a book with my tea. Absorbing their words as if they were candy.

I felt like I reconnected to a part of myself I had thought lost.

Therefore, I wanted to share this happy milestone by sharing the favourites reads of this year, where their words either moved me, excited me, consoled me or made me feel at home, or all at the same time.

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The Year of Nothing, by

Emma Gannon

Divided into seasons, Emma’s account on burning out and how to get back up is both beautifully honest and a delight to read. Being a milleneal who also burnt out, I can see so many paralels between Emma’s journey and my own. For instance, giving up alcohol after relating it to brain fog and overwhelm, discovering I can choose to be calm in chaos, writing to get better, being unafraid to talk about feelings, while being grounded and without making it a big thing out it, just endlessly accepting. These were just a few examples of where I felt kindred to her words.

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Slow Seasons, by

Everything Looks Rosie

Rosie introduced me to the eight Celtic seasons, and it is an invitation to a slow and sustainable enjoyment of each one. This ode to a slower, seasonal life sparked a lot of memories, of feelings of home, and ideas I didn’t know I had. Next year, I want to read it again, but enjoy each chapter in the season I am in.

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home body, by Rupi Kaur

This book got to me, as it is about the journey to find home in our own bodies. Seeing a woman’s body, acknowledging it, loving it without any need for perfection, letting go of prejudice, accepting and empowering it. A lot of words I needed to hear, to help me in my own journey with my body.

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Calm, by The School of Life

A cool and insightful book about the calm and outlines what affects calm in our daily lives. It is an honest and accepting book, while tackling sensitive subjects, that we might never dare speak out loud (or at least me). I ended up highlighting half the book.

As I read the book on my Kindle, I decided to make a little illustration instead.

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Chasing Fog, by

Laura Pashby

Laura educated me about fog through this book, as she describes the different types of mist and fog, its history, its importance, and how it is a phenomena that happens less than it has ever before. It felt like an ode to fog, something I had forgotten I enjoyed, allowing me to re-discover it through her stories and wisdom.

Photo by Laura Pashby, as I bought it as an eBook.

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Matrescense, by Lucy Stone

A book that took me through the reality of the journey of motherhood, not the fluffy one, the layered one. It is an eye opener to the transformations that happen to our bodies when growing a child in our womb, the process and beliefs related to it. It gave me so much comfort in a time of transformation, I had never been told about. It’s a book for everyone, for the ones who want kids, for those who don’t, to the curious ones, both men and women.

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I also read and enjoyed:

• The boy who was a freedom fighter: A book about Kim Malthe-Bruun, by Bertil Nordahl

• Steal Like an Artist, by Austin Kleon

• The Crossing Places, by Elly Griffiths

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Which book(s) did you read and loved this year?

I’d love to add them to my list next year.