10 books you need to read this autumn

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Autumn is the second best season to read books in. 

I am shrouded in cosiness and the warming feeling that the festive period is just around the corner. Although the weather usually dips to something that makes it acceptable to stay indoors, I’m still trying to be out and about before wind and ice make an appearance. It’s actually hitting 26 degrees in London next week, so I’m wondering if I should be telling you to read books that transport you to the sweltering heat of 1920s New York instead…

Regardless, I’m interested in walking on crunchy leaves and seeing what autumnal offerings the coffee shops have for me. Pumpkin spice? Maple? Hot apple? Give it to me. I’ll curl up with a book and my black forest hot chocolate (or is that a winter thing? Global warming has kicked all seasonal knowledge out of my head…).

I know a lot of people opt for cosy books to read this season – low orange lights, candles, mild weather, orange leaves, a cute romance – but I’m not a cosy book reader.

The last time I tried, I managed three pages of the Pumpkin Spice Cafe before I deleted it from my Kindle immediately and rinsed my eyeballs. I like a gothic novel, or something crimey and thrillery – but my favourite autumn and winter reads are philosophical stories that force me to withdraw and take the time to get to know the things I ignore about myself. And the world around me. While we all have some downtime and nobody is paying attention.

So here are some not-cosy book recommendations for the next couple of months:

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Imagine queueing on a mountain

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I will never queue at the top of a mountain. Are you dumb.

I’ve reached a point in my life where if I wake up after 7am, I am a huge lazy failure who is wasting her entire sloth life away. Like today. Obviously, this isn’t a humble brag – I hate it and I don’t want to feel guilty for waking up ‘late’. I am a woman. And I am tired.

Being up early means I have more time to think. Having more time to think means I have more time to drop myself into scenarios that I haven’t had the pleasure of experiencing. Like this one that has recently plopped itself on my radar: the queues on Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon), and the fact that people are upset with others for refusing to adhere to their nonsensical queuing system. Read more

Everything I thought about this month: August

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I feel like August was a roller-coaster month. The month went by so quickly, but also seemed to be a massive slog. Unusual during the summer that people typically never want to end, but I have never really been a summer person.

Good old British weather is having an identity crisis, one that I’d like it to fix if people would be so kind as to stop polluting the Earth. The heatwaves left me incapacitated and I seem to have done nothing but eat and spend money this month. Read more

The best way to live again is through music

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For a society that is full of people self-diagnosing as autistic, nobody is obsessing over and fixating on music like they should be.

I jest. Sort of.

Last month, I thought about the tragedy of realising you’re in a memory as it is being made, and it made me think about those ineffable feelings that engulf us whenever we hear or smell something familiar.

I think music has fallen into the box of ‘things we’ve tried desperately to optimise’ – skimming through albums, popularising seven second snippets of the catchy parts and going viral with them. We hear way too much music without actually listening to it – there’s a subway take that expressed how I feel about this so well. Read more

To write well, you must live: part 2

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All consuming and no living makes Jack a dull and stupid idiot

There are times I’ll have a conversation with someone and they’ll actually say something like burnt toast theory. It’s giving. Ate and left no crumbs.

I get that language evolves, but genuinely what the hell are you talking about.

Other times, I’ll have a conversation with someone who is so detached from anything online that I am embarrassed for myself when they don’t understand a reference I’ve made (road work ahead? Uh, yeah, I sure hope it does).

In that moment, I realise some people really are just living their life away from social media influence (as intended), and others have TikTok (or Vine) fully wired into their brain. There’s a sweet spot – where you get the reference and you know what the trends are but you don’t fall victim to influencer crap.

When you’re incessantly consuming repetitive content, including “tips and tricks” from people around the world (who seem to live the exact same life, for some reason. The beauty in our differences is lost.), you also don’t really have anything interesting to talk about except the regurgitated shit you’ve read and heard.

Consequently, you can only repackage it through your own point of view that has also done nothing but go to the gym in Oner and a slick-back, eat a healthy high-protein balanced meal, take 15k steps, and use red light therapy. Or wake up and make a cup of tea, take a nature walk, write in your journal, post an article about ‘the media I consumed this week’, and be in bed with your kindle at 8pm. Everyone seems to want to be boxed up into one of few categories, and doing one is no better than the other.

Content – on TikTok, Instagram, and now even Substack – becomes a snoozefest. We’re inundated with nothing but articles and videos about how to schedule your day to be exactly like each others. Read more

To write well, you must live: part 1

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Writing for fun, writing as a millennial, the case for FAFO

Source: Carl Randall

As a millennial and a Tumblr gal back in the 00s and 10s, I started to feel like I was existing on Substack in a sea of people who are getting younger and younger than me and, if I am very candid, having less and less in common with me. It’s comforting to know that there are so many of us who refused to disappear when blogging dissolved or turned into the shitshow that is Twitter.

I write the same way I did when I was in my twenties, which probably contributes to why I feel like an old ugly duckling on here. The cynicism has never left me, my general anger at the state of the world has only compounded, and I probably will say things that will offend some people. But I’ve never cared about that. I’m not interested in reading about beauty trends, living a soft life, being a thought daughter, or how to become intelligent and well-read. I do what I want (while wearing winged eyeliner), and I already am intelligent and well-read. I don’t understand why many other people can’t get there on their own too.

I don’t care for censorship and trigger warnings, either (probably why the kids think we’re so inappropriate). I don’t believe in walking on eggshells because you want to appeal to everyone and then making sure you only make content that everyone will like. We’ve all walked different paths and have seen the world through different eyes – blogging is for everyone and, for me, the point is to be real. Why would I want to read a carefully curated piece of work that serves to be the same as… everything else? Some people have been able to live a nice, easy life; others have seen the horrors and want to share with the class

I want to read about what people are thinking, I want to read about personal experiences and all the little things that make their lives (and writing) different from everyone else’s. I want it to be accidentally adorned with their own personal flair and I don’t want it to be so censored. Thoughts can be ugly when they’re not censored, and it seems we’re scared of that.

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