10 books you need to read this autumn

September 26, 2026 by kkamilah Leave a comment

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:

Everything I thought about this month: August

September 2, 2026 by kkamilah Leave a comment

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

As long as you do not stop

November 27, 2025 by kkamilah Leave a comment

If you haven’t read my previous post, go ahead and do that, because it’ll hopefully give you a good insight into the state of my brain at any given moment, firsthand. It may explain why I write the way I do (or, if you know me, act the way I do). You might be surprised. You might not be. You might have already diagnosed me. It’s 2025 and everyone’s autistic!

Back when I was a teenager spending as many free hours after school as possible carefully curating my Tumblr, I had this stupid Confucius quote seared into my brain a little more each time I created a new post (and, for an angsty teenaged youth, this was often).

“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop”

You can’t hurt me, my tote bag is falling down my arm

February 6, 2025 by kkamilah Leave a comment

A love letter to winter.

I gaily (but quietly, I hope) skipped down the stairs at 5:30am this morning. I put on my trainers, I filled up my water bottle. I fumbled around for my house key which, regrettably, is still only attached to one tiny keyring (Lego Voldemort) and slips away from my fingers much too easily, especially when I am wearing a glove.

My eyes flicked mechanically over to the CCTV screen (as it does prior to any time I leave the house, in case there’s a murderer waiting for me) and I immediately did a double take: I could only see a spectral wooosh of blurred white.

I walked back over to the window and peeled aside the netting to find that the street was covered in a thick blanket of fog. Nice, I thought. I checked myself – surely I should have recoiled? Surely I should be grimacing and clutching my chest and saying ‘what is this? I should be asleep. I can’t do it.’? But I wasn’t. There was no plea to return to the warm sanctity of my bed. There was simply alertness in my brain and elation in my heart: I was genuinely happy to be leaving the house. Whilst I have never been one to begrudge the dawn (I’ve always been an early bird, even when it’s dark), I sensed a change from the difficult mornings I had a few weeks ago as my body adjusted. I realised, in the gradual arrival of the end of the year, I had been factory reset to my default setting.

How I’m making 2024 last longer

January 15, 2024 by kkamilah Leave a comment

…

Happy new year! It’s still appropriate to say that, right?

January is grey and bleak. You’re broke, fat, depressed, and severely conscious of how far away you are from whatever goals you set 365 days ago, and the 365 before that. You can’t fathom where the entire previous year went; it all feels like a blur that passed you by far too quickly, and you’re desperate to go back in time to savour each and every minute you let waste away. But you can’t.

Cue the blues.

This is a feeling that, sadly, escapes almost none of us. No matter how fully you have lived, no matter how happy you are with how you spent the year, you’re always left with that gut-punching feeling of time is slipping from me. It’s painfully obvious that there’s only one solution to this, because unfortunately nobody has come into possession of Bernard’s watch:

Make the decision to live slowly and more consciously.

You can’t go back and relive those precious days, but you can do something with your newfound self-awareness. I like to think I do this already, but, in my desperate attempt, I actually end up doing the opposite.

My mind is always going at a thousand miles an hour and I wring my days dry until I’ve squeezed out every minute. The result is that I don’t feel like I’ve truly been living; I’ve simply ticked a lot of boxes off my to-do lists. In trying to be productive every day, I’ve ultimately made a full time job out of living in which I must fill a quota in order to be satisfied with how my day went. Wake up. Go to the gym. Go to work. Read this many pages. Go to the park on that day. These days don’t add up to a successful period of living: they are confined to what they are, which is a day of robotically doing things I pencilled in just to feel like I am making use of my time. I need to stop clocking in and out of my life and just live.

I am obsessed with poring over my calendar to make sure every waking minute is filled with useful things — but I don’t want to just have useful days. Those aren’t memorable. Reading and writing and a hundred walks through Richmond Park are not memorable; it is not the act itself that we remember, but the memories we attach to them. It’s the lessons in strength and perseverance that hundreds of characters have displayed in varying ways, it’s learning how to get our thoughts down on paper in creative ways, it’s when we stepped ankle deep in mud to get close to the deer and had to put our shoes into plastic bags before getting into my car. My point is, you should be living life and relishing both the ups and downs rather than letting it pass you by.

The way you do this will be personal to you. You should know how to ground yourself, you will know what makes you feel present and alive. It doesn’t have to be something monumental; it could be as small as sitting outside for ten minutes a day or as big as spending a weekend swimming in the ocean every month.

For me, it is the following:

A Letter to the Influencer Who Thinks I Can Do Pilates at 1pm

January 9, 2024 by kkamilah Leave a comment

Hi babybotoxlifter,

I hope this letter finds you in the midst of a groundbreaking, spirit-awakening culinary creation involving oats. Just thought I’d take some time out of my day to write to you; I’m exhausted after spending nine hours in front of a computer screen, so apologies if you see any typos.

First, let me start by expressing my deepest admiration for your morning routine, your ability to redefine breakfast entirely. The way you do it is so *chefs kiss*; from the freshest ingredients straight from Waitrose, to the way you ethereally put the dish together. I would never have thought it could improve my mental health to slow right down and take the time to procure a healthy, nutritious bowl; your invention of turmeric oats with lashings of agave syrup, hemp seeds and dragon fruit seems nothing short of a masterpiece that makes for a transcendental experience. And well done for discovering cinnamon sprinkled over apples – ground-breaking! I don’t believe anybody has thought of anything so innovative before, so thank you for showing us all about it in your perfectly posed selfie video.

Unfortunately, as I peel my eyelids apart and stumble out of bed at 5:30am, my morning is less magical. Most days I can only muster a quick, sad, film-topped coffee before I jolt out of the door to catch a train that smells of sweaty gym socks. Sometimes I manage buttered toast, if I’m feeling fancy.

I also applaud your commitment to dragging yourself away from the comfort of your post-breakfast reading time in your perfectly made cream bed to then reposition your camera in your pilates studio. Your very own pilates studio! I wish I didn’t have to share a gym with sweaty men who grunt during every rep. When the clock strikes 1pm, I am not donned in a cute, matching gym set. Instead, I find myself sat at a hot desk (that I had to book three weeks ago to secure, mind you!) convincing myself this £5 prawn cocktail sandwich from M&S was worth sacrificing a flat white from Caffe Nero for the office beans. In this moment, I am not gracefully extending opposing legs and arms and letting go of all negative thoughts. Instead, I find myself thinking this could have been an email. I could have been spared the torture of being trapped in a conversation about your children if you had just emailed me but saying ‘oh, I can’t believe it’s Monday again already! Honestly, where does the time go.’