Welcome back to Book Break!
I am sitting here today in one of my favourite bookshops, and one of the quirkiest bookshops
in London
Word on the Water, which is actually on a barge.
And I am here today because we are talking about our favourite quirky books!
These are some of my favourite types of books to read
Really unusual, hard to describe ones, so I'm going to give them a go.
So to start with, let's kick things off with another favourite subgenre: books about books.
So this is The Girl Who Reads on the Metro
which is a gorgeous translated book, translated from the French
about a woman named Juliet, living in Paris, who every day rides the metro
and observes the people around her and what they're reading, and tries to guess little
clues about their lives from what they're reading.
And one day, she meets a very mysterious man who offers her a job as a passeur, which means
that it's her job to pass on the perfect book to somebody at the exact right time of their
life.
So it's all about the power that books have to change people's lives, a perfect one for
book-lovers.
So next I've got a really magical book, this is The Nightjar by Deborah Hewitt
which is about a woman named Alice, who all of her life has been haunted by these visions
of mysterious birds.
And one day, a man named Crowley shows up at her door, and tells her that the birds
she's been seeing are actually nightjars
which are these magical birds that guard our souls.
And so her visions are actually this really rare magical talent that she has.
And Crowley wants her to use this gift to help him hunt down other magically gifted
people.
And so their journey takes them through this amazing alternate London, with its own dangerous
magical world.
This is a really unique book.
Now this next one is fab, this is the Astro Poets book.
So the Astro Poets are a Twitter phenomenon.
They are two successful poets, who both have a genuine passion for astrology, and so they've
been combining these two things into a very popular Twitter account
where they have these absolutely hilarious tweets about astrology.
And now they've got a whole book!
So I've been learning so much about my star sign, which is Gemini.
Mainly that everyone seems to hate us
but also it says that we're charming, so I'll take that.
So this is a really fresh approach to astrology, which has been making me laugh out loud as
I read it.
Next, I've got a gorgeous one, this is another translated book, this time translated from
Japanese.
This is Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi.
So this is a very quirky little book, set in a time travelling cafe in Tokyo.
So customers can visit the cafe to travel in time, but there are very specific rules.
They have to sit in one specific chair to do it, they can only go back and visit someone
who has already been to the cafe, and they must return to the present before their coffee
gets cold.
And it's sort of divided into four main sections, following four of the different customers
who come to the cafe to travel back in time, and what their reasons are.
And it's so sweet, and so moving.
It's a tear-jerker, but it's also just like such a fun quirky little book, with characters
you'll fall in love with
and you'll completely fall in love with the cafe as its own character as well.
So this next one is by Frances Hardinge, so you always know these are going to be quirky
This is Deeplight, which is about a world that used to be ruled by these cruel gods,
that have now died, and relics of the gods are scattered underneath the ocean.
And so we follow two teenage boys, Hark and Jelt, who go on dives to try and find relics
of the gods that they can sell.
But on one particular dive, they come across something much more dangerous than either
of them had bargained for.
So it's really magical and fantastical, but also super dark, definitely one for someone
looking for something a little bit different.
Now The Life-Changing Manga of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo, I just read this all in one
go, and it sparked so much joy!
So Marie Kondo, as I'm sure you know, is the author of the massively popular The Life-Changing
Magic of Tidying Up, and the star of that Netflix show
where she shows people how to tidy up their homes and only keep the things that spark
joy for them.
And The Life-Changing Manga of Tidying Up is a story about a young woman who lives in
this incredibly messy flat
where she's just surrounded by all of the relics of her past hobbies that she's taken
up and tried and given up, and also the ghosts of past relationships.
And she's kind of lost track a bit of who she is and what she wants out of life.
But then Marie Kondo appears, and shows her how to tidy up her life, and discover a bit
along the way about who she is.
And it's also a love story.
It's really adorable, and it's got little hints along the way about how to tidy up your
own house and your own life, so it's really inspired me to go home and Marie Kondo my
own house.
Now this one, Diary of a Somebody, is such a quirky book.
So this is by the Twitter poet Brian Bilston, that's a fake name, nobody knows who he really
is, but he does run this Twitter account.
And then the novel is about a Twitter poet called Brian Bilston.
The character of Brian Bilston is a complete mess, basically.
His poems are brilliant, and so kind of relatable and accessible and funny,
and as the year goes on he gets into all sorts of scrapes,
like at one point becoming a suspect in a murder.
It's just one of the strangest and most ridiculous but brilliant books I've read this year.
Now a book that I read years ago, but it's really stuck with me because it's just such
an unusual premise
is The Notable Brain of Maximilian Ponder by J.W. Ironmonger.
So this is about a guy called Maximilian Ponder who decides to write down everything he knows.
He wants to make a catalogue of the human brain, and he thinks it will take him about
three years to write down all of his knowledge.
But of course the project just goes on and on for decades, because he just knows so much
stuff, and also keeps getting new information,
so slowly he holes himself away in his house, with the windows closed, to try and not let
any new information in
so that he can just make a complete catalogue of what his brain was full of when he started
the project.
So his only contact with the outside world is through his childhood best friend, and
it's through the best friend's eyes that we watch the story unfold.
And it's completely bizarre!
And my final quirky read has maybe the most unusual viewpoint of any book I've ever read.
Nutshell by Ian McEwan is a Hamlet retelling, from the point of view of a foetus inside
the body of a woman plotting a murder.
So the foetus is the sole witness.
And the foetus is just this ridiculously intelligent, articulate, rather snobby character, who's
got all these views on the world that's waiting for him outside.
Nutshell is very funny, very weird, definitely worth checking out.
So those are some of my favourite quirky, unusual reads, but do leave a comment because
I just love books like this, so I definitely want to hear your favourites.
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Coming up next week we're talking about our favourite cosy Autumn reads.
And of course do come and check out Word on the Water for a really quirky, unusual book
shopping experience.
See you next time.