A Summer of Impossible Things by Rowan Coleman

Time travel in stories has always been one of my biggest bugbears. I have vague memories of a teacher warning my young self away from using time travel as a way to "correct" plot points in stories, so wonder whether those early warnings may have been the seed to my dislike. I feel differently about...

Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

I found Stumbling on Happiness to be a fascinating insight into the way our brains are programmed. As someone who is studying code, I couldn't help but think of navigating our brains' inner workings as akin to working with a large legacy code base. This particular code base is brilliant and works magnificently, though we...

The Collected Works of A. J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin

We have a disenchanted widower, a baby abandoned at the doorstep of his bookstore, and an unlucky-in-love sales representative who takes an immediate dislike to the store's snarky owner. Along the way we meet an assortment of other characters in the remote island where the story's set, all of whom tie into the theme of...

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

I remember my first introduction to the work of Cheryl Strayed. It was in Florida, 2018, when she spoke at my company's annual retreat. I was struck by the questions and emotions that her work conjured. I saw my colleagues open up about their experiences of love and loss in a way I hadn't expected....

The Bone Sparrow by Zana Fraillon

It only took a few pages for me to fall in love with Subhi, an innocent, wildly imaginative, 10-year old refugee. Subhi was born in a permanent detention centre in Australia. We quickly learn that his spirit cannot be confined, as the Night Sea delivers gifts from his Father, while the faraway whales sing out...

The Binding by Bridget Collins

With The Binding, Collins conjures up a world that's somewhat reminiscent of a 19th century England, with a twist. In this world, people's deepest, darkest memories can be found written in the pages of books. It is the book binders who free people of their unwanted memories and transfer them, making both binders and books...