(I made this post’s featured image using Adobe Firefly’s AI generator. To see the prompt, check out the alt text. I was rather amused, myself, since I was provided with Asian and Black versions too, after not specifying any particular race or ethnicity.) Anyway, on to the post!
One of my favorite fall and winter activities is cozying up with a book while I’m nice and warm indoors—and if I’m truly in need of comfort, I’ll often turn to a much-loved title and give it a re-read.
This is something I’ve done since I was a child, actually. There were certain books I turned to again and again—because I loved them; because they felt safe, like an old friend; because I could escape into them; because I felt as if the stories themselves understood me in a way I couldn’t articulate. In some fundamental way they had become real, and I wanted to inhabit that reality for a while.
I wanted to become part of the story, too.
Instead of being stuck at my dad’s during a required visitation after my parents divorced, I wanted to be James rolling away inside a giant peach, away from Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker, going on adventures and finding friends who understood me. Instead of being plain old boring me, I wanted there to be something special about me. A psychic power like in The Girl with the Silver Eyes. (Don’t ask how many times I attempted in vain to move things with my mind.) The ability to commune with dolphins like in A Ring of Endless Light. There were so many more, too.
I also re-read books when I wanted to laugh.
There have been so many of those over the years. Anything Roald Dahl. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Good Omens. Numerous compilations of Bloom County and Life in Hell.
I still re-read books when I’m in need of comfort. There are so, so many wonderful books that I’ve read over the years since my childhood and teen years, books which have been become loved and treasured. Books that I turn to when I don’t feel like reading anything else. Books that I want to hug close to my heart. Books that are more than just this one writer’s inspiration—that bring me somewhere compelling and vivid, that turn me into someone compelling and vivid, even if just for those minutes spent reading.
At the moment, I’m re-reading Connie Willis’s Oxford Time Travel books. This is my first actual re-read of these, and it just felt like the right time, as it were. (I’m glad I didn’t re-read Doomsday Book during the Pandemic, though…IYKYK.) I’ve re-read ALL of Tamora Pierce’s series multiple times. I’ve been through the Graceling books at least twice now. (Girls Who Kick Ass is evidently a theme I find comforting.) I’ve been through the President’s Daughter series a few times, most recently last month. I dip back into the occasional Diana Wynne Jones; doesn’t matter which. Any and all are terrific.
So there you go.
What are your go-to comfort re-reads?
