Comfort books, are books you have ready many times and can curl up with again and again. Mine have taken me through bouts of sadness, illness, and grief. They are books I keep returning to for a laugh or a pick me up. A small thread.

McCarthy's Bar and the Road to McCarthy by Pete McCarthy, hilarious and unputdownable travelougues. They paint a wonderful picture of the places the writer visits and Irish Heritage.

The Razor's Edge William Somerset Maugham. Not generally considered his best book, but such a wonderful portrait of human relationships, desire and what it means to find yourself.

Terry Pratchett’s Lords and Ladies. (Frankly his whole body of work), but Lords and Ladies was what got me hooked on to Terry Pratchett. Among its charms, the beautiful dissection of the concept of ‘Glamour’.

Jane Austen. Though Pride and Prejudice is the universal favourite, I love to read Sense and Sensibility quite as much.

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. It’s the beautiful descriptions of Manderely that get me, and the heroine that overanalyses every little all the time.

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, David Sedaris. Perhaps the funniest author I have read. His ‘When you are engulfed in flames’ is also an instant pick me up.

This thread isn’t an exhaustive list of my comfort books, and certainly doesn’t do justice to the many brilliant books that I love dearly and the writers (Indian particularly) whose work i enjoy reading.

But these books are the intellectual equivalent of eating warm rice with salt and a dollop of ghee in it. Hope those of you under lockdown can pick up a few and hope they give you the joy they have given me.