Keira's Bookmark

The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim

‘To Those who Appreciate Wistaria and Sunshine. Small medieval castle on the shores of the Mediterranean to be let For the month of April, above a bay on the Italian Riviera.’ 

Four very different women–the dishevelled and downtrodden Mrs Wilkins, the sad, sweet-faced Mrs Arbuthnot, the formidable widow Mrs Fisher, and the ravishing socialite Lady Caroline Dester–are drawn to the shores of the Mediterranean that April. As each, in turn, blossoms in the warmth of the Italian spring and finds their spirits stirring, quite unexpected changes occur.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

It’s been centuries since the robots of Panga gained self-awareness and laid down their tools; centuries since they wandered, en masse, into the wilderness, never to be seen again; centuries since they faded into myth and urban legend.

One day, the life of a tea monk is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honour the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of “what do people need?” is answered.

But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how.

They’re going to need to ask it a lot.

Small Hours by Valérie Minelli

Not atmospheric, but cosy! These perfectly poignant webcomics find inspiration in the everyday, encompassing rainy coffee mornings, playful relationship adventures, and quiet introspective moments. The small, unexpected minutes that quilt life together.

Hodongseorakgi: Travelogue of Kim Keum-Won

1830s, Korea: Aged 14, Kim Keum-won wants to explore the world before she grows up enough to become a man’s wife, or concubine, or gisaeng. Being ill often since she was little, her father decided to give her a man’s education in the classics rather than a woman’s education of needlework and household duties, and she longed to visit the landscapes she had read about. Convincing her parents to let her go, she dresses as a boy and sets out on a trip to the various beauties of natural Korea. This is her travelogue. [Memoir]

Under the Earth, Over the Sky by Emily McCosh

An ancient king born before the history of men finds a dying baby and takes him. But in the lands of Látwill, where winds carry fae across the star-strewn sky and the woods ensnare the weak-minded with their sinister song, even the King is susceptible to the will of the immortal mountains. Magic long-tethered to the King’s soul begins to crumble, unknown shadows and monsters of mirrored glass encroach upon the borders, and the King’s fragile human son is really very fragile.

Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao

On a backstreet in Tokyo lies a pawnshop where those who are lost can pawn their life choices and deepest regrets. Hana wakes on her first morning as its new owner to find her father missing and a choice stolen – something the rulers of this other world cannot allow. With the help of a rather strange physicist who offers help rather than asking for it, Hana must travel through rain puddles and on the backs of paper cranes through a mystical world in search of her father, the stolen choice, and the truth.

The White Book by Han Kang

While on a writer’s residency, a nameless narrator wanders the twin white worlds of the blank page and snowy Warsaw. THE WHITE BOOK is a meditation on the colour white, as well as a fictional journey inspired by an older sister who died in her mother’s arms, a few hours old. The narrator grapples with the tragedy that has haunted her family, an event she colours in stark white–breast milk, swaddling bands, the baby’s rice cake-coloured skin–and then visits all that glows in her memory: from a white dog to sugar cubes. 

The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern

Zachary Ezra Rowlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a story from his own childhood in a strange book tucked away in the library. Desperate to figure out how this is possible, Zachary uncovers as series of clues that lead him, finally through a doorway to a subterranean library below the surface, home not only to books but lost cities and seas, love notes that travel across time, and stories of the dead. But there are those who seek the destruction of this other-worldly archive.

The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry

Victorian England: Newly widowed, Cora leaves London with her son and nanny/friend for a visit to coastal Essex seeking refuge in fresh air and open space. She arrives to a rumour: after nearly 300 years, the mythical Essex Serpent has returned and taken a life. A keen amateur naturalist with no patience for religion or superstition, Cora thinks this might be a new species. Eager to investigate, she is introduced to the local vicar who is also suspicious of the rumours, but thinks they are caused by moral panic.

The Ninth Child by Sally Magnusson

1850s Scotland: Isabel’s doctor husband had been assigned to the Loch Katrine waterworks. It’s no place for a lady, but maybe this wild place can bring her some consolation after a series of miscarriages that have denied her motherhood. But as life quickens within her again, a darker presence is also emerging. Maybe the navvies were right to worry about digging too deep and disturbing the land of faery.