Top 10 Tuesday 2nd June

Hello and welcome back to another edition of Top 10 Tuesday! Originally created and hosted by The Broke & the Bookish, Top 10 Tuesday now lives with Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. It features a different literary theme each week and this week we are talking about…..

Books That Give Winter Vibes!

I am in the Southern Hemisphere, so we welcomed winter yesterday, unfortunately. I’m not a winter person, I don’t like cold weather at all and I feel the cold a lot. A lot of people would probably feel our winter isn’t really that bad – and it isn’t really, I guess! It doesn’t snow where I live, rarely gets below 0 and usually only at night time, but it’s what you’re used to, isn’t it? And I grew up 1500km (about 1000 miles) north of here, where it’s quite tropical and the winters are much warmer. It’s taken me a long time to acclimatise but I still don’t like it.

I do like reading wintery books though! Some of my favourite settings are places like Antarctica and Alaska, places that are really different to me weather wise. I always feel like places where you get snowed in are such great settings for a book. So here are some books that I think give some winter vibes….some I’ve read, some I just got the vibes from the cover.

The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel. This book’s cover gives me really strong winter vibes. The hotel in the title is a massive structure on a secluded island accessible only by boat somewhere in Vancouver. It seems like the sort of place where the winters would be long – very The Shining type of thing.

The Christmas Lights by Karen Swan. I read this recently as well and it’s very wintery! It revolves around the desire of a couple to winter in Norway on a secluded farm, where you can either get a boat across, be lifted in via chopper or reach it via snowmobile. Karen Swan’s books seem to have either winter vibes, like this one and be set somewhere snowy and isolated or they’re very summery and set in places like on a Greek island or in Rome in summer. They’re amazing for escape, no matter which one floats your boat.

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey. I’ve owned this book for so long and I haven’t read it yet! I’m not sure why, it’s set in Alaska – one of my favourite places. There are some truly stunning covers, this is the one I have and it definitely feels very wintery and I’m sure the story is as well!

The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Probably the first book I ever read that gave off ‘winter vibes’. I remember reading this, watching the BBC {I think?} mini series when I was about 10 and being in awe of all the snow when Lucy first steps through into Narnia.

The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley. Set mostly in a castle atop a cliff in Scotland, this book has loads of winter vibes! Scotland has some brutal winters (actually, to be honest, their summers seem pretty brutal as well, to this Aussie. I keep reading about how the average high in some places in summer is about 16*C) and those rugged cliffs looking out to grey, savage seas probably have a winter vibe most of the year!

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond. I honestly don’t know anything about this book other than the fact that it’s set in Antarctica and revolves around two people who study penguins. But the cover is amazing. Looks like Aurora australis at it’s most beautiful. This has two of my favourite things – Antarctica and penguins, so I feel like it should go on my TBR asap.

Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater. It’s been a long time since I’ve read this…..*checks notes* 2010 actually! So almost 10 years. But when I saw this prompt, it was actually one of the first books that popped into my head, so the cover and it’s overall atmosphere has definitely stayed with me!

Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer. I have been meaning to read this for a while now – ever since I watched a movie about a disastrous Everest climb, which Krakauer has also written a book about, called Into Thin Air. I looked him up then and discovered this book, about a man who hitchhiked to Alaska and then walked alone into the wilderness to start a new life.

Dash & Lily’s Book Of Dares by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan. I read this one a long time ago as well but it’s also a book that springs to mind when I think of winter. It’s a sweet story with a real NY winter vibe to it. Because I’m in Australia, Christmas for me is a summer thing – I’ve never known any other way. We are used to the beach, BBQs, salads, swimming etc as our Christmas thing but most of the Christmas books I read are set in the Northern Hemisphere, so are full of snow and eggnog.

Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak. I haven’t read this either but I’ve owned it for a number of years. It’s Russian, and basically anything Russian gives me winter vibes because when you think cold, Russia is one of the places that comes to mind.  So many Russian novels seem to be about suffering, whilst in the middle of one of the harshest climates in the world. It’s the sort of winter I don’t want to experience!

Got anything else you think I should read to add to my winter vibe feel, now that it is actually winter here? Let me know!

 

 

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