People who returned to reading books for pleasure later in life have been telling Express how rediscovering the habit has improved their lives, as part of the National Year of Reading.
Sharon Hurel (53), from Guernsey, was a regular reader up until she was 16, but fell out of the habit when the demands of work, marriage and raising children took over.
But, last year’s collapse of airline Blue Islands had an unexpected silver lining – prompting Mrs Hurel to take up reading again.
She was returning from holiday with her daughter, Chloe, late last year when they got “stuck for a couple of days in Southampton” as a knock-on consequence of Blue Islands’ closure.
The pair went into an airport newsagents when Chloe – a keen reader – picked up a book and said: “Oh, mum I’ve heard this one is really good – I think it’d be right up your line.”
Mrs Hurel, an accountant, read the back cover blurb and thought: “Yeah, this is something I could do – I could read.”
‘Switch off and relax’
Since that first book, ‘Wild Love’ by Elsie Silver, Mrs Hurel has read seven more books and now looks forward to reading before bed as it helps her “switch my mind off to the world” and relax.
While she normally reads romances, her favourite book since she restarted has been ‘The Thursday Murder Club’, by Richard Osman, adding: “It was really good – it’s not my normal genre, but I got into it.”
Marketing professional Alice, from Jersey – not her real name – “used to love reading” until her early teens, but a “heavy focus on skim reading” during her GCSEs left her struggling with novels.
She said teachers encouraged her to quickly “pluck out the relevant information” for exams, at the expense of reading stories, and found herself “struggling” to read for pleasure.
“I don’t want to blame the education system, but it affected me – as well as many of my school friends,” she added.
However, starting a role at one of the island’s major media organisations rekindled something in her.
“I ended up reconditioning my brain because I had to read in a very specific way, I had to read slowly and with intention to be able to write about whatever it was.”
After she left the firm, she found herself “craving the want to read” so went into a charity shop to pick up some classic novels, like ‘The Great Gatsby’ and ‘Gulliver’s Travels’.
“These are books I would never have considered reading a few years ago,” she said.
“That’s wonderful, but I also, kind of, mourn this period where I wasn’t reading.”
Guernsey-born Aimée Curzon was already a regular reader when she challenged herself to read more books in 2023 – after seeing a friend on social media say he’d read 25 in a year.
“I thought, ‘I could do that and then some,'” she explained.
“So, I set myself a challenge to read 100 books in a year – and I did 102.”
‘Like telling a story’
“Some days I’ve been known to finish a book, read a whole other book, and then start another,” she added.
Miss Curzon works as a Senior Client Relationship Manager in the finance industry, and says she loves the storytelling aspect of her role.
She explained that “writing all the minutes” of meetings was “like telling a story – I love it”.
If 102 books in a year sounds like a lot, how about 135?
That’s how many Mrs Hurel’s daughter, Chloe Browning (24), read last year.
Her secret? Read “short and crap” books, which give her brain a rest from the demands of her day job – in the IT department of Guernsey’s airline, Aurigny.
‘Like trash TV’
Miss Browning mainly reads “girl fantasy” novels, such as fantasy romance and romance set in dystopian futures.
“It’s like trash TV,” she added.
Miss Browning had “basically stopped reading” as a teenager in favour of video games like Minecraft.
However, money pressures as a student encouraged her to take up reading again as she couldn’t afford to “just buy a new video game every week because I was bored”.
Miss Browning explained: “I’d been given a new Kindle for Christmas when I was about 20 and it’s only £9 a month for Kindle Unlimited, so I could download as many books as I wanted.”
Being dyslexic, e-books give her more flexibility to change things like fonts and background colours.
She also has hypermobility, so holding physical books gives her “lots of cramps” in her wrists because of the extra weight.
It was “a bit ironic that we were stuck in an airport” when she “recommended mum a book, given I work for a rival of the airline that went bust”, Miss Browning said.
But where did she get her own recommendations?
“TikTok and Facebook groups mainly”, as well as reading apps – like Goodreads and Book Tracker.
No shame
Her favourite “trashy” novels include the ‘Fourth Wing’ series, by Rebecca Yarros, while she also enjoys “deeper” reads like Pierce Brown’s ‘Red Rising’ saga from time to time.
Lots of women in their mid 20s were “rediscovering reading on TikTok”, as she had done, Miss Browning said.
So, what would she say to anyone considering reigniting their reading habit?
“There’s no shame in picking up books again – and there’s no shame in reading stupid books.”