20 books to read in your 20s *fiction*

it was the best of times it was the worst of times welcome to your 20s and that is the last you'll be hearing from charles dickens in this video trust me some people refer to your 20s as the defining decade for me so far it's been the declining decade no i'm kidding we're thriving but i did go for a family dinner very recently where one of my relatives turned to me mid-conversation and they were like jack you know what i love about you you have absolutely no direction and you're just enjoying it and if that doesn't just sum up my twenties so far i don't know what will listen i'm gonna cut us some slack because a whole pandemic happened during our twenties the lion the witch and the audacity of this [ __ ] to happen during our twenties and not in like the olden times i want to be reading about covid in history textbooks not on my twitter feed the roaring twenties were looking a little bit like the boring twenties for a minute there but we're back on track but i recently saw an article online where they were talking about friends and how in the first series of friends the tv show the characters are like 24 and it's not until a whole decade later that they have their [ __ ] together and they're getting married having kids making sensible life choices and you know what i found that very reassuring to know i'm just in the first season of friends and so today i wanted to recommend you some books that i think are perfect for reading in your 20s whether that's because they depict a character who is in their 20s and is therefore very relatable or just because the book covers themes that i think are very pertinent and relevant to your 20s now i'm 23 so i guess that's still considered kind of early 20s although i turned 24 in october and then 25 next year which means i will be in the overs category on the x factor not that i can sing i am actually tone deaf but that's worrying for me that is spiraling me into an existential crisis it makes me feel violently sick projectile so to distract myself from that here are some great fictional books that you can read number one is this book right here this is cleopatra and frankenstein by coco mello's cleo is a british woman in her twenties living in new york and on the way home from this night out she meets a charming older guy named frank they walk home together have this instant spark this instant energy this instant attraction and very shortly afterwards they decide to get married because cleo needs a green card from that point this book is just about how their lives are ruptured by that decision and how this one relatively spontaneous decision both makes and destroys them and the people around them there's a huge cast of characters who are all experiencing their own thing they're all encountering their own dramas and dilemmas on a daily basis and i just think this perfectly depicts and represents the myriad experiences that people will go through in their 20s and also beyond we also have lots of people with very different financial situations which again i think is very accurate for a friendship circle at that age there's a lot of knowing of not knowing of mental health and self-awareness of meaningless and meaningful sex and i think the book goes on for maybe just a little bit too long but it is great and i enjoyed getting to walk a mile in each character's shoes especially there's this one character called eleanor who you're just gonna fall in love with and yeah i think it was interesting to consider what goes on in each person's individual life behind closed doors within a circle of friends no matter how kind of tenuous their connections and links are the next book that i wanted to talk about is this one this is less and this is by andrew sean greer now hear me out because if you've read this one you'll know that this is actually about a man who is about to turn 50. however however stay with me here this book explores the constant process of aging in a very fascinating way and it's sort of about how having the wrong attitudes in your 20s and your 30s your 40s end up impacting you later on in life and so sort of following this character and seeing what a detrimental impact his attitudes in his 20s had on his later life i think you can actually take away quite a lot even if you're not anywhere near 50. so this book is about a struggling writer a struggling human to be honest who has just found out that his ex-boyfriend is getting married because he receives an invitation in the post in order to avoid confronting his problems very relatable when you're in your 20s he travels the world instead again very relatable coming to you from my apartment in paris i will warn you this is a slow burn at first but the payoff is huge and it's one of those books where the tone completely makes sense by the time you get to the end even though it might have been confusing at first i want to make a joke about the title less but i honestly couldn't recommend this more so there you go now something else that i highly recommend is actually the sponsor of today's video and that is skillshare as i'm discussing in this video your 20s are all about self-improvement self-development and investing in yourself and the person that you want to be now whether you're finished or finishing formal education that does not mean it's time to stop learning and cultivating the skills you currently have and also learning new ones and this is where skillshare comes in because skillshare is a platform for curious and creative people with literally hundreds of courses designed and curated by experts for you i recently took this course it's called happy house plants caring for your plants and it's hosted by chris sach who is a botanist at the sill because one thing i can guarantee about your 20s you're going to be surrounded by houseplants it's the only interior design that i know but while you're trying to thrive it's nice if the houseplants are you know living and you're not surrounded by a kind of succulent graveyard as with all skillshare classes this is divided up into manageable chunks and the fact that it's online means you can do it at your own pace and so if you'd like to join a huge learning community over at skillshare and learn new skills from photography to creative writing to animation you're in luck because the first 1 000 people to click the link in the description box down below will get a free one month trial of skillshare premium it's time to grow like your monstera that line works better in my head not gonna lie next book is open water by caleb zuma nelson oh my lord i love this book so freaking much open water is the most moving and tender and raw portrayal of a young black man in his twenties if you love music this book literally sings with musical references it's like completely soundtracked with music and it discusses the intimacies and the uncertainties of the early stages of a relationship and also the process of falling in love and i do think that in your 20s and maybe forever it does feel like falling there is this sense of the fall of being vulnerable and giving yourself over to someone else and not knowing whether where you land will be soft or shattering and i just think this book captures that anxiety perfectly but this book is also about another kind of anxiety and that is the anxiety of the black body caleb zuma nelson discusses the experience of being a black man specifically in britain but i think it is very international too talking about microaggressions talking about police brutality i think this is six out of five stars an absolute must-read so lyrical so poetic the most stunning prose ever and i will continue to shove it down everyone's throat whether they like it or not you might as well read it book number four is luster by raven lalani okay not gonna lie i am noticing a theme here and that is that a lot of these books are about sex but you know what we're embracing it let's talk about sex baby lustre is this stunning portrait of a woman who is having an affair with an older married man and she actually ends up moving into his house with his wife's consent her interactions with this man's daughter are so interesting and it's introspective and gritty and just absolutely spellbinding again this is a book about money issues the character is initially living in a very run-down kind of horrible apartment it's about doing what you can to make ends meet and raven lilani writes with such razor sharpness she did what needed to be done this is one of those books where not a lot happens in terms of the plot but the prose like the writing is just captivating it's gorgeous so luster by raven ilani is number four number five is writers and lovers by lily king this is a book about a woman who is a writer and she's been working on her novel for about six years and so to keep herself afloat whilst doing that she's been working as a waitress i loved how unashamedly this book approached dating the character is dating multiple people all at once and i love that for her live your life like you're in love island casa or more why not it kind of focuses on tough realities but also finds humor in the everyday and it feels like a love letter to the art of writing of dating of surviving of not knowing this book discusses grief and loss and there are some absolutely beautiful lines it's about art and life and love and uncertainty and i loved reading a book about someone who doesn't necessarily have a concrete plan but they do have ambitions and goals and they kind of know who they are because as we've discussed as my relatives have discussed just like liam payne i no longer have one direction so writers and lovers everyone number six is similar ish to the last one because there are a lot of overlapping themes this is yabba buena by nina liqueur again one of the characters is a waitress and one of the characters has also lost their mother this time however we have two different women who have each confronted their fair share of trauma and grief and are on their own individual journeys before eventually they meet and their parts cross and i liked that i liked that each person had their own stuff going on and it's about how they complement each other as two whole complete beings rather than like two halves to a whole the book is quite fast-paced it's almost like a supercar of their lives i do think that means that some details are lost and i sometimes wish it lingered a little bit longer on those but it's a great book if you're looking for something to just absolutely fly through lots of very relatable themes if you're in your 20s but like i said i really enjoyed how these two characters had their own backstories before kind of their lives intertwined so if you're looking for a static romance this is that number seven beautiful world where are you i could have recommended any sally rooney book for this video but i think this one just hits different this book is so damn validating i love sally rudy with my whole heart you know this and i will continue to recommend her books at any given opportunity but no video is more relevant for this than a video about books to read in your 20s i love how she writes characters and notices the small intricacies of human behavior i think her writing is so perceptive there's this dinner party scene right where not a lot really even happens it's just about four people sitting and having dinner together and i just thought it was the perfect representation of what it's like to be an adult and hang out with your adult friends and just have dinner in your house and the reality of being in your 20s that you won't always see your best friends all the time and you will be introduced to like your friends partners and stuff i just think it's a wonderful exploration of feeling intimidated and scared and overwhelmed by a lot of the negativity going on in the world and these huge profound big questions and yet still finding beauty in the small pleasures in life and the little things and in this book one of the characters is a writer and so sally rooney kind of talks about how a lot of people dismiss writing about things like sex and love and relationships and human communication and miscommunication because they see it as frivolous or unnecessary whereas really those are the things that we encounter and navigate and grapple with on a daily basis and so she basically says why shouldn't we talk about it why shouldn't we write about it why shouldn't we make art about the things that we experience there are also some really fascinating conversations about wealth and financial disparity especially there's one scene about like who is entitled to consider themselves working class and whether our notion of what working class means is actually still appropriate in today's economy so there are these bigger wider kind of societal conversations but also the intimacies of the everyday and i love that it also ends in the pandemic which gave me goosebumps no i think it's great that's a modern classic in my humble opinion but now let's go on to another classic and that is the picture of dorian gray this is oscar wilde's magnum opus i think it's about self-perception about youth about mortality about beauty and it includes the quote the aim of life is self-development to realize one's nature perfectly and i just think that's wonderful isn't that what your twenties are about it's a magnificent book i can't describe it with anything other than superlatives and i think maybe the less that you know going into this book the better because i would sell my soul to read that book again and if you've read the book then you know the irony of that sentence so moving on i missed it moving on to number nine assembly by natasha brown this is a stunning debut you're gonna get whiplash actually from how starkly different this is to the previous book that i just mentioned but we're all about range and assembly is this ultra contemporary tiny little book it's a portrait of modern britain and the experience of that space from someone who has always been told they don't belong in it despite doing everything she's always been told that she has to do you know get a good education get a well-paid job this is about a black british woman sort of reflecting on the fact that she still feels that britain is very hostile towards her the book is irreverent and bold and perceptive and there's also some brilliant scenes about meeting your partner's parents and what that is like which i think a lot of people will find very relatable this feels like a real snapshot of britain right now kind of presented in a series of electrifying vignettes so i'd highly recommend this book number ten and she is a ten ah this is norwegian word by haruki murakami this is just a dazzling book i love how murakami just transports you to a different world it's genuinely transcendent and if you listen to the song norwegian word by the beatles where this book gets its name that is exactly the vibe that murakami captured with this novel pretty sure that the characters were actually in their late teens because our central protagonist and the narrative voice is at university but i think that the themes that this book covers of mental health the first relationships of loneliness of coming of age are just chef's kiss however i will say if we're still with the chef uh he needs to give it a little pinch of salt because does murakami depict women kind of as just like tits on legs yes sometimes well a lot of the time but does he also kind of frame that through the male gaze and present young masculinity in a very interesting way also yes so i do think this book is fantastic to read in your 20s and it's just so whimsical and it will just transport you so enjoy okay to balance that out we're gonna go with the bell jar by sylvia plath this is the book to read in your 20s i think it's about a woman called esther on a scholarship in new york city kind of experiencing independence and that freedom for the first time and being left alone with her thoughts it's gorgeous and shattering and heartbreaking and poignant all at the same time and look there's a reason that this is such a cult classic it does contain multitudes of heavy topics like eating disorders and suicide but it's a book that you will never ever forget reading and from literally the opening line the writing is just stunning i think it's a book that everyone should read at some point so you might as well do it now right unless of course you find the themes too triggering always make sure you look them up before reading a book number 12 is vile bodies by evelyn war and this is a book all about the fast pace of our lives and the theory of speed it's this satirical novel about a group of young socialites in london in the 1920s and it's silly it's funny it's flamboyant it's one of my favorite books of all time and weirdly i keep coming back to this book because even though it was set a hundred years ago like a whole century ago i think it's actually even more relevant today than it was back then because it explores the pace of your life when you're that age and now in a digital age we're even more fast pacing on the go and we have this crazy information diet there's so much symbolism it's the kind of book that you immediately want to write an essay about and the ending has stayed with me forever and ever and ever i say at the ripe age of 23. anyways number 13 lucky number 13 in this case is the razor's edge by w somerset moore which is actually another book kind of about a bunch of socialites but this time set in paris i will warn you that this will make you want to book a flight to paris immediately and the book her follows about four or five people as they age and they grow all through a series of conversations with w somerset mum who is a character in the novel and the narrative voice it makes sense when you read it now these people who he interacts with over the years each kind of represent one or two desires and hopes that most people have in their lives so whether that's marriage or wealth or recognition or reaching the spiritual absolutes and essentially what most of them realize is that what they hoped for wasn't always what was best for them and the way things transpire isn't actually always satisfying or fulfilling so that's nice and depressing but the point is the realization of this often happens a little while after their 20s but again i think this is a book that's valuable to read now because it's sort of about the mistakes in attitudes that people have when they are a bit younger so yeah i thought it was great and now let's move on to two books that both kind of depict friendships in your 20s which i think are such a huge part of the experience firstly one last stop by casey mcquisten this is about a really vibrant and wonderful and supportive and tightly knit community of a kind of chosen family and these beautiful friendships that one person is able to make as a queer person in new york city the main point of this book really is this love story with like kind of fantasy it's about a woman who gets frozen in time on the new york subway and that was cute that was nice but for me the main thing i loved about this book was the friendships that the character forms yes there is kind of actual magic going on with that story but for me the real magic was in the bond that she has with her housemates the experience of living with other people is something that a lot of people will be able to relate to in their 20s and i think that this book is just testament to how much a good supportive group of friends can mean to you and how it can just completely revolutionize and change your experience of being this age so yeah it's very hopeful story about people just having your back and being there for you and i really liked it and then next we have queenie by candace carty williams this is about a woman who just keeps making terrible decisions and self-destructive moves just constantly she's very unlucky with love she's experiencing a very toxic side to dating and you know she's a flawed protagonist but she's trying her best and again like the previous book she's just surrounded by this brilliant group of people this book i think is a masterclass in writing peripheral characters like i find it so annoying when i read a book and the side characters just don't feel developed properly and they don't have a distinctive voice because i really think that being in your 20s is all about the people around you who enrich your lives not necessarily people you're in relationships with but also people have friendships with too this book however just captures it so well it is on point all hits no misses truly and it's also about kind of expectations and pressures put on you by your family and ultimately taking life at your own pace whether that's your career or your relationships because everyone is on their individual path so yeah i like this one number 16 out of 20 of books i think you should read in your 20s is the vanishing half by brit bennett okay so lots to unpack here but the primary story of this novel is actually about a set of twins who are black but can pass as white and they each make a decision one chooses to pass as white and one chooses to live her life as a black woman and it's sort of about how their lives diverge from that point but what i wanted to talk about is the fact that both of these women then have children and the children's perspectives which we then get are so brilliant because we also see how they then go on to navigate the world and so within one book we get two generations of people coming of age and it's really really powerful there's some great trans representation there are discussions of identity and belonging and your sense of self as well as just representing people in their 20s number 17 is on earth we're briefly gorgeous by ocean vong such a tender and emotional little novel i think that ocean vong is one of the most exciting writers that we're seeing making art right now and i love nothing more than when poets write novels because they're just so lyrical they have this real electric kind of rhythm to them the prose is so taught it feels like every single line is a masterpiece and even the title is exquisite right now this is actually a book written as a letter from a child to his mother who is a literate and so therefore will never read it and it's just beyond brilliant again it's written in a kind of series of vignettes and just frankly beautiful it's writing that demands to be heard and if you're like me and you underline books like moments in books that you really enjoy your hand is gonna be sore and your pencil is gonna need a sharpener because holy moly you are going to be underlining to your heart's content there are going to be a lot of annotations in that book there's also a really heartfelt retelling of a kind of first queer love story and every line in this book just punctures your soul i love it on a different note we have number 18 which is boy parts by eliza clark this is like unhinged woman being chaotic vibes because you're essentially reading the perspective of this very violent and masochistic woman but in a weird way you're also kind of rooting for her because there's something about her brutal honesty which is actually very endearing it's kind of refreshing and also just kind of depraved it's about balance boy parts is essentially a reversal of american psycho but this time about an erotic photographer who kind of seeks out men to be her muse she invites them over takes pictures of them and treats them horribly the humor in this book is very very british in its kind of dry wit and i'd really highly recommend listening to this as an audio book because eliza clark narrates it and hearing it in her kind of geordie accent is just a magnificent experience i think it really elevates the tone of the novel in just an unmatched way this book is about the parties that you go to the people that you interact with in your 20s and granted most of us i hope won't resort to kind of bodily harm but this book essentially just takes everything to the extreme and i still think it's great and just such a unique narrative voice now this is an exciting time because we're almost at the end of the list but number 19 is exciting times this is about a woman who has moved from ireland to hong kong and we kind of follow and explore her relationships with both a man and a woman there's elements of social commentary and kind of cultural criticisms it really speaks about language and lots of very deadpan descriptions of characters and their mannerisms and interactions with a range of people who will probably feel quite familiar if you're in your 20s and i think it's a really refreshing book to read if you're like one or two years out of university and a lot of people that you know kind of have like corporate jobs and everyone is a bit on their own path and doing their own thing and there's a lot of financial disparity within the people that you know and that you interact with because this just represents that so well as well as that kind of existential crisis that you have where you feel like you're stagnant or you're not progressing at the same speed as the people around you and ultimately not really knowing what you're doing with your relationships and your career and your life exciting times and finally book 20 is pure color by shyla hetty i've spoken about a lot of books that really focus on the intricacies of everyday life but this is one that sort of zooms out a bit from that and looks at the world in a much more abstract way it discusses how this iteration of the world is essentially the first draft within the confines of this book this existence that we are living in is essentially some omnipotent god's first attempt at making a functioning planet we're essentially the trial run it's kind of like god is playing the sims and he's taken away the ladder and been like what will happen will they drown in the swimming pool so it's about life and death and mortality and ultimately the fact that this is the first time that any of us have lived this life and so we will make mistakes and not know and be a bit clueless and hopeless and confused we don't know what we're doing and the earth doesn't know what it's doing because it's also the earth's first time doing this too and the book is kind of like that's scary and strange but also okay in a weird way and it's fine and we have to accept it because that's how it is that's kind of beautiful in its own way and yeah this book is unlike anything that i've ever read um so unique so profound i thought it was really cool so there you go go forth and prosper my friends it's your 20s be messy make mistakes learn lessons embrace the uncertainty of this time be on your own timeline and love it and do whatever you want to do i feel like being in your 20s is about discovering who the [ __ ] you are and trying everything and doing things wrong and that is so beautiful and special you have time so fall in love with not knowing what to do with it have no direction and enjoy every second of it i hope that you also enjoy these recommendations and that if you do pick up any of these books that they resonate with you i would love to also know which books have resonated with you in your 20s in the comments section down below i hope these books help to guide you and reassure you and validate you as much as they have for me actually in the process of making this video i did also think maybe it would be cool to do another video about non-fiction recommendations or even fictional books to read in your teens the ones that kind of helped me so let me know if you'd like that i am nothing but a walking library at your disposal massive shout out of course to skillshare for their continued support of this channel i really appreciate it and the biggest thank you of all to you for being here right till the bitter end it is an absolute privilege to be navigating my 20s alongside all of you now this is kind of crazy but i've actually been nominated for creator of the year at the blogosphere awards this year which has just blown my little mind it's such an honor and something that i'm still very much getting my head around but if you would like to vote for me there is a public vote and i will leave the link down below it means the world to me but even being nominated for creator of the year is so surreal and mental so yeah there's that subscribe if you'd like to continue coming along for the journey with me you can give this video a like if you liked it if you like i have some big life news kind of coming in the next couple months which i just confirmed and i'm very excited to share that with you and take you along with me until next time all the best stay in touch have a wonderful day and i'll catch you very soon bye bye

Channel: Jack Edwards

Views: 488,174

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Id: EaSNufmauFg

Length: 26min 46sec (1606 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 26 2022