Shelf Help: Books to Read When You Need Some Vitamin D

hi everyone my name is Miranda and welcome to my youtube channel so today on my channel I'm starting a new little series called shelf help I turn to books all the time for consolation for words of wisdom and I thought it would be really fun to start a little series where I think of a problem or maybe you'll ask me about a problem and I'll try to recommend some books that I think will help you solve that problem so for today's shelf hell I am talking about books that you should read if you need some vitamin D I'm recording this on a really gray wet day in London and I'm definitely dreaming of some sunshine because at the moment my vitamin D is really only coming in tablet form now usually I do like to read books in season so I'll read wintery reads and winter and summery reads in the summer for instance but on a late February day sometimes I really do just want to read some books with some sunshine in them so let's get started my first recommendation is the enchanted April by Elizabeth von Allmen this is one of my all-time favorite books it was originally published in 1922 and of those I do like to often reread this book in April it actually starts on a bleak gray rainy day in February in London in Hampstead in fact I live in West Hampstead so this feels very apropos for today so the book is all about some dissatisfied housewives if you get together and decide they really need a rest they want to get away from the rain they want to get away from Hampstead they want to get away from their husbands so they start dreaming about wisteria and the Italian Sun so landscape and then plan a holiday to Italy for April the only problem is they have very limited means so the advertiser for some other women to join them on their holiday to this little Italian castle so they can split the costs so this group of rather ill-assorted women set off for Italy in April when they get there it seems like their dreams have come true the little castle is gorgeous there's wisteria climbing up the walls and everything is as it should be however all of the women are dissatisfied with their lives for some reason or another but as they holiday in Italy and they just enjoy soaking up the Sun they learn how to find happiness in their lives so by the end of the holiday they are all for the most part quite different women this is such an enchanting fun read that if you yourself or need if you yourself need a bit of sunshine then I really really recommend the enchanted April next I have to recommend one author that's Mary Stewart I read all of her books I think when I was a teenager and into my early twenties and they're wonderful light reads Mary Stewart wrote these in the 1950s 1960s that kind of era and they're all about essentially a young woman who goes on holiday abroad and stumbles upon some kind of mystery or some kind of adventure this one is called this rough magic and it's set in Corfu it says Lucy wearing a young out-of-work actress from London leaps at the chance to visit her sister for a summer on the island of Perak guys of corfu and once more a famous but reclusive actor is staying in a villa nearby but Lucy's hopes for rest and romance are shattered when a body washes up on the beach and she finds herself swept up in a chilling chain of events so there is always some kind of mystery the girl always gets wrapped up in it there's always a hero's there's always a bit of romance as well and it's often um the man who you actually think is the villain turns out not to be but these are such fun light-hearted reads they're some of my favorite cosy reads but they're also some of my favorite armchair travel reads because Mary Stewart generally sets her books in quite exotic locations there are definitely some settled locations too so yes these will give you some virtual vitamin D to be sure I'm also going to recommend madam will you talk buy her this one is set in Provence so again an excellent choice and also these have fairly recently been republished I think by Hodder yes way harder and I absolutely love the covers that all stunning I think I've now collected all of the books that they've republish in me in this series and I I do adore them the covers are beautiful so Mary Stuart is a real recommendation next I'm going to recommend a spring magic by de Stevenson this is about a young girl caught remember her name now oh yes Frances who is having is living a very dreary life in London during World War two on a whim she decides that she sort of had enough and she deserves a holiday she wants to get away from her domineering stepmother and her rather weak willed father so she decides to go to Scotland so she travels there completely on her own to a remote village by the sea in Scotland and there she witnesses the start of spring and she takes herself off for long long rambles around the countryside and it's very gentle cozy sort of story there is a bit of romance in this I found it really interesting because de Stephenson herself was an army wife and she writes in a lot of her books about the community of army wives and what that life was really like and in this book Frances for friends quite a few army wives so there's a lot about that in the book but it's just a really sweet read and Frances also finds the landscape and the sunshine the start of spring around her very restorative and I think this is a very restorative read and will also be a bit of sunshine on a bleak day so yes I recommend this one obviously idea actually recommend all of these but so the next one is picnic in Provence a tale of love in France with recipes by Elizabeth bard I really love a list of the bards books I've mentioned them before on my channel first memoir was lunch in Paris and this is the follow-up memoir called picnic in Provence um in lunch in Paris Elizabeth bard falls in love with a Frenchman and marries him and in this book she writes about their move from Paris to Provence and setting up their own ice cream company in Provence so this is definitely a sun-soaked to read as well and there are some lovely recipes through it I actually went and visited Elizabeth when I was in Provence a few years ago I went to the little town that she lived in and I had ice cream um at their little ice-cream place and it was just lovely it was such an amazing memory and I got to meet her of course so that was really fantastic and whenever I look at this book now I just think of sunshine and prevalence and eating ice cream and that special day so this definitely acts as some vitamin D for me so next I'm going to recommend one of my other all-time favorite books which is the Panama alone by Mary Wesley so this novel starts off in the August of 1939 so just before war is declared and it's about a young group of cousins who gather every summer in Cornwall their uncle has this law and a caramel lawn at the back of his house and the cousins will gather on it and marry Wesley writes about this nostalgic summer that is always blended with the scent of caramel in the cousins Minds because of course after this last summer together World War two begins and their lives changed completely and you follow what happens to each of these characters during the war I just love this book it is a very it has a nostalgic quality to it and I love the descriptions of this sun-drenched summer in Cornwall I adore Cornwall so I love that part of this book is set in Cornwall there's also really great antique heroine in this called Calypso when I first read this I really didn't like clip so at the start of the book but my opinion of her really shifted the more and more that I read and I loved it when and also can do that when she can sort of radically change your mind about one of her characters and that definitely happened for me in this book but it will also have you dreaming of summer's in Cornwall as well then sometimes it's people who can bring sunshine to your life so with that in mind I'm recommending this book dear mrs. bird by AJ Pearce this is set during World War Two but it features a brilliant character called Amy and she's just such a spark of joy and array sunshine I love her voice in this book it's so plucky and just really light-hearted I loved reading this and it's so it's about a young girl called Emmy who starts working for a woman's magazine during the war and she is almost like a secretary to an agony art columnist who is not a very pleasant woman and Emmy starts typing up her letters that she sends in response to the readers who write in about their problems seeking advice and Emmy starts to feel very sorry because her boss rejects so many of the letters she won't reply to anything that she considers having sort of any you know nastiness in them at all so young women who were struggling with being left alone without their husbands for instance or young women who are aren't sure whether they should marry someone or not she won't deal with any of those queries so Emmy starts to secretly write back and give these women advice of course in the end she gets found out but there's a lot of hilarity in between although this book obviously does also deal with some darker themes and there is some tragedy that happens in this but I just sew and wire Emmys courage and I think this she's just got a brilliant voice in literature I really admire how a jps wrote this and I think this book is bound to cheer anyone up so another recommendation then my final recommendation is in the full light of the Sun by Claire Clark now I haven't read this one myself yet it's actually one I would like to read and in my quest to get a little more virtual vitamin D into my own life I couldn't resist the cover and the title this book has actually been on my shelf for quite while though so I think now is quite a good excuse to read it and I wanted to share it with you two it's set in Berlin in me into all years but it's all about a group of artists and sort of generally creative people so it's about our to music and love and life in Berlin and before the outbreak of war so I'm really interested as you can probably tell in that period of history anyway I think looking at it from the perspective of what was happening in Berlin and then in particular looking at it through the eyes of creatives and artists is really interesting and I also really like the idea of how artists perceive light and how light is important in paintings and how the Sun and light are used in that way so I thought that this one would also be a nice addition to our vitamin D part of books but those are my recommendations do let me know about the books bring a bit of sunshine into your life or if you're tempted to read any of these or if you have any shelf health questions that you would like me to tackle then let me know but thanks you so much for watching give this video a thumbs up if you enjoyed it and don't forget to subscribe to my channel which you can do by clicking my face it pops up here I'll be back again very soon with another video bye

Channel: Miranda Mills

Views: 2,359

Rating: 4.9805827 out of 5

Keywords: books, booktube, reading, bookstagram, shelf help

Id: SKHgDJ1Gxsw

Length: 14min 57sec (897 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 24 2020