Books for a rainy day

Rain on the glass, nowhere to be. These are books that reward a slow afternoon: inward, absorbing and a little wistful, the kind you finish and then just sit with.

1. Kitchen

   1.Kitchen

   Banana Yoshimoto · 1988

   Grief, midnight kitchens and unexpected family. Short, gentle and luminous.

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2. Hotel du Lac

   2.Hotel du Lac

   Anita Brookner · 1984

   A novelist hides out in an off-season Swiss hotel. Wry, quiet and very rainy.

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3. Norwegian Wood

   3.Norwegian Wood

   Haruki Murakami · 1987

   First love and loss in 1960s Tokyo, soaked in nostalgia and long walks.

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4. Jane Eyre

   4.Jane Eyre

   Charlotte Brontë · 1847

   It opens on a day too wet for walking. A heroine who will not bend.

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5. The House in the Cerulean Sea

   5.The House in the Cerulean Sea

   TJ Klune · 2020

   A grey office man is sent to an island of magical children. Pure warmth.

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6. Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont

   6.Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont

   Elizabeth Taylor · 1971

   An elderly widow, a London hotel and a sweet, made-up grandson. Funny and sad.

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7. The Thirteenth Tale

   7.The Thirteenth Tale

   Diane Setterfield · 2006

   A famous author finally tells her true story. Gothic, bookish, made for rain.

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8. The Remains of the Day

   8.The Remains of the Day

   Kazuo Ishiguro · 1989

   A butler drives across England and slowly faces what he gave up.

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9. Wuthering Heights

   9.Wuthering Heights

   Emily Brontë · 1847

   Storms on the moors, and a love that is more weather than romance.

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10. The Night Watch

    10.The Night Watch

    Sarah Waters · 2006

    Wartime London told backwards, through four people and their secrets.

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