Daisy Buchanan's guide to reading your way to happiness

Telegraph

26-01-2025

Books have saved my life. If it wasn't for books, I'm not sure that I'd be here. Reading has brought me comfort and hope during some of the darkest, most difficult periods of my life. I'm not especially clever or academic. I haven't read half the classics (yet).
I don't have a story about how I mounted a bookcase and climbed my way out of a burning building. But I've read my way through triumph and disaster. When I was violently bullied at primary school, stories eased my anxiety, and the friends I found on the page lessened my acute feelings of loneliness. When I've had my heart broken, romantic novels have helped me to patch it back together.
I've read my way through broken bones, punishing commutes, UTIs, getting fired and moving house. When I was 21, and an ex-boyfriend brought his new girlfriend to a party, I hid in the toilets with a copy of
Indiscretions
of Archie by PG Wodehouse until I had laughed enough to recover my composure. Last year, when my Eurostar train broke down between Paris and London, I was oblivious to the chorus of huffing and muttering because I had
On my wedding day, my godmother read out a short passage from
The Pursuit of Love
('She was filled with a strange, wild, unfamiliar happiness, and knew that this was love'). I'd been reading and rereading the novel since I was 12 years old. It was a beloved guest at the ceremony, a dear friend whose presence was very important to me. It had also been guiding me in my own pursuit, for my whole adult life. When things went romantically wrong for me – and they often did – Nancy Mitford's words had been the best possible balm. Then, and now, they seemed to offer joy and encouragement, just as a proper mate might.
Books made me dream
My
School was a complicated place for me. I was good at listening and quietly following instructions – and I was anxious to please my teachers and do well. But the playground was another terrifying problem. Chubby, sensitive and intense, I was a clear target for bullies, and being around other children was overwhelming. My world felt violent and chaotic, so I turned to books – when I was lost in a story, I was guaranteed some peace.
Looking back, I realise that
Even though I tried to be a 'good' girl, when I was reading I could secretly rebel. At home, my parents were quite strict about what we were allowed to watch on TV – and in the '90s and Noughties, the internet was patchy, and the smartphone era was far away. But it was relatively easy to sneakily read adult books in the library. That was where I discovered
At the time, I was struggling with an eating disorder. Critics of the book have claimed that Bridget's
Most powerfully of all, the book's teasing tone helped me to relax, and worry less about what I was eating. Bridget never sticks to a diet and eats a lot of Milk Tray. When she finally reaches her impossible 'goal weight', she goes to a party, and everyone tells her she looks tired and terrible. It was the first time anyone had ever suggested to me that there might be more to life than trying to be as thin as possible.
It was also the first book that made me feel optimistic and excited about my adult life. I didn't fantasise about finding my Mr Darcy – I wanted an 'urban family', Agnès b jeans, a flat in Borough and a glamorous job in TV.
Books taught me to dream. They made me realise that I'd probably never have a perfect life, but I could look forward to an interesting one. When I was 15, I inhaled
Ralph's Party
by Lisa Jewell, because it came free with
Elle
magazine – and vowed that I'd move to London as soon as I possibly could, for spliffs and boys and curries and parties. Around that time, I found a copy of
Rachel's Holiday
by
When I picked the book up, it was with a wide-eyed, breathless curiosity about a scenario that seemed thrillingly adult and sophisticated. When I finished it, hours later, I had an unexpected insight into my own emotional state. The story is a comedy about pain, shame and big, complicated feelings. I read it every year, and every time it helps me to let go of something I've been struggling with. I finally quit drinking alcohol in 2022, after reading
Rachel's Holiday
22 times in all. It's been the best friend and the kindest guidebook I could have hoped to find.
Books are my drug – but they're the only drugs I've ever used that reliably leave me better than they find me. There have been periods of my life when I've struggled to read, and it's taken me a long time to understand that books can only meet us where we are. Like many people, I never read fewer books for pleasure than when I was studying English literature. There weren't many texts on my degree course that captured my imagination, and I resented the fact that I was always kept at arm's length from the novels and poems, and forced to read through the lens of dry critical theory.
But every so often, something would surprise and delight me. I was thrilled when we were assigned
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos – a book about two of my favourite things, sex and gossip. I ignored the rest of the reading list and retreated into the arms of my favourite sex and gossipmongers – Jilly Cooper, Jackie Collins and Erica Jong. I fell upon Henry James and Edith Wharton with alacrity. I inhaled Alberto Moravia's
The Time of Indifference
– a book I'd never have discovered on my own. (This kicked off a love of Italian literature, and primed me for Ferrante's Neapolitan Quartet, as well as teaching me that you might judge a book by its cover, but you don't have to judge it by its boring-sounding title.)
Reading is the best possible start to the day
In my early 20s, I was diagnosed with generalised anxiety disorder, and I slowly started to make links between my behaviour and my mental health. When I was reading regularly, I felt much calmer, and life felt much easier. I loved funny books most of all, and if I needed to self-soothe, I could pick up an old favourite and fall straight into it, in the way you immediately feel at ease with a very old friend. And if I wasn't reading regularly, I struggled to maintain my appetite for books.
Then, I acquired my first smartphone and discovered that I'd bought myself the ultimate 'I couldn't put it down' reading experience – one that left me feeling insatiable and agitated, with an unquenchable craving for stimulation. My relationship with work changed. Before, I'd read books on my commute, and arrived at the office feeling nourished, revived and ready for the day. After a train journey with my phone, I felt enervated and at odds with the world. There were two contradictory things at play – being intensely online made me feel as though I was falling behind. On the other hand, I was overstimulated and exhausted, as though I'd already put a shift in.
When I left my job to go freelance, I realised that I didn't have a commute, but I needed to build some reading time back into my life. After a lot of trial and error, I discovered that the best time for me to read was the morning. I always wake up feeling anxious, and my brain is craving information and input. I've taught myself to reach for a book, instead of my phone. Reading gently leads my brain away from whatever it thinks it should be panicking about and forces it to focus on something sufficiently absorbing and distracting, at a more measured pace. I believe that reading anything at all, for just five or 10 minutes in the morning, is the best possible start to the day.
Reading is like exercise
Having interviewed hundreds of authors (my husband and I have a literary podcast,
You're Booked
), I've been gratified to discover that nearly every writer is a catholic reader, with no book too grand, silly or strange to grace a shelf. My literary heroine, Jilly Cooper, told me that
Middlemarch
is one of her favourite comfort reads. I was delighted to discover that George Eliot has had as much of an influence on Cooper as Cooper has had on me.
My morning reading habit has made me a more ambitious reader, too. I read
Bleak House
by tackling it as soon as I woke up, two chapters at a time. This has only been possible because I built up my reading muscles by picking up the books that have brought me uncomplicated joy. Reading in the morning has boosted my focus throughout the day; I notice that I'm more attentive, more productive and less distracted if I begin with a book.
Ultimately, I think reading is a little bit like exercise. We all know it's 'good' for us, and we 'should' do it. It's easy to think of it as an earnest, worthy hobby – the kind that makes us feel guilty and resentful because it's hard to find the time for it when life is already so challenging. But, just like exercise, it can feel brilliant. It's simply a case of finding a way to do it that works for you.
You might feel you ought to be working your way through the Booker shortlist, for the sake of cultural relevancy. But that might not be the best course of action if you're feeling lost and low – rereading
The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole
might be more restorative. If you're muddling your way through a dense political biography, and you want to pick up your phone after every two paragraphs, try picking up a different book instead. (Anthony Trollope's Palliser novels could satisfy an urge for political gossip.) Reading shouldn't feel hard – but nurturing a reading habit will make our lives easier, calmer and happier.
Read Yourself Happy: How To Use Books To Ease Your Anxiety, by Daisy Buchanan, is published by
on February 6