I keep a whole box full of future seasonal reads. Winter is the largest contingent because it includes Christmas, cold, snow and ice; followed by summer, which also covers heat, sun and so on. Every once in a while, I’ll come across a spring-related book. Autumn may be great for misty canal walks, vibrant leaves and variegated squashes, but it’s the hardest of the seasons to find books for. I’ve read all the obvious ones by now. Some of the below connections are more abstract but not too much of a stretch, I hope.
Corduroy by Don Freeman (1968)
Autumn is when I wear the most corduroy, sometimes (accidentally) head to toe.
I knew I’d read this as a child, but didn’t expect individual pages to feel so familiar. It must have been on frequent rotation in my house growing up. Corduroy the bear is among the toys on offer in a large department store. One morning Lisa, a little Black girl, picks him out, but her mother says no, they’ve spent too much already – and besides, the toy is damaged. He didn’t realize until her mother said: his green overall is missing a button. That night he rides the escalator to go look for the button, thinking he’ll never be loved until he’s complete. His adventure doesn’t turn out as planned, but Lisa hasn’t stopped thinking about him. Long before Toy Story, here was a sweet book about what toys get up to when we’re not around. And the repeated expressions of the bear’s meek wonderment – “This must be home,” “You must be a friend” – gave me the warm fuzzies. (Little Free Library)
Field Work by Seamus Heaney (1979)
Harvest is a secondary theme in this poetry collection, which also has an overall melancholy tone that seems appropriate to the season of All Souls. Two poems are headed “In Memoriam” and another is titled “Elegy.” Even when they are not the stated topic, the Troubles rear up, as in the first section of “Triptych”: “Two young men with rifles on the hill, / Profane and bracing as their instruments. // Who’s sorry for our trouble?” The countryside can nevermore be an idyll when armoured cars and bombs could be anywhere. “The end of art is peace,” a late line from “The Harvest Bow,” may well be the poet’s motto (so long as “end” is interpreted as “goal”). There is a sequence of 10 sonnets and several poems devoted to animals. I experience Heaney’s poetry as linguistically fertile and formally rigorous; probably best heard out loud. (Secondhand – Oxfam, Marlborough)
Autumnal passages I marked:
“We toe the line / between the tree in leaf and the bare tree.” (from “September Song”)
“the sunflower, dreaming umber” (from “Field Work”)
“A rowan like a lipsticked girl” (from “Song”)
“the sunset blaze / of straw on blackened stubble, a thatch-deep, freshening barbarous crimson burn” (from “Leavings”)
But none of those stood out to me as much as “Oysters,” the opening poem, which I photographed here. I’ve read and savoured every line of it five times now. It’s gold.
Hello Autumn by Jo Lindley (2023)
Depicted as elfin children, the seasons take turns wearing a single crown. Autumn is a timid soul worried about what might go wrong. But when one of the others is at risk, he rushes to help even if it might take him outside his comfort zone. By doing so, he realizes how much there is to enjoy in every season. This is part of a didactic series (Little Seasons/Best Friends with Big Feelings) about coping with anxiety. I’m surprised it wasn’t classified in the mostly-nonfiction “Family Matters” section of the children’s library, which includes books on feelings, illnesses, death, divorce, siblings, first experiences, etc. It was a little heavy-handed for me and I wasn’t sure why the characters had to be elves. (Public library)
Heartstopper: Volume 1 by Alice Oseman (2019)
I’ve been rereading the series through the hardback reissue; I’m now on Volume 5 (and WHERE is Volume 6, huh?). I’ve included the first book because of the falling leaves motif on the cover, which fits the back-to-school vibe. (Public library)
What I thought this time: Just as cute the second time around. All the looks, all the blushes, all the angst! I’d forgotten the details of how Nick and Charlie met and got together. Single best page: when Tori appears out of nowhere and says to Charlie of Nick, “I don’t think he’s straight.”
Original review: It’s well known at Truham boys’ school that Charlie is gay. Luckily, the bullying has stopped and the others accept him. Nick, who sits next to Charlie in homeroom, even invites him to join the rugby team. Charlie is smitten right away, but it takes longer for Nick, who’s only ever liked girls before, to sort out his feelings. This black-and-white YA graphic novel is pure sweetness, taking me right back to the days of high school crushes.
Bookish Beck = Rebecca Foster. American transplant to England. Freelance proofreader and book reviewer.
Bookish Beck 
Aw, good old Corduroy! And Heaney’s Field Work sounds well worth while.
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The Little Free Library copy was well worn and thus clearly well loved! There was a cute misspelled cursive address inside, too.
I have never loved an entire Heaney collection, but individual poems blow me away.
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I think I still have my copy of Corduroy, loved it as as a child! This is a great selection. I haven’t read the Heartstopper books but would definitely give them a try.
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I’ll stick Corduroy back in the Little Free Library for a child to discover.
I think you’d enjoy Heartstopper!
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Love to see Heaney crop up! Field Work is such a great collection, I love the Glanmore Sonnets and Strand at Lough Beg is so powerful.
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I’m sure you’re contractually obligated to like his work 😉 No hardship as he was amazing.
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You’re an inspiration to me to make more of an effort with seasonal reading. I like your idea of keeping them separate so it’s constantly in your mind. I have been a little more attentive to them this year, but I still felt there was a lot of “catch up” in this year and I didn’t always plan properly. Next year won’t likely contain more actual reading, but I think I will be happier with the blend of selections. I have scribbled Heartstopper into my 2025 list and I will request them in pairs so that I have to make them last just a little. heheh Thanks for the warning about their being so gobble-able.
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I had them all on a shelf in roughly chronological order, but then I needed that shelf for novellas, so moved the seasonal reads into a box. It’s funny how the children’s section of the library most reliably provides the books for the less bounteous seasons.
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Did you get the idea from the way that libraries house their seasonal collections separately? Or was it simply a random thought about organizing books/reading that made sense?
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My library doesn’t; does yours?! I’d be impressed at that. The children’s seasonal reads tend to come under the 500’s for nature, or at random in the picture book boxes.
It was just because otherwise I forget what I have and wouldn’t read them. Though, in all honesty, having them in a designated place doesn’t seem to make it any more likely that I will actually add them to a reading stack…
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Yes! They usually have a different section of shelves that is nicely displayed, like one whole row as you walk into a section, (all the formats together, audio and video and books, etc. all ages), with a cute little deco sticker on the spine, so they’re quickly recognisable, and sometimes the collection rotates outof/into storage but in some branches they are available all year (so transgressive borrowing something Xmasy in July hee hee but likely it saves hauling in branches with more space).
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Nice! The only thing we have is a year-round children’s Christmas books case, shoved in by the toilet.
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heheh Well it’s always cooking and crafts back THERE for me, but I nearly always find myself picking up one of them to look at (if not borrow) too. Perhaps that’s actually the BEST place for a display.
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Ah, I find autumn the easiest season to match! Maybe it depends on what you count… I’d include any campus novel and anything spooky, so that’s about 50% of my reading right there 🙂
I just finished Heartstopper season 3 – I’ve not read vol 5 (holding out for the inevitable 99p Kindle deal), but it looks like it covers all the currently published material now, with some additional material from novels like Solitaire. I’ll be interested to see if there’s another season as I can’t imagine one vol of a graphic novel would be enough to fill it, and Nick/Charlie’s arc seems basically complete (though I wouldn’t be averse to a season where they take a backward step and remain #couplegoals while we get side character drama – I always want more Tori!)
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PS In my Heartstopper excitement I forgot to say: CORDUROY! We have a fantastic tape of my sister ‘reading’ from this in the strong American accent she lost when we came back from the States.
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Aww, so cute!
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R.I.P. has always seemed like a separate thing to me, but you’re right that it does coincide with much of autumn. I could see myself including some campus novels in future if they’re set at the start of the first term.
I feel like watching the series would ruin the books for me. I’ve seen some still shots and the main actors just don’t look enough like Nick and Charlie to me. The hardback special editions of the first four volumes have some bonus comics set in the future of their relationship, but they’re just little vignettes, not enough to fill out a series. I would enjoy a Tori spin-off, too.
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Interesting – I thought the Nick and Charlie casting was bang on – especially Charlie!
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To be fair, I’ve not seen them act in the roles; I’ve only seen photos.
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