Literature for Adults in the Time of Pandemics

Summary: Movie suggestions, lists of TV series to binge, virus playlists, and newly created livestreams of cultural events are being posted on Twitter all the time. But many NWP folks are turning to books while they “self-quarantine.” You can find reading suggestions on Twitter through the hashtag #quarantinereading, but we have collected here some of the more interesting ones.

Many publications, such as the New York Times, are putting together their own booklists for our quarantine times. Here are a few, either for suggestions for your reading or because, who doesn’t love a good booklist? With the exception of The Guardian’s list, most of these trend bleak when it comes to fiction, but maybe that’s what you need right now.

• The Guardian collected suggestions from readers for a list of joyfully distracting books at their Coronavirus Reading List. Their approach of going for joy is unique among these lists.
• Haaretz, on the other hand, went full-in with their pick of the 15 best apocalyptic books to read now. And Politico publishes Literature for a Lockdown.
• The Week wants to help you gain perspective on coronavirus with this list of seven (mostly) non-fiction books.
• The Millions notes that there has always been pandemic literature because there have always been pandemics. See their discussion. PEN makes some similar suggestions with a few novel non-fiction and memoir pieces.
• And Goodreads has several lists, including (seriously) 50 popular nonfiction books about diseases.

And, finally, for a different approach, here’s a list from Zibby at Bookshop.org of new releases where the author’s book tour has been canceled. The book tour is central to getting books out and getting authors paid, so you might want to look at the list and pick up a new release that would otherwise go unnoticed.