When someone gifts me a book, it fills me with excitement and dread; excitement because I love books, and can’t wait to read it; dread because it’s going to be at least a year before that happens, during which time I guarantee you said gifter will ask whether I’ve read it yet…

My pile of books to read has always been huge. I just can’t help myself, and as soon as that pile starts to dwindle, I start to splurge. Back in 2014, I noticed that all those classic ‘must-reads’ that I’d bought in order to educated myself had been sat on the shelf for years. (Truth be told, most of them had been bought with the insurance money from when my boarding house had burned down, literally.)