WHATBOOK..?

... are you reading now?

I HAVE just finished reading The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah. It blew me away!

Set during the Great Depression and the terrible dust bowls, it follows Elsa and her family; a wonderful story of love, courage and hope, crucially highlighting issues of migration and prejudice that are so relevant today.

I am currently reading the phenomenal books on the shortlist of the Royal Society of Science Prize 2021. My mind has been enriched by every single one.

At the same time I am reading Probably Ruby by Lisa-Bird Wilson. A beautiful novel about identity, love and belonging, telling the story of an indigenous woman given up for adoption as a baby. I am totally gripped by Ruby’s brave search for her family and her identity.

... would you take to a desert island?

THIS is a tough one as there’s so many books that I’d like to take. Ideally, I’d like to have a Desert Island library.

But if it has to be just one ... Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. I have a really old edition of it on my bookshelf. I always get swept up in her prose, her use of stream of consciousness, the way that Woolf takes the reader on a deep journey of the mind.

It’s so multi-layered that I don’t think I can ever get bored of it — how it deals with themes of loneliness, isolation and communication, how we see the effects of post-war Britain and the reality of oppression, colonialism and Empire through the characters’ beliefs and understanding of the world.

... first gave you the reading bug?

THE Worst Witch by Jill Murphy. I still get excited when I see one of her books on a bookshelf. I’m still enchanted by the lovable characters, the humour and the magic. I recently bought the collection as a gift for my boyfriend’s seven-yearold daughter.

I hope she will love the stories as much as I did. After reading The Worst Witch, I just couldn’t stop. I remember that sense of anticipation I would feel whenever I entered a bookshop or library. What would I discover next?

What world would I enter by opening the pages of a book?

... left you cold?

I THINK it will have to be Jeffrey Eugenides’ Middlesex. It’s been on my bookshelf for years. I have picked it up and started it so many times and yet I never manage to get passed the first quarter.

I’m pretty sure I’ll try again though, so if I ever end up on a Desert Island with a library I would want it on the bookshelf.

CHRISTY LEFTERI is a judge for this year’s Royal Society Science Book Prize. The winner will be announced on November 29. Her latest novel Songbirds is published by Manilla Press, £12.99.