“Everything we need is right here. Everything we are is enough.”

Notes on a Nervous Planet

Matt Haig

“How does a government steal a child and then imprison him? How does it keep that a secret? This book is how.”

My Name Is Why

Lemn Sissay

“I was a man, that much was clear. But, years after I became one, I still wondered what, exactly, that meant.”

Amateur

Thomas Page McBee

“So there I lie on the plateau, under me the central core of fire from which was thrust this grumbling grinding mass of plutonic rock”

The Living Mountain

Nan Shepherd

“The only difference between a medicine and a poison is the dosage.”

The Way of All Flesh

Ambrose Parry

“Some people need a red carpet rolled out in front of them in order to walk forward into friendship. They can’t see the tiny outstretched hands all around them, everywhere, like leaves on trees”

No One Belongs Here More Than You

Miranda July

“We’d been running ragged for months and were in the homestretch. With any luck, Timmy and I were about to become full-patch Hells Angels, and JJ was about to become a real-life HA old lady”

No Angel

Jay Dobyns

“I still don't know if things fit together, or if everything will be all right in the end. But I believe that something means something. I believe in cleansing the soul through fun and games. I also believe in love”

Naïve. Super

Erlend Loe

“Perhaps, in the end, where your anger comes from is less important than what you do with it”

My Song

Harry Belafonte

“We are now in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us.”

My First Summer In The Sierra

John Muir

“I have an imagination. It is my most precious possession”

A Notable Woman

Jean Lucey Pratt

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Time Warped

Claudia Hammond

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“All around me I felt the ghosts of an immense past, I heard their whispers and I smiled when they walked by my side through the fields and woods. I relished the companionship of the dead”

The Hidden Ways

Alistair Moffat

“The truth is, this is a ghost story. No, this is an adventure story. This is an adventure story about how I quit being a ghost”

Man Alive

Thomas Page McBee

“There are only four basic factors that determine how good your food will taste: salt, which enhances flavor; fat, which amplifies flavor and makes appealing textures possible; acid, which brightens and balances; and heat, which ultimately determines the texture of food”

Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat

Samin Nosrat

“I’ve decided to open with ‘Hello’, and then, even if you don’t care for anything that comes after that, at least you’ll say I was well mannered”

Little Me

Matt Lucas

“We are all so much more than the sum of our fragile parts. We are all our journeys, hopes and dreams, clad in mortal wrapping paper.”

Penguin Bloom

Cameron Bloom & Bradley Trevor Greive

“What follows is a dive into the creative mind, a celebration of the human spirit, and a vision of how to reshape worlds”

The Runaway Species

David Eagleman & Anthony Brandt

“To a country boy this tapestry of colour, movement and mystery was an irresistible draw, a treasure trove wholly unimagined, each discovery bursting unforgettably into my consciousness: every newt a nugget of gold, every wren’s nest a gem, every slow worm a bracelet of silver”

The Dun Cow Rib

John Lister-Kaye

“Architecture creates shelter and transforms the ordinary. Good architecture civilises and humanises, bad architecture brutalises”

A Place for All People

Richard Rogers & Richard Brown

“Travelling is like emptying the crumbs out of a toaster. You think you’ve found them all until you give it another bang. And what I’ve discovered in life is that it’s always me who cleans the toaster”

More Moaning

Karl Pilkington

“I've never worried about life's big questions. People at my age sit about pondering "why are we here?" The only time I ever asked myself that is when Suzanne booked us a surprise holiday to Lanzarote”

The Moaning of Life

Karl Pilkington

“In the West, brave men got killed. Cowards stayed alive. Death was everywhere on the frontier”

A Million Ways to Die in the West

Seth MacFarlane

“The confines of our mind attic have shifted. They have expanded. We should strive to be cognizant of that change, and to take advantage of the shift instead of letting it take advantage of us”

Mastermind

Maria Konnikova

“She's online. 'I booked a hotel,' I say. 'Near Marble Arch.' 'That sounds great, hon. I can't wait to see you.' 'Yeah. Me too.' 'I'm vaguely nervous.' 'Don't be.' Do be. I'm a child”

Lolito

Ben Brooks

“Baking can be a great way to express yourself, and if you treat it this way, your baking will always be unique”

Lily Vanilli's Sweet Tooth

Lily Jones

“The slow hours of the afternoon yawned and presented themselves with a certain belligerence. Those who go mad go mad first in the afternoons”

There Are Little Kingdoms

Kevin Barry

“Words have been important to me for as long as I can remember. Their sound, their construction, their origins”

The Last Holiday

Gil Scott-Heron