No pressure, just read on

Cute cats, quirky bookshops, hot coffees and tangy prawn pickles... add these 10 comfort reads to your TBR for literary hugs

- Kritika Kapoor

1 We'll Prescribe You a Cat (2024). Finally, a book that dares to ask the important question: Is the solution to all your problems a cat? Syou Ishida's novel (translated by Emmie Madison Shimoda) is set in Kyoto's Kokoro Clinic for the Soul which prescribes the company of cats as medicine. Hate your job? Here's a cat! Colleague getting on your nerves? Cat! Your perfectionism is ruining your life? C-to-the-A-to-the-T. The whole thing is ridiculous, but it's meant to be.

2 Legends & Lattes (2022). Want Lord of the Rings but with nicer orcs? Viv is a battle-weary barbarian who's had enough of the warrior life, and hangs up her sword to open a cafe.

Travis Baldree sets the story in Thune, where succubi, hobbits and giant cats go through the motions of their daily life. No evil rings or expeditions to Mordor to get worked up about, just pastries, hot lattes, and Viv's everyday problems that probably echo your own.

3 The House in the Cerulean Sea (2020). TJ Klune's novel will get your serotonin, oxytocin, dopamine and other happy juices flowing.

Linus Baker, a 40-year-old case worker at the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, is on a secret assignment to an orphanage by the sea. There he meets six orphans, including a gnome, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist called Lucy (short for Lucifer). As these kids melt Linus's crusty heart, they form a family, the kind none of them has known.