Have you tried a 5:2 reading diet?

I’m on a reading diet. After reading too many 500+ page tomes, and in honour of Dr Michael Mosley (RIP), and his genius 5:2 diet, I’ve decided to read five thin books, or short stories for every two fat books. 

This reading diet won’t make you thinner, but it may bring you the joy I’m having from intentionally reading shorter novels and short stories in-between the long reads. 

I am a speed reader. Even with books that deserve a slow read I still read them fast. Why? I want to finish and decide whether the book is destined to be my friend. My book friends are the ones I reread slowly and often. As a poor sleeper these books are the ones I can open at any page knowing they will read me back to sleep. Like old friends, they know what I need. 

I have never selected what to read based on length. Now this consideration is vital to my 5:2 reading strategy. Here are thin books I recommend.

Irish writer Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These, So Late in the Day and Foster. Clair Keegan’s ability to distil into the shortest of short books, novellas really, is beyond compare. Her work is, as The Guardian says, “A thing of finely honed beauty.” 

Good Morning, Midnight is a book title that comes from an Emily Dickinson poem. The book is written by British writer Jean Rhys. Like Emily’s poem it’s about loneliness and melancholy. First published in 1939 (yes you read that right) it is a book of timeless relevance for anyone who has ever been lonely, uncertain and afraid. Isn’t that everyone? 

Japanese writer Nanae Aoyama’s A Perfect Day to Be Alone won the 2007 Akutagawa Prize, translated to English in 2024. I stumbled on it in Balgowlah’s Berkelouw Books on my quest to find thin books. Knowing nothing about it I was drawn to its cover and promise of being a moving, microscopic examination of loneliness and heartbreak. It is. The central character is a 20-year-old female stumbling towards self-understanding, an ageless dilemma in my opinion.

I am ashamed to admit not reading Tirra Lirra by the River before now. Written by Australian Jessica Anderson, published in 1978 it won the Miles Franklin Award that year, the same year Helen Garner’s first novel Monkey Grip won the National Council Award for fiction, a book I have read many times.

Jessica Anderson was in her early 60s when Tirra Lirra was published. It’s a story told by an old childless woman. Sounds a winner! Why it wins is that it’s about the memory, imagination and workings of one person’s mind as she remembers almost seventy years of her life in the span of a month when immobilised by illness. There is a reason this book is rarely out of print, it’s extraordinary.

Another winner is a fat book of short stories by Amon Towels, Table for Two. The author of longish books, A Gentleman in Moscow, Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, his latest book is a collection of six stories and a novella set in two different capital cities. I’m not saying any more. Binge read it, dare you not to.

Where to buy

Shop local. I found all these books at Balgowlah’s Berkelouw Books.