With winter in full swing, we’re all spending more time indoors, ideally cozied up in bed with a good book and a hot beverage. Here are some winter book recommendations to help you through the long cold nights.

Non-fiction

  • Names for the Sea: Strangers in Iceland – Sarah Moss
  • Skating to Antarctica – Jenny Diski
  • The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride – Daniel James Brown
  • Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster – Jon Krakauer
  • Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Polar Expedition – Buddy Levy

Children’s/Picture Books

  • The Arctic Incident (Artemis Fowl #2) – Eoin Colfer
  • Moominland Midwinter – Tove Jansson
  • Odd and the Frost Giants – Neil Gaiman
  • The Red Tree – Shaun Tan
  • The Golden Compass – Philip Pullman
  • The Polar Express – Chris Van Allsburg

Fantasy/Scifi/Horror

  • The Bear and the Nightingale – Katherine Arden
  • The Coldest Girl in Coldtown – Holly Black
  • A Game of Thrones – George R. R. Martin
  • The Left Hand of Darkness – Ursula K. Le Guin
  • Northern Lights – Philip Pullman
  • The Terror – Dan Simmons
  • Red Sister – Mark Lawrence
  • Spinning Silver – Naomi Novik

General Fiction

  • The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
  • Where’d You Go, Bernadette – Maria Semple
  • Beartown – Fredrik Backman
  • Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantel
  • The Bluffs – Kyle Perry

Literary/Classics

  • Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
  • The Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoyevski
  • Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
  • The Daylight Gate – Jeanette Winterson
  • The Secret History – Donna Tartt
  • War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
  • Winter – Ali Smith
  • The Winter’s Tale – William Shakespeare
  • Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte

Poetry

  • The Latest Winter – Maggie Nelson
  • Snowflake – Eileen Myles
  • Winter Hours: Prose, Prose Poems, and Poems – Mary Oliver

Some of these winter book recommendations are filled with snow and ice, others are only on theme if you squint, but all of them have something to offer while you try to keep the winter chill at bay.

Happy reading!  

Looking for more book recommendations? Read our diverse book recommendations here.