Historically, I have not been a bathtub person. I was in fact anti-bath for many years. Apparently, it only takes a global pandemic to make me a bathtub devotée. As with many in the world, these past two years have confined me to my apartment much, much more than I would like. So last winter, desperate to discover a new space in the one-bedroom I share with my now-husband and dog—after first exhausting all other options (e.g. our windowless sub-basement, the bit of floor in front of our radiator), I turned to the once-dismissed fixture taking up half of our bathroom. And oh, how much I was missing!
An entirely new world emerged between office-couch and Netflix-couch! The bath could be steeping hot and filled with epsom salts to soothe away the stresses of the world. Here one could light candles and find reality suddenly very far away. So plentiful are the options for delight, that I only recently decided I could make my sanctuary even better by incorporating an activity generally confined to my reading-couch. I picked up Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge—a collection of stories I’d read before but never really appreciated or in which I'd never really languored, and brought it into the tub with me. I didn’t get very far at first due to the excessive heat and pleasant blurriness of mind accompanying it, but the experience of reading in the tub was extremely enjoyable. Now that I’m more practiced at reading in the tub, I can make it through most of a story before I decide to get out.
So, my advice to you is simple: take a bath! When you’re won over by the hot water and steam, try a book! I recommend keeping a towel within reach so that if you have to wash your face, you can dry your hands before turning the page. In general, paperbacks are easier to hold with one hand than hard covers, if you can swing it. But don’t be a hero: the stakes for dropping a book in the tub are high, and higher still if it’s a library book! For this reason, the best format of all for bathtub reading might be an audiobook, which eliminates entirely the need to hold something aloft and turn pages, and frees your whole body for soaking. My final advice: sitting in cold water doesn’t make anyone happy. The point of all this is to have a few minutes of other-worldly bliss before you have to return to the very real world of your apartment. So don’t embark on this journey thinking that you’re going to lie there and read a whole book. But if you’re one of those readers who has to finish what you’ve started, I’ve included a few collections of short stories so you can have that satisfaction. Here are my recommendations for captivating bathtub reads, many with bonus bathtub plot elements.
Grace Paley’s Collected Stories - Short and hilarious and often strange, Grace Paley’s stories are surprising and refreshing. Many take place in New York, and many center Jewish characters, harried mothers, and shocking daughters. Paley was also a political activist, pacifist and feminist who wrote poetry as well. If you’re a person whose head echoes with Zoom meetings at the end of the day, Paley’s inventive language will knock all the boring right out of your head while you take a bath.
Things That Are by Amy Leach - I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve recommended this small book of essays to one friend or another in need of comfort. Leach’s little stories are beautiful romps through the natural world accompanied by gorgeous black-and-white illustrations. Each essay takes its inspiration from a plant, animal or a natural event, and spins through associations, astonishing facts and poetic musings. Plus, many stories take you underwater to observe miraculous diving penguins or the death-streamer tentacles of jellyfish. This book is a trip. And perfect for the tub!
A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan - Though this book starts out like a witty portrayal of self-obsessed Millenial life, it lands decidedly in the horror genre by the end. And if that’s your kind of thing you could not find a more perfect book for the tub! Baths figure prominently in Beth Morgan’s uproariously well-written and transgressive debut. There’s a character who invents a kind of personal spa called a “spod,” and the book ends with a very memorable bathtub scene which I will not describe in further detail. I think you just need to read it…if bathtub horror is your kind of thing, of course.
Ulysses by James Joyce - Don’t be intimidated! I’m not suggesting you slog through the whole of this tome while submerged in water. I’m merely suggesting that it’s possible to approach this epic in small doses, preferably the audiobook version! Close your eyes (forgo the ineluctable modality of the visible) and let Joyce’s creative use of English and Irish wash over you. Baths and bathing abound in these chapters, whether it’s Irish swimmers dipping themselves into the snotgreen sea or Leopold Bloom fantasizing about visiting the Turkish baths. Just think, you could be in Dublin on June 16, 1904 simply by pressing play on your library-provided Libby App.
The League of Extraordinary Women series by Evie Dunmore - This is my only romance novel recommendation on the list (I don’t want to be too cliché, but suffice it to say that romance novels are ideal for the tub). This three-book series is a fantastic read, even without the romance! A friend recommended the series to me after I tried one too many badly-written romance novels and let me tell you, Evie Dunmore really does her research. I learned a lot about Victorian-era Oxford and the early suffragist movement. Her books are full of well-drawn characters and thoughtful plot lines, and you don’t have to read them in order. Plus, at least one of the heroines takes numerous baths throughout the book. So … there’s that.
BirdNote: Chirps, Quirks, and Stories of 100 Birds from the Popular Public Radio Show - Finally, if none of these books strike your fancy, I give you: birds! Birds take baths! Some birds conduct half of their lives underwater! I have recently discovered how soothing it is to look at illustrations of birds and learn fascinating bird facts that will later completely escape you. This beautifully illustrated, pocket-sized book grew out of the popular bird podcast of the same name. So if you want even more #birdcontent, you can incorporate BirdNote into your bathing routine. Their charming two-minute episodes drop daily and feature lots of bird sounds and calming narrators to teach you about your fine-boned, feathered friends.
Read in the Bathtub Day is celebrated annually on February 9th
Virginia Marshall is BPL’s Podcast Associate. She writes and produces Borrowed, BPL’s flagship podcast, and helps out with other audio projects at the library, like the audio walking tour and the growing collection of oral histories.
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