Books about neighbours to start a neighbourhood library

In our October issue, we have a weekend project on how to make a tiny neighbourhood library for your front garden. Obviously, we were immediately sold and already measuring up planks of wood before the ink was dry on the pages. You can find the project on page 84.

Once you’ve knocked up your tiny neighbourhood library, you’ll want some books in it, and we think for the launch, some books that focus on neighbourhoods and neighbours might tempt the folk on your street to get lending and borrowing. Here are a few to get you going…

The Quiet at the End of the World by Lauren James

The story of Lowrie and Shen, the two youngest people left on earth after a pandemic causes mass infertility, and the community that reveres them.

The Woman Next Door by Yewande Omotoso

Hortensia and Marion are next-door neighbours in post-Apartheid Cape Town. One is black, one is white, and they are sworn enemies, until an unforeseen event begins to change things.

The Stars Beneath Our Feet by David Barclay Moore

The Christmas after Lolly Rachpaul’s brother is killed in a gang-related shooting in Harlem, his mother buys him a huge box of Lego. While he tries to avoid the bad gangs in the city, he’s also building an amazing Lego city at the community centre which starts to become his way back into the neighbourhood.

The New Neighbours by Diney Costeloe

The residents of quiet and exclusive cul-de-sac, Dartmouth Circle have their peace shattered by the arrival of a bunch of students. Will there be hilarious antics, upset and changes of heart? We think it’s likely.

A Year of Marvellous Ways by Sarah Winman

Eighty-nine-year-old Marvellous Ways lives on the edge of a river in Cornwall, where she often sits on the banks with her telescope. One day a young soldier called Drake is washed up in the river, broken, bloodied and in need of help, and of course, Marvellous obliges.

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