5 Books to Read to Get You Through Your 20s

By Eric Silver

BREAKING NEWS: READING IS ALIVE.

In fact, books are doing the same things that they’ve always been doing: empowering readers,

making you look cool inpublic, and whisking you away to a magical world filled with

whatever your mind can pull together from the words on the page. And sometimes,

just sometimes, they can help you with your problems. Here are five works of fiction to get you

through your darkest and toughest periods after teenagedom:

The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald

Because the smartest thing you can do when you’re young is befriend a tragic millionaire.

Since you might have been fantasizing about Catherine Pitt’s cleavage during all of

sophomore English, you may have missed the actual time frame of the book. It takes place

over one single summer in the 1920s. Three months! Nick Caraway’s life was irreversibly

changed because he moved to Long Island and went to the right parties for 90 days. That is

such a short amount of time.That is barely enough time to figure out how you sleep best in

your bed, or to buy the right pan for your famous Spanish frittata. Life comes at you pretty fast,

and the quicker you figure that out, the less you’ll stress that things are changing. And the less

“WHAT IS MY LIFE?!” statuses you’ll have to make along the way.

2. Swamplandia – Karen Russell

If a twelve year old girl can live in the 10,000 Islands off the coast of Flordia, save a gator-themed

amusement park, AND fight off the supernatural terrors that lurk around there, you can probably

deal with twenties angst, okay buddy?

3. Zone One- Colson Whitehead

Your city could be an extremely plausible zombie terror zone. So be thankful that you only

have to deal with your terrible roommate/boss/strangers on the street/bodega owner/

significant other and not monsters trying to pry your flesh from your bones. It captures what

it’s like to be scared and struggling in a new city, and, also, it’s further proof that Buffalo is

a magical place.

4. Love is A Mixtape – Rob Sheffield

Once upon a time, Rob Sheffield was an awkward, Catholic, recent-graduate total nerd who was

super-awkward. But he loved music. Loved it. Wholly, utterly, ridiculously. And although his life

never completely fell into place, he wrote about what he knew – music and the girls it conjured up for

him. Guess where he is now? 3 books, 18.7k followers, contributing editor at Rolling Stone, and one of

the most endearing public speakers in recent memory . The lesson: you like things and you can do

things. Follow them. Good things will happen.

5. Goodnight Moon- Margaret Wise Brown

Just go to bed. Seriously. Get off tumblr. Get off your phone. Get off twitter. You have an interview

tomorrow. You have work in the morning. You have a date with that hot/cute/smart/kind person

from the coffee shop/spin class/bar/DMV/draft board. You don’t have to photoshop your face

onto anymore Corgis. You don’t need to see if Buzzfeed put up your latest community post. You

don’t need to wait up for that Facebook message. You are not too high. You are not wired.

You are not too nervous. Just go to bed. Yeah, just do it. Okay?

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