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Original poster

Books set during covid

65 replies

Wildchild60s · 02/12/2025 09:50

I read a lot of contemporary fiction, nothing especially highbrow. In two recent novels there was passing reference made to covid as a time in the characters' recent past. In one the character had taken up baking as a new hobby during lockdown. In another the character (who was one of the murder victims) had become increasingly isolated during lockdown.
This set me off wondering if anyone has come across novels set right in the middle of the pandemic, where all the restrictions we all lived under were an essential part of the plot, having such a huge impact on people's personal and professional lives?

OP posts:
BarnacleBeasley · 02/12/2025 09:59

Summer and Companion Piece by Ali Smith - but I think she probably is quite highbrow. Also, they do work as standalone novels but they sort of follow on from Autumn, Winter and Spring.

pteromum · 02/12/2025 10:03

Lockdown Maria Frankland

Orangesarenottheonlyfruit · 02/12/2025 10:04

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

yorkshiretoffee · 02/12/2025 10:06

Ann Patchett Tom Lake
and Elizabeth Strout Lucy by the sea (You need to read the other Lucy books first)

I didn't think I'd ever want to read a Covid novel but these work really well.

CatChant · 02/12/2025 10:07

Delphi by Clare Pollard has a narrator who is an academic trying to research the history of prophecies and oracles from home in lockdown while juggling looking after her 10-year-old. Quite slim and accessible, but not the most cheerful read.

Frynye · 02/12/2025 10:10

False witness by Karin slaughter.

SheilaFentiman · 02/12/2025 10:15

Past Lying - Karen Pirie book by Val McDermid. But Karen can still work, being police, so it's not as overbearing to the plot as it might be.

TamzinGrey · 02/12/2025 10:26

Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton is a lovely book.

It's the true story of a writer who retreats from London to an isolated house in the countryside during the pandemic. One day when out walking, she comes across an abandoned leveret that she ends up lovingly rearing by hand, whilst cut off from the horrors of COVID raging in the background.

Original poster
Wildchild60s · 02/12/2025 10:39

Wow, thank you, so many suggestions. I will definitely look out for some of these.

OP posts:
cadburygorilla · 02/12/2025 10:49

56 Days by Catherine Ryan Howard is a thriller set in covid

Sheeppig · 02/12/2025 12:13

The Fell by Sarah Moss.

JaneJeffer · 02/12/2025 12:15

The Fell by Sarah Moss. I haven’t read it but it was reviewed on an Irish book club programme and was universally hated so maybe not the best suggestion 😬

NorthFaceofthelaundrypile · 02/12/2025 12:16

I’ve just finished The Wedding People, after seeing a recommendation on here.
It’s not set during Covid, but shortly afterwards. It references that strange in between times and how the effects of isolation, and contact limited to Zoom calls affected relationships between people.

JaneJeffer · 02/12/2025 12:18

Oh I was typing as you posted @Sheeppig

JaneJeffer · 02/12/2025 12:20

The Guardian review of The Fell mentions another couple of books:
“With its unwavering interiority and meticulously excavated disquiet, The Fell is a novel certain to be seized upon by scholars in the future. But what of readers in 2021? Lacking the dystopian romance of Sarah Hall's Burntcoat, say, or the glamour and verve of Gary Shteyngart's Our Country Friends - both of which are also set against the backdrop of the pandemic - The Fell is almost too faithful an artefact. For the time being, many readers, such as Moss's own Alice, may prefer to reach for a dog-eared Lord Peter Wimsey than this intense time capsule of a tale.”

Imicola · 02/12/2025 12:21

Dream count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie covers a long time period, but quite a bit is set during lockdowns. Not really central to the plot though. I enjoyed it, but at the beginning i was disappointed that it started during lockdown! Might not have picked it if I had known.

cestlavielife · 02/12/2025 12:22

Jodi picoult wish you were here

cestlavielife · 02/12/2025 12:25

Day by michael cunngham
And a few more

The Best Books that Utilize COVID in the Plot - Jeanne Blasberg share.google/hvjDiQESB3Wfi3eCd

Arran2024 · 02/12/2025 12:30

Night Swimmers by Roisin Maguire. One of the best books I read this year.

Benvenuto · 02/12/2025 12:32

The second half of Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld is set in lockdown & it does drive the plot.

Latenightreader · 02/12/2025 12:33

One of Catherine Fox's Lindchester books (maybe the 5th) is set during covid (each covers a year in a cathedral close and associated families). You do really need to read them from the start though.

Storynanny1 · 02/12/2025 12:34

cestlavielife · 02/12/2025 12:22

Jodi picoult wish you were here

that was an amazing book, I didn’t guess the big twist at all

bagsofbats · 02/12/2025 13:07

Elizabeth Smout, Lucy by the Sea - the character is having a fair old winge from a point of privilege, its only a short book but I may not make it all the way through ...

tobee · 02/12/2025 13:26

Wasn't there some weird romance book about someone having relations with the virus itself? I presume it was meant to be deliberate satire.

PS I write "relations" as I can't remember if it was a romance or erotica! 😆

tobee · 02/12/2025 13:28

Found it! It wasn't some mad lockdown fever dream of mine!