Lockdown made me appreciate where I live more than I could ever have imagined. Three years ago we moved to a house very close to the sea. Every morning during lockdown I was able to walk down the pier and breathe in the fresh sea air. I could look out at the horizon and gaze at the line where the sky meets the ocean. It gave me a sense of space that I was lacking in the “new normal”. I honestly believe those sea walks saved my sanity. I truly feel that we are blessed to live on this island that is so full of natural beauty. Whether you live on the coast or inland, you are only ever minutes away from the soothing balm of nature’s beauty.

This year after an initial loss of concentration, I began to eat books. I craved to be transported elsewhere. I yearned for my mind to be full of plots and characters rather than Covid case numbers and variants. As an ambassador of the Easons’ Must Reads book club I am lucky to get books a season before they come out and I have read some incredible novels this year. Some favourites have been:

Sarah Winman’s Still Life is a love letter to Florence, art and friendship. The book spans four decades, beginning at the end of WWII. This book transported me to the centre of Florence where I was surrounded by history, art, books and the most wonderfully warm and complex characters. The two main characters, Ulysses Temper, a young British solider and Evelyn Skinner, an older art historian are most unlikely friends, but they alter and enrich each other’s lives forever. Evelyn’s talk of truth and beauty plants a seed in Ulysses’ mind that will change his life and make him fall in love the with the city of Florence forever.

Another transporting read was Snowflake. A dairy farm in Kildare may not sound as exotic as Florence, but it has its own charm. This gorgeous debut novel by Louise Nealon is full of damaged and flawed characters that you will recognise and fall in love with. It’s a tender coming of age story of a young girl from a dairy farm who goes to Dublin to study in Trinity College, only to find that she doesn’t fit in. Louise’s writing is raw, pared back and searingly honest. The book is a must read.

In early lockdown, to get myself back into reading, I went back to a favourite comfort read from my childhood. I re-read Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild. Sometimes you need to go backwards to go forwards. After reading this classic children’s book, set in London in the 1930s about three orphaned sisters, I got my reading mojo back.

About Us by Sinead Moriarty is published by Penguin, Sandycove on July 15, €16.00. It’s about three couples in crisis who find themselves telling a stranger about the most private part of their lives – the hopes, the disappointments, the crushed expectations, the awkward realisations … And they come to some shocking and life-changing decisions.