With the approaching and biting cold in the decision of how to spend winter break, it’s no doubt to assume that most people would choose the warmer, and safer option of staying indoors.

Either way, there’s only so much to do indoors.

Clean. Sleep. Game. Write. Eat. Television. Trace shapes onto frosted windows. Read. Bother your family. Enjo—

… read?

If you’re someone who has a knack for reading books, any books, books of boring nature, books of slow nature, fast nature, natural nature, mechanical nature, then I have some recommendations for you.

If you’re someone who just can’t seem to sleep at night because you have so many questions, tend to drift off into sudden epiphanies, can’t seem to settle down, or just has to find a way to grasp understanding of anything and everything you desire to know, these books may be for you.

1. The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory Of Effects

By Marshall McLuhan

The Medium is the Massage is a visual and textual exploration of the author’s media theory.

Its primary argument presents the belief that the medium, or so the way something is informed and given, is stronger and more impactful on society than the message.

A good example of this would be how weather channels are influenced in today’s time. 

In the recent decade, weather channels have shifted from an honest approach in their descriptions of the climate overview, smooth jazz, and weather scan, to intense and alarming sounds, fear-mongering, exaggerated information about coming events, and the constant repetition of how those expecting any intense weather should be terrified.

This is a draining and continuous cycle used within any news broadcasting, no matter the bias.

If you’re someone who’s curious about society and the way it’s shaped, maintained, abused, and manipulated, then this book will come off as a treat —a big, swirly lollipop— for its readers.

2. Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA, and the Tragedy of MKULTRA

By John Lisle

MKULTRA, is personally one of my very favorite and most endearing parts of our history as we know it. 

But another thing that I’m sure we all know is how much our government likes to hide its history.

Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottelieb, the CIA, and the Tragedy of MKULTRA is a book that gives an in-depth description and explanation of the grueling and underground parts of history that many aren’t aware of.

As the title states, and as I have given my humble opinion about, it talks about the CIA’s plans and attempts to discover how to mind control its people back in the 1950s.

Using psychedelic drugs, such as LSD, Mescaline, Morphine, Psilocybin, and a plentiful harvest of other psychological abuse tactics, the CIA attempted to find a way to control the minds of unsuspecting people to get the truth out of them or control them to say what they desired to hear. 

If you’re intrigued by understanding the deeper and darker parts of history that the government we as a society decide to look to for our problems, then I highly encourage you to dive into this book.

3. Neverwhere

By Neil Gaiman

Neverwhere is a fictional dark urban fantasy that follows the perspective of a young London businessman, Richard Mayhew, and his spiraling fall from the world he understands and knows into a hidden world beneath London’s streets.

With creative and visually painted descriptions of Richard’s journey through the subterranean world of a city of shadows, monsters, and angels together, the story has a way to lure its reader closer and closer to the end like a fish on a hook.

If you’re someone who finds fantasy fiction with dark and unique elements in cities and mysteries, Neverwhere would be a good story for you to follow.

4. Ratman’s Notebooks

By Stephen Gilbert

I am someone who loves stories about rodents and pests, especially rats. They stand as my favorite animal, so I feel that this fact gives plenty of explanation to my statement. 

Ratman’s Notebooks is a fictional tale written in descriptive journal entries of a young man living in England, sharing his experiences as a social misfit.

When he’s given the task to clear out a family of rats in the rock garden behind his home, he finds himself feeling remorse for the family and allows them to live.

Continuing through the entries, the main character shares his experiences with his workplace, his mother, and most importantly, the rats.

It certainly might not seem appealing for someone who doesn’t quite enjoy rodents or any sort of pests, given that that’s the main shared dislike around the globe, but the story contains intense plot turns that keep the reader hooked.

Using elements of robbery, break-ins, theft, suspense, and even murder, Ratman’s Notebooks is a story that’s worth the read for someone who doesn’t have any other idea how to spend their winter break.

And if you’re not into reading or books, which wouldn’t make sense since you clicked this article, perhaps you enjoy looking into the peephole of someone else’s little world. There’s a wonderful film adaptation released in 1971 of the story, titled Willard.

5. Welcome To Night Vale

By Jeffery Cranor and Joseph Fink

Welcome to Night Vale is a fictional, friendly desert community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and mysterious lights pass overhead while everyone pretends to sleep.

Haha.

In this novel, we follow two main characters, Jackie Fierro and Diane Crayton, who face the same problems: figuring out what “KING CITY” means.

Throughout the surreal and artistically horrid writing, we learn about the backgrounds of the character’s lives and their own problems, all while trying to understand the one they’re stuck in together.

So, if you’re someone who questions their reality and their place in society while looking for a good read and being stuck indoors from the freezing truth of cold weather, these books are a definite great choice.