Why I Keep Reading Emma M. Lion’s Journals
I’m on book six of Beth Brower’s The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, and I’m deliberately reading them slowly because I don’t want them to end.
These aren’t sweeping historical romances or grand adventures. They’re quiet, observational novellas told entirely through the journal entries of Emma M. Lion, a young woman living in 1880s London who has returned to her quirky neighborhood of St. Crispian’s after three years away.
Emma documents her life at Lapis Lazuli House with dry wit and sideways amusement—the peculiarities of her eccentric Cousin Archibald, the formidable presence of Aunt Eugenia, the mysterious tenant in the garret next door, and the slowly unfolding friendships with Pierce, Islington, and Hawkes.
Nothing dramatic happens, and yet everything feels significant.
What these books remind me about
Reading Emma’s journals takes me back to a time when communication was deliberate. When you sat down with pen and paper to write a letter because that was the only way to reach someone. When documenting your day meant reflecting in a handwritten journal, not posting updates for an audience.
Emma doesn’t perform her life. She lives it, then writes about it later—sometimes with exasperation, sometimes with delight, always with honesty. There’s no curating for likes or worrying about how it will be received. It’s just her thoughts, preserved exactly as they occurred to her.
These books also show how the extraordinary grows from the ordinary. Emma’s life isn’t glamorous. She reads, she walks through her neighborhood, she has tea with friends, she navigates family expectations. But Brower writes these small moments with such care that they become deeply meaningful. A conversation over tea. An unexpected friendship. The particular way afternoon light falls through a window.
It’s a reminder that a rich life doesn’t require constant novelty or grand events. It requires paying attention to what’s already there.
Why I’m reading them slowly
I could binge this series in a week, but I’m treating each volume like the journal it is—something to be savored, not rushed through.
Her world feels so different from ours, and yet the things that matter to her—friendship, belonging, finding your place, figuring out who you are apart from what everyone expects—those are timeless.
If you’re looking for a series that rewards slow reading, that makes you want to write letters by hand and document your own ordinary days, start with Volume 1. The entire series is available on Kindle Unlimited, which makes it easy to work through at your own pace.
Sometimes the best stories aren’t about escaping your life. They’re about learning to see the one you’re already living.
P.S. Are you reading anything that’s changing how you see your own daily rhythms? I’d love to hear about it.