Between check-out and check-in, I've scheduled exactly one hour. Why, I honestly can't remember anymore, but it's too late to change it now without half the calendar collapsing. Today I'm mostly hoping that guest A sticks to the check-out time and guest B doesn't show up too early, or your humble hostess has a problem. I run my Airbnb as a kind of dress rehearsal for Bed&Books, with the idea that I'm already preaching slowing down here. Rest, a book, a window with a view, a c

The light comes slowly through the curtain. Downstairs, someone puts the kettle on. The sound of a spoon against a cup. She's still lying in bed, turning the page of her book. Her body beneath a rumpled sheet. Her mind in the world of ‘Clean’, written by the Chilean author Alia Trabucco Zerán. The man in the story has also started his day: not lazing in bed, but with a plan, with lists, with goals he's forgotten the reason for. "(..) a man who counts. Who keeps track of every

Anyone who thinks reading is a lazy activity because you're not moving, couldn't be more mistaken. How long can you stay in the same position with a book resting on your lap? Or lying on your side, holding your book upright? Just when you've finally found the perfect balance... it's time to turn the page. And who decided that reading in a hammock is the ultimate way to relax? Holding up a hefty novel while trying to keep your arms comfortably supported in the gaps of the hamm

Every special place begins with a story. Bed&Books is no exception. Long before there was a house filled with readers, homemade cakes, and quiet afternoons overlooking the Stockholm archipelago, there was simply a child who loved books. Some of my happiest childhood memories were made in bookstores. Every so often, my father would take me along, smile, and say just two words: "Go ahead." I would lose myself among the shelves until I'd found the one book that simply had to com

You may be reading alone, but it is anything but lonely. For me, a good book means never feeling alone. I see what the protagonist sees while I walk with him or her through the same landscape. So I trudge through muddy alleys in 19th-century London (‘There are Rivers in the Sky’ by Elif Shafak) or walk across the cobblestones of a piazza under the Neapolitan sun (‘Gap’ by Yannick Dangre). Still, physically you are just sitting there alone with your book, but it doesn't have t