Book & Perfume Pairings

An olfactory exploration of my personal library

It’s the little sensory details that help you get more immersed in the world of a story: how a piece of clothing might feel against a character’s skin, descriptions of sonic fluctuations in a conversation scene, the taste of a bite of food and a sip of a drink, and, of course, what they smell when they breathe in the air around them whether that be the fragrance on a lover’s skin or the odors that orient us to a story’s setting.

Scent is a powerful tool. It can trigger memories and spark feelings. It transport you out of yourself, or sends you back into your body through a visceral gag or shudder. Often when I write, I find myself using scent to help map out the worlds of my poems and stories. I might smell a sample of a fragrance to help set the emotional tenor of a scene, or use them to recall certain experiences. Lately, I’ve been associating perfumes with books I’ve read, too, using the olfactory to enhance the sensorium settings and characters described by their authors. So I thought I’d share a some of my favorite compositions of impactful novels and their fragrant counterparts.