‘Gateshead reading group helped me brave the outdoors’

Kirby was still experiencing severe anxiety when he built up the courage to join Reading Ramblers, where members listen to audiobooks or share stories during a guided walk around woods with a ranger from Forestry England.

“Even on the day, I had hundreds of reasons I wasn’t going to go,” he said.

“It was the most scared I’d been for a long time, but I didn’t want to let anyone down.”

Three years on and Kirby has joined another book club and started volunteering in a care home.

He said walking through the woods with other readers gave him a “new lease of life”.

On Wednesday, he will appear alongside Queen Camilla on BBC Two’s The Book That Changed My Life, which sees her explore the power of reading.

“It was lovely,” Kirby said of meeting the Queen.

“The Queen’s reading room has been doing some research into how reading can boost health, and I’m a prime example of that.

“Doing what I do now, it definitely reduces my anxiety, so to know that it has the Queen’s blessing means a lot.”