2021 Books

I'm grateful for the good friends I talked books with this year. Here are the Top 12 (6 in Nonfiction and 6 in Fiction) with a clear winner in each category. 

Nonfiction Book of the Year

The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise by Cardinal Robert Sarah 

I finished this book and felt I immediately needed to turn back to the beginning and start again. Thoughts on God's silence and our need to be silent, this book is full of the very thing I need in a cacophony of noise. This in and of itself was enough for me to contemplate for most of my life:  "The narcissisim of excessive speech is a temptation from Satan. It results in a form of detestable exteriorization, in which man wallows on the surface of himself, making noise so as not to hear God." 

 Other nonfiction

Habits of the Household: Practicing the Story of God in Everyday Household Rhythms by Justin Whitmel Earley

We practice what we believe; we believe what we practice. Earley has thoughtfully written a book on how to do that better in our families. See my full review here.

My Divine Comedy: A Mother's Homeschooling Journey by Missy Andrews

Being both mom and teacher is hard, and particularly so at different stages. I blogged about this and the book here. 

The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West by David McCullough

I love McCullough's writing, I love history and I read this one eagerly looking for mention of any of my ancestors who were part of the settling of the Ohio Territory. I was disappointed in the latter, but the story of the Northwest Ordinance and the determined and principled pioneers who made it reality was intriguing. There are a lot of characters and it was easy to get lost, but McCullough didn't disappoint in weaving a narrative to history.

The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes and Why by Amanda Ripley and The Survivor's Club: The Secrets and Science That Could Save Your Life by Ben Sherwood are two books about who survives extreme disasters. This is a subject that fascinates me and Ripley is the better writer and wrote the better book, with one exception. She doesn't acknowledge faith, prayer, or the unexplainable. Sherwood does. And while he admits his skepticism, he acknowledges the near universal indication that prayer makes a difference in who survives, using data and anecdote.

Fiction Book of the Year

Inferno by Dante Alighieri, translated by Anthony Esolen

I'm not sure how I received a Humanities degree without having to read any part of The Divine Comedy, but I, tragically, did. Enter 100 Days of Dante and Ben and I reading all three books and listening in on leading scholars discuss each canto of Inferno. Looking forward to Purgatorio and Paradiso in 2022. Wow!

Other fiction

Silence by Shusaku Endo

Endo's haunting story about Jesuit missionaries in Japan and the tortures and crises of faith they endure is unforgettable. 

Eden Mine by S.M. Hulse

I rarely find a modern novel that truly gets me thinking. Hulse's setting in a small Montana town and how we love even the deeply flawed (i.e. when your brother has taken someone else's life) kept me turning the pages until I was finished, leaving me thinking for...well, I'm still thinking about it.

Gerta by Katerina Tuckova

This was a hard book to read, written by a young Czech author about being Czech as the Nazis, and then the Russians come to power. It is a brutal read, guaranteed to make your life look a lot better.

The Fall by Albert Camus

Also not fun reading, this is a classic conservative text. In a nutshell, man can keep running from God, but it leads to nothing but misery. 

Things We Didn't Say by Amy Lynn Green 

A small northern town hosts POWs during World War II. Told entirely through written correspondence between the primary character who is essentially sentenced to return to her hometown to serve as an interpreter for the POWs in order to keep a scholarship and those she is interacts with, it was unique and worth reading.