book lists

What I’d Place in a Little Free Library

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Little Free LibraryI posted yesterday about Little Free Libraries, the free lending library you can “Steward” in your front yard. At the end of the post, I asked what books you’d put in a Little Free Library if you had one. So, it is only fair that I give a list of a few of the ones I’d put in there.

This is an interesting exercise, because at least some of the books I read wouldn’t be ones my neighbors would be keen about. So, here’s the compromise between things I feel good about and that I think others might like. Tell me what you think:

First of all, some children’s books:

  • Owl Moon, by Jane Yolen. We always loved reading this aloud to our son.
  • Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak. Great pictures and story to address children’s fears.
  • Good Night Moon, Margaret Wise Brown. We loved saying good night to the moon and everything else!
  • The Cat in The Hat, Dr. Suess–either this or one of the others. We always loved Yertle the Turtle.
  • I Am A Bunny, Ole Risom with illustrations by Richard Scarry. Our favorite board book and frequent baby gift. The illustrations are amazing.

Then some books for older children and young adults:

  • Charlotte’s Web, E. B. White. I first heard this story in 5th grade and we read it aloud as a family.
  • Carry on Mr. Bowditch, Jean Lee Latham. Tells the story of a young sailor who becomes a renowned mathematician.
  • A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle. A sci-fi book with strong character values.
  • Dandelion Wine, Ray Bradbury. Evokes a mix of summer vacation memories and fantastic elements.
  • The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis. I feel like this book is the Wardrobe to the whole series of Chronicles of Narnia.

Adults: Fiction

  • Bel Canto, Ann Patchett. Just read it, her best in my opinion, and something I think both men and women could like.
  • Surreality, Ben Trube. Have to get my son’s in here. Besides, I really think if you like techno-thrillers, you’ll find it as good read. Kept me up at night!
  • Murder on the Orient Express, Agatha Christie. Her most famous, and introduces you to one of her most famous characters.
  • The Crocodile on the Sandbank, Elizabeth Peters. The first of her Amelia Peabody stories. We have loved following Amelia Peabody from one hair-raising adventure to another.
  • A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr. I think this is one of the best science fiction books, an early post-apocalyptic book envisioning a post-nuclear world.
  • Hunt for Red October, Tom Clancy. I thought some of his early stuff was best.
  • Shoeless Joe, W. P. Kinsella. The book that served as the basis for the movie Field of Dreams. A wonderful tale for anyone who loves baseball.

Non-fiction:

  • The Wright Brothers, David McCullough. Ohio boys who were the first to figure out powered flight. Well-told by this master historian and biographer.
  • Great by Choice, Jim Collins. One of the best business books I’ve read.
  • Genome, Matt Ridley. Fascinating science writing on the 23 pairs of chromosomes that make us who we are.
  • Destiny of the Republic, Candice Millard. The fascinating tale of the short presidency of James Garfield, another Ohioan, and the crazed assassin and incompetent doctor who contributed to his untimely death.
  • Unbroken,Laura Hillenbrand. Tells the story of Louis Zamperini, Olympic-level runner and POW.
  • Shiloh, Shelby Foote. His account of the battle of Shiloh and a great introduction to this great Civil War historian.
  • Both-And, Rich Nathan. This is a book written by a pastor in my home town that talks about how the church can overcome the polarities that are tearing apart American society. He articulates a picture of what many of us long for church to be.
  • Prodigal God, Timothy Keller. He takes the parable of the prodigal and turns it on its head, showing that the real prodigal is the father, who represents God, prodigal in his love for both is profligate and self-righteous sons.

Of course, there is probably not a single person who would agree with this list. And that’s the great thing about Little Free Libraries. You can add your favorites to someone else’s while discovering something new for yourself.

By the way, for right now, probably the way I will support Little Free Libraries in my area is to visit that box a few blocks away, and add a few of these books, and see what they have that I might like.

So, if you were to take one from and leave one with my hypothetical Little Free Library, what would you take, and what would you leave?

 

 

A Different Best-Seller List

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seven-habits-highly-coveyI’m a sucker for a book list–any book list. I’m always curious about what others find interesting enough to read. Best-seller lists tell me about what lots of people are interested in reading. That doesn’t mean I run out to buy the book, but rather that it gives me some ideas, when I talk to readers, what they might be reading. For lists that include “backlist” books, I’m always interested to find out how many of these books I’ve read, and the “holes” in the list give me ideas for things I might want to pick up some day.

AbeBooks, an Amazon company specializing in used, rare, and out of print books, came out with an interesting list recently that combines “book list” and “best-seller” list. It was their list of the 100 bestselling used books since 2000. The surprise for me was that at the top of the list was Stephen Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. They had an interesting explanation of why this came in ahead of more significant literary works like To Kill a Mockingbird (number 2) or one of my favorites that I did buy at a used bookstore, East of Eden (at number 44). They said, “This is a book that many people want to read, but no one wants to keep.”

Actually, that is an interesting statement, because to some degree, this must be true of every book on this list, because these all are used books. For various reasons, the original purchasers didn’t want to keep them, but others want to read them. Truthfully, there are a number on the list I would agree to this being true: Khaled Hosseini’s books, The Five Languages of Love by Chapman, One Hundred Years of Solitude, to name a few. I’m glad I read them, but had no desire to read them again or have them hanging around.

There are some I’ve read that I wouldn’t part with (my heirs might or probably will however!): East of Eden, and anything by Hemingway would be on the list as well as C.S. Lewis and Tolkien. And there are some I’d never touch, including the recent novels of Stieg Larsson and Eat, Pray, Love. (Sorry if that offends anybody–books are like ice cream and everyone has their own taste).

Then there were some I would like to read or re-read someday. To Kill a Mockingbird and The Great Gatsby are up on myu list of re-reads. Believe it or not, I’ve never made it through Gone with the Wind and given my love of all things Civil War, I probably should some day. Freakonomics and The Tipping Point are on one of my TBR piles. I’ll probably re-sell them as soon as I read them (if I do).

One of the most interesting things this reflects is the whole world of used bookselling. The truth is that probably over two-thirds of the books I read are used, or from a used bookstore. The new books I get, I almost always buy at significant discount or get free. I think one of the commandments in my universe is “thou shalt not pay full price for a book”. This means that the person who wants to read a book but not keep it is one of my best friends!

So, are you curious how many of the books on the AbeBooks list are ones I’ve read? To make this fun, I will invite you to guess, and post the answer on Friday.

Books and Brownies 2015

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brownieA cold winter night, brownies, and milk, and good friends sharing about books they’ve enjoyed. A simple idea but one that always yields not only new ideas of books to read but also new bonds with those friends. Last Friday, some graduate students from the Christian Graduate Student Alliance met to do just that. This year, I thought I would include (not verbatim) some notes I took about the books they shared.

Creation Regained by Albert M. Wolters. We often talk about things in terms of good or bad. Wolters suggests we consider what God’s created purpose for those things might be.

Playing God by Andy Crouch. This book applies Wolters suggestion to the idea of power, which can corrupt and be corrupted but actually reflects what it means for us to be in God’s image.

Modern Pheasant Hunting, 2nd Edition by Steve Grooms.  The decline of the pheasant population necessitates more sophisticated hunting techniques. Recommended by a pheasant hunter as the one leisure book he’s read recently in graduate school!

Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton. The book explores in beautiful writing apartheid in South Africa through the story of two families caught up in tragedy and the efforts of a black pastor to pursue forgiveness and reconciliation.

Catcher in the Rye and Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger. Catcher was the first novel in English read by the Japanese student who recommended it. He deeply identified with the title figure. He also particularly loved the short story “At the Dinghy” in Nine Stories.

Stepping Heavenward by Elizabeth Prentiss. This Christian fiction from 1869 explores in diary form the basic longing to follow God more deeply while struggling with the tensions of human, sinful nature.

A Year of Biblical Womanhood by Rachel Held Evans. Each month focuses on a different quality of character that the Bible upholds for women. The woman who recommended it also appreciated Evans discussion of Proverbs 31 in its original Jewish context.

Extraordinary Chickens by Steven Green-Armytage. This is a coffee table book of photographs of the many varieties of chickens showing what an incredible bird (and the closest living relative of Tyrannosaurus Rex). A veterinary student interest in poultry veterinary work recommended this one.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This was a best-seller post-apocalyptic book that is far better than the movie in exploring the scenario of adolescents trained to kill or be killed in the hunger games.

The Academic Job Search Handbook by Julia Miller Vick and Jennifer S. Furlong. This book provides everything a grad student aspiring to jobs in academia needs to pursue the job search including timelines, samples of vitas in various disciplines, how to accept or decline an offer, and more.

The Power of a Praying Woman by Stormie Omartian. This book was also recommended last year and the woman recommending it this year not only picked up the book as a result of last year’s recommendation by Skyped with a friend from Houston who read it with her.

I loved this last recommendation because it illustrates the joy of sharing books that have touched our lives–they may touch the lives of others as well. Personally, I realized that I’ve never read J.D. Salinger, nor particularly wanted to. My Japanese student friend intrigued me enough that I just may.

Perhaps the list and the stories might motivate you to try a “books and brownies” night some time soon! What books would you add to this list?

Links to earlier Books and Brownies Lists:

2014

2013

Bob on Books New Year’s Resolutions

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IMG_2263I took some time over the past week to do some thinking about some directions for “Bob on Books” in 2015. Looking back at a similar post from the past year, I was able to do some of the things I came up with and also saw the blog go in some totally unanticipated directions. I suspect this year will be the same, so no guarantees but here is what I’m thinking:

  • Reviews: I will continue to review what I read and what interests me. At the encouragement of my son, I will probably throw in a few more graphic novel reviews –this is obviously a big segment of publishing and one that I find more intriguing than I thought I would. I also want to try to review more new books but look for me to weave in some old stuff that I’m interested in as well!
  • Interviews: This is something I want to try this year, particularly in conjunction with reviews. Some of the authors are people I know, or might like to, and I hope in at least some cases that this personal touch might interest you in their work. I’m also thinking of throwing in a few interviews with bookstore owners (particularly independents), perhaps someone working with libraries, and maybe others connected to the world of books.
  • The Reading Life: In case you haven’t noticed, I think reading, and engaging the world of books, is one of the things that can be life enriching. I want to continue to look for new slants on reading, perhaps profiling some other famous readers, as I did Teddy Roosevelt this year. As there are new technological developments that affect reading, I will explore those as well.
  • Bookstore Reviews: As time permits, I want to do something I tried last summer which is to review bookstores I visit. I might try to extend this to some online sources as well (though not Amazon, of which I think we probably all have our own opinions!).
  • Book Lists: I will do several kinds of things this year. I love getting folks together to share their favorite books and will probably do a few posts passing these along. Each month, I will post my “The Month in Reviews” list which will have all my reviews of the past month. I will also do some “category” lists of books I’ve reviewed in different categories. And look for my own “Best of the Year” post at the end of 2015, Lord willing. I’m looking forward to finding out what books I really like as well!
  • Posts on other things besides books: Oddly enough, these have been some of the most viewed in the past year (see my Bob on Books Top Ten Posts of 2014). Some of this is plain unpredictable–sometimes I just find something I want to write on and people really like it–or not! I plan to continue regular posts on Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown into the spring, which would cover a year. After this, I may post more occasionally, depending on how many new ideas I get for this series. I also will continue posts connected with my church’s Going Deeper blog, which are every other week reflections on our pastor’s messages.  And look for some posts on themes related to higher education as I do some research on “the changing university” over the next six months, related to a presentation I will be giving this summer.
  • Blog appearance: I will continue to tweak the appearance of the blog including categories to make this more usable–feedback from those of you who follow (no spammers please!) is welcome! At some time, I might even explore a face lift!

Blogging is social. I would love to know what you think of these ideas and wouldn’t mind hearing those “I wish he would write on…” ideas. The common thread for me that holds together the different things I write is engaging with others about the good, the true, and the beautiful as we encounter this in the experience of books, reading, and life. Your engagement with this blog is what makes writing a joy. I look forward to more of that in 2015!

Can a Book Change Your Mind?

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Recently The Chronicle of Higher Education Review asked 12 scholars what book had most changed their mind. The list was interesting, mostly for the fact that I had not heard of most of the books. But what caught my attention was one of the commenters who raised the question of whether books can “change our minds.”  Part of the commenter’s discussion was what we mean by “mind” (typical academic question!) and what it means to “change” this.

Partly, I was grateful for these comments because, surprisingly, I had a hard time with this question as well. My initial thought was that although I cannot think of a book that “changed” my mind, I can certainly think of books that have expanded my mind, or opened up new avenues of thinking about a question. I suppose this can be labelled as change in an incremental sense. But I cannot say there is a single book I think of that has caused a profound revolution in my thinking–at least overnight or in a single reading.

That said, I do think there have been books that have shaped core convictions and the way I live my life. Perhaps one mark of their significance is that they are books to which I return that seem to yield new depths with each reading. It seems with these books that it is not so much that they “change” my mind, but that they “make sense” of my world and give words to what I sense is real and true about life.

Of course for me, The Bible would be at the top of my list. In my youth, it was the stirring language of Romans 8 and a God whose love I could not be separated from. In more recent years, it has been the psalms of lament as I’ve faced loss and seen the evil of the world.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together continues to speak compellingly to me about the character of Christian community and the possibilities of two people meeting each other uniquely through their common faith in Christ.

I am in the midst of a re-reading of John Stott’s profound work on The Cross of Christ and reminded how “cross-shaped” a truly Christian life is.

Barbara Tuchman’s The Guns of August persuaded me more than any other book of the follies of war and the great responsibility those in power have for such folly.

Alan Paton’s Cry the Beloved Country and Wendell Berry’s Port William stories helped me understand how important a sense of place and a love of place is to our lives.

Books like Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac reminded me of the intricate ecosystems of our places.

I could go on, but I guess what books have done for me is not so much “change” my mind but rather have given words to make sense of my life and enlarged my view of the world in which I live it.

So what do you think about this question? Is there a book  that has changed your mind? How would you describe the significance of important books to your life?

Keeping a List of Books Read (and What This Says About Us)

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Rebecca Mead recently published a delightful article in The New Yorker titled “The Pleasure of Reading to Impress Yourself.” She describes unearthing an old notebook in which she recorded the books she had read for several during the 1980s. What she particularly noticed was how heavily it was weighted toward classics of English literature and the pleasure derived from not only having read these books but being pleased with oneself as becoming “a well-read person.”

True confessions time. I’ve kept a list of books I’ve read since 1993, when a colleague made a remark about being deliberate in our choices of good literature since “there are so many books and so little time” and how he recorded not only the books he read but a summary of those books and his response. So I began keeping a list which I’ve kept up to this day, now numbering over 1600 books. Back around 2008, I started supplementing this with reviews posted on an app on Facebook, and when I had problems with this because of one of Facebook’s interminable changes, I started posting those reviews on Goodreads in late 2011, and linking them to this blog, which I began last year. Here was my list from 1993:

1993 Reading List

My 1993 Reading List (click to enlarge)

What strikes me as I look back on this list is that my reading choices were probably driven by a similar motivation–not only to read for information or pleasure but to have the pleasure of being impressed with being well-read.  I remember that it was around this time that I picked up an edition of Clifton Fadiman’s The New Lifetime Reading Plan and started looking for books that I didn’t have. I notice on the list for that year reading Dickens, Dreiser, Forster, Hardy, and both The Iliad and The Odyssey by Homer.

It was probably a few years later that I supplemented Fadiman with Eugene Peterson’s book, Take and Read (I just found it on my list for 1996), focusing on spiritual reading. But even in 1993, I noticed taking on Calvin’s Institutes, Newman’s Idea of a University (which I re-read last year) and books by Lewis and Chesterton.

I also noticed that then as now, I was reading lots of history and biographies, including a biography of Lawrence of Arabia, another of Teddy Roosevelt, a history of the battle of Antietam, Landscape Turned Red, and more.

I’m reminded of the good memory of reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s A Long Winter as a family as the winter of 1993-94 began as well as Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time.

I see some of the books I read for issues we were wrestling with then and (and now) including I Suffer Not a Woman on women in the church and books on race by Cornel West and Perkins and Rice.

As I reflect on this list, I’m struck over and over by the continuity of reading interests, and even authors. I see a book on this list by Jaroslav Pelikan, and I just recently completed another book by this author. Likewise, I am currenly reading James Davison Hunter’s To Change the World. I note that I read his book Culture Wars in 1993. Of course authors like Lewis and Chesterton turn up on my lists again and again, as do authors like Dickens and Hardy. I also seem fascinated with books on Winston Churchill and Teddy Roosevelt. Sometimes I give an author a second chance. I thought Gabriel Garcia Marquez kind of strange in 1993. I still thought he was kind of odd when I read him last year, when I discovered that either people absolutely love his stuff, or just don’t get him–I confess I’m in the latter category.

It is fascinating to me how our book lists, if we keep them, serve as a kind of narrative of our lives, and a window into the things that matter to us. These days, I’m not so much into following book lists which, when transferred to my books read, leave me impressed with myself. My book choices reflect curiosity, sometimes serendipity, and sometimes simply returning to authors that have given me pleasure and insight in the past. But they also often remind me where I was when I read a particular book or who I was reading it with as is the case of some from our Dead Theologians reading group, which has met since the late 90’s.

So while it may seem compulsive (which my wife says I can be!) my book lists remind me not only of the books I’ve read but the events of life associated with these. Some evening soon, I need to just sit down with the list and take a walk down memory lane.

Do you keep a reading list or post the books you’ve read on something like Goodreads? What has keeping such lists meant for you?

 

Twenty-five Favorite Books

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Being new at this blog thing, I still feel I’m introducing myself to potential readers.  I see lots of top 25 book lists.  I’m not sure that this is my TOP 25 nor are these necessarily in any priority order.  I might generate a different list tomorrow.  But at least for today, these are some of my favorite books.

1.  The Bible. Certainly, I’ve read this more than any other and reading this has been more transformative than any other book.

2.  J R R Tolkien. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Read through this at least four times and love for the picture of how the ordinary and insignificant defeat the great power of evil.

3.  Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Life Together. Probably the most profound book on Christian community I’ve read.

4.  Homer.  The Iliad and The Odyssey.  Foundational narratives that explore the human condition.

5.  John Calvin. The Institutes. Bought the Ford Lewis Battles edition with a graduation award from seminary.  A model of rigorous thought, clarity and devotion to the sovereign God.  Don’t judge Calvin by his successors until you’ve read him.

6.  Shelby Foote. The Civil War. Bruce Catton comes close, but for sheer readability and sweeping narrative, nothing beats Foote.

7.  John R W Stott. The Cross of Christ. I am indebted to so much of Stott’s writing but this is his magnum opus in my opinion.

8.  Alan Paton. Cry the Beloved Country. I love the economy of his writing, his love of place and this compelling tale of reconciliation.

9.  J I Packer. Knowing God. Read, ponder, and pray this book and you will at least a bit more.

10.  Barbara Tuchman. The Guns of August. She later wrote of war as the “march of folly”.  She chronicles at length the folly behind the beginnings of World War I.

11.  C S Lewis. Mere Christianity. Hard to pick a single title but this is perhaps the book that most reasonably and clearly articulates what it means to be a mere Christian–apart from all the cultural trappings and denominational idiosyncracies.

12. Wendell Berry. Hannah Coulter. One of his “Port William” novels that deeply captures a sense of place, the passage of time, and the deep woundedness that many bear who fight our nation’s wars.

13. James Sire. The Universe Next Door. Jim has done more than anyone I know to introduce the idea of “worldview” into Christian discourse and this is the book that started it all.

14. Walter M Miller, Jr. A Canticle for Leibowitz.  Possibly one of the very best science fiction works that explores what a post-nuclear holocaust world might be like.

15. Miroslav Volf. Exclusion and Embrace. Volf explores how we overcome the pervasive alienation from the “other” in the human community.

16. David McCullough. Truman.  I’ve loved everything McCullough has written but I still think of this as his best, introducing me to the last man to be president before I was born.

17. Eugene Peterson. Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity.  Peterson begins this book by decrying the ways American pastors have forsaken their calling and then focuses on prayer, the ministry of the word, and spiritual direction as the core of pastoral work.

18. Stephen Jay Gould. Wonderful Life.  Gould was simply a magnificent science writer!

19. Augustine. The Confessions.  Simply the best narrative of conversion out there.

20. Fyodor Doestoevsky. Crime and Punishment.  Glad I waited until adulthood to read this profound work on human nature.

21. George Marsden. The Soul of the American University.  Simply the best history tracing the foundation of American universities out of the life of the church to the present disestablishment of religion from the intellectual life of universities.

22. John Steinbeck. East of Eden. Magnificent writing retelling the Cain and Abel story in early 20th century California.

23. G K Chesterton. Orthodoxy.  He is wonderful for turning ideas on their head, with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek!

24. Winston Churchill. A History of the English Speaking Peoples.  Churchill may not have been the best historian but he could write and he certainly gives one an appreciation for our shared democratic institutions.

25. Francis Schaeffer. The God Who Is There.  Going back, I find ways the book is flawed and dated, yet I am profoundly grateful for having this book in hand during my freshman intro to philosophy to have some framework to think Christianly about western thought since the enlightenment.

As I come to “25” I realize so many I could have included (such as Manchester’s biography of Churchill) and something by Wallace Stegner.  I’ve also omitted the witty writings and drawings of Columbus native James Thurber.

I’d love to hear some of your favorites.  Don’t worry if they are very different than mine.  Booklovers always love hearing about good books and tastes for books are as individual as tastes for ice cream!