It’s the most wonderful time of the year!
The internet is awash with lists containing the “Best books of 2018.” I love reading them and seeing which books I’ve read, which are on my to-read list, and which are brand new to me. Here is my list, enjoy!
Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World
Genre: Work / Life
About the book: “Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task. It’s a skill that allows you to quickly master complicated information and produce better results in less time. Deep work will make you better at what you do and provide the sense of true fulfillment that comes from craftsmanship.”
Why I loved it: I find too much of my time/brain space given to shallow work and shallow tasks. Newport helped me understand how much this impacts my brain and the ability to do sustained deep work. The constant attention switched we do is not good for our brains. I read this book last January and find myself returning to it again and again.
The Power of Healthy Tension by Tim Arnold
Genre: Leadership (I would argue “Life”)
About the book: “Often leaders and teams have a clear vision but fail to live it out. They feel stuck because of conflicting values, division within the team, and resistance to change. The Power of Healthy Tension helps leaders get unstuck.”
Why I loved it: I know have written about this book more than any other this year. Sorry-not-sorry! Culturally most of us reading this post have been programmed to see situations as “problems to be solved.” The result? We lack discernment on what are actual problems and what are tensions to be managed. For instance, responding in a truly loving way requires both unconditional acceptance and accountability (not one or the other).
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell
Genre: Classic
About the book: “When her father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her comfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the north of England. Initially repulsed by the ugliness of her new surroundings in the industrial town of Milton, Margaret becomes aware of the poverty and suffering of the local mill workers and develops a passionate sense of social justice.”
Why I loved it: I will come clean, I had never heard of this North and South until it was chosen to be the June read for the Velvet Ashes Book Club. Though full of death and class clashes and written in a style of another era, I loved it because it sucked me in (and is free on Kindle!). Bonus: this book models the importance of having touchpoints for different groups to interact and talk.
The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Dorris Kearns Goodw
Genre: History
About the book: “A dynamic history of the first decade of the Progressive era, that tumultuous time when the nation was coming unseamed and reform was in the air.”
Why I loved it: Okay, I truly did love this book, but why it made my top ten is because this book and I have been dancing for years. Finally, I quit dancing and read it for the Summer Reading Challenge. It was totally worth it! If you have been dancing with a book, quit dancing, pick it up and read. I shared Ten Takeaways from The Bully Pulpit. Added bonus? My friend Kathleen read it with me. That’s true friendbookship!
My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry by Fredrik Bachman
Genre: Fiction
About the book: “When Elsa’s grandmother dies and leaves behind a series of letters apologizing to people she has wronged, Elsa’s greatest adventure begins. Her grandmother’s instructions lead her to an apartment building full of drunks, monsters, attack dogs, and old crones but also to the truth about fairy tales and kingdoms and a grandmother like no other.”
Why I loved it: While Grandmother is slower to fall in love with than A Man Called Ove and confused me for the first third (clearly salesmanship runs in my blood! Ha!), I loved this book. Both of my book clubs read this, and it was in the second reading that Bachman earned my total respect as a storyteller. It is only as she delivers her Grandmother’s letters does Elsa realize her grandmother used stories to make sense of her reality and it was through the stories that she could actually see the people in her life. Not to over-spiritualize, but this book might be a modern parable. For those who have eyes to see, you’ll love it. For those who don’t, you won’t.
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
Genre: Memoir
About the book: “Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule.”
Why I loved it: Memoir is my favorite genre, and this book is why. Memoir lets the reader (me) walk in another’s shoes. In my notes, I wrote, “Compelling, tight, humorous, a great read for a Baltic cruise.”
Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover
Genre: Memoir
About the book: “Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Her family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when one of Tara’s older brothers became violent. When another brother got himself into college, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she’d traveled too far, if there was still a way home.”
Why I loved it: You know when you read a book and can’t quite believe that another person’s life could be like this? That’s Educated. Once again, I love how memoir opens a door into a world I did not know existed. (Warning, if you hated The Glass Castle or do not want to read how this family abused each other, pass on this book.)
Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life
Genre: Christian Living
About the book: “In the overlooked moments and routines of our day, we can become aware of God’s presence in surprising ways. How do we embrace the sacred in the ordinary and the ordinary in the sacred? Framed around one ordinary day, this book explores daily life through the lens of liturgy, small practices, and habits that form us. Each daily activity is related to a spiritual practice as well as an aspect of our Sunday worship.”
Why I loved it: This is the book I wish I had thought of to write. This is the book that comes the closest to capturing what goes on in my head and how I want to interact with this world. This is the book that captures the muck of my life while offering out the hope of who I can be. This is the book that shows how theology and spiritual practices are for our common lives. I’m pretty sure Tish and I would be friends if we met.
Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf
Genre: Fiction
About the book: “In the familiar setting of Holt, Colorado, home to all of Kent Haruf’s inimitable fiction, Addie Moore pays an unexpected visit to a neighbor, Louis Waters. Her husband died years ago, as did his wife, and in such a small town they naturally have known of each other for decades; in fact, Addie was quite fond of Louis’s wife. His daughter lives hours away, her son even farther, and Addie and Louis have long been living alone in empty houses, the nights so terribly lonely, especially with no one to talk with. But maybe that could change?”
Why I loved it: I first fell in love with local Coloradan author when I read Plainsong. How he can tell such rich and quietly moving stories with such sparse writing is a beautiful mystery to me. Months later I find myself thinking about Addie and Louis. I wonder how they are.
As Kingfishers Catch Fire: A Conversation on the Ways of God Formed by the Words of God
Genre: Christian Living
About the book: “‘Sixty years ago I found myself distracted,’ Eugene Peterson wrote. ‘A chasm had developed between the way I was preaching from the pulpit and my deepest convictions on what it meant to be a pastor.’ And so began Peterson’s journey to live and teach a life of congruence—congruence between preaching and living, between what we do and the way we do it, between what is written in Scripture and how we live out that truth.”
Why I love it: When Eugene Peterson died this fall, I found myself craving his writing. I love this book because he shares sermons he gave over the years, which is to say, Peterson modeled what “a long obedience in the same direction. When I own a book, I note in the back pages and thoughts I want to remember. This is by far my most marked up book of the year. Peterson, you will be missed.
And a bonus book because not every year will I get to share a book I wrote, so when I do, it is to be noted (and celebrated!).
All the News That’s Fit to Tell and How to Tell It: How to Write Christian Newsletters
“You might not think of yourself as a writer, but you are. Whether on social media, newsletters, or reports, writing is a part of your ministry life. What if improving as a writer allows you to communicate with friends, family, and co-workers more effectively? What if improving your writing is simpler—and more fun—than you remember from school days?”
You might also enjoy the 9 Books I Loved in 2014, 10 Books I Loved in 2015, My top 15 books in 2016, and Have you read the 17 Best Books of 2017?
What were some of your best reads from 2018?
by Adam Grant
by Susan David
by Sean Covey, Jim Huling, and Chris McChesney — Absolute must read.
by Peter Drucker
and now plan to read these books, all recommended by Joann.
by Erik Larson—”The time is 1933, the place, Berlin, when William E. Dodd becomes America’s first ambassador to Hitler’s Nazi Germany in a year that proved to be a turning point in history.”
by Frederick Kempe—The Berlin Wall
by Giles Whittell—You might have heard of the 
by 
by Ruta Sepetys. In this Young Adult Novel, “Fifteen-year-old Lina is a Lithuanian girl living an ordinary life — until Soviet officers invade her home and tear her family apart. Separated from her father and forced onto a crowded train, Lina, her mother, and her young brother make their way to a Siberian work camp, where they are forced to fight for their lives.”
by Robert K. Massie—I read this in high school and fell in love with one of the last Czars, his wife, their son who had hemophilia, and the mystic Rasputin. On our tour, we visited the Peter and Paul Fortress and Cathedral, where all of the Czars are buried, including Nicholas, Alexandra, and Alexis. The next day we toured the Palace where Rasputin was murdered. I am eager to read this a second time.
by Henri Nouwen—This book is one of my favorite five books of all time. So, when I heard we would be going to St. Petersburg and go to the Hermitage, I felt quivery inside. I need to reread it. If you haven’t you must read it. Please.
by M.T. Anderson—My niece Emily read and recommended this book to our family. I now need to reread it! “In September 1941, Adolf Hitler’s Wehrmacht surrounded Leningrad in what was to become one of the longest and most destructive sieges in Western history—almost three years of bombardment and starvation that culminated in the harsh winter of 1943–1944. More than a million citizens perished.”
by Jonas Jonasson—this international bestseller is described as “A reluctant centenarian much like Forrest Gump (if Gump were an explosives expert with a fondness for vodka) decides it’s not too late to start over . . .” So, you can tell it’s fiction. I’m wondering what it is about Sweden that turns out such good storytellers? I’m thinking of 
and Fredrik Backman.
by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon takes place in Afghanistan and, as the title says, shows women entrepreneurs (actually they started as teens!).
by Joan Bauer is a delightful book that is not your normal angsty YA novel. Add this to your “to read” list
by Gareth Hinds . . . this is the way to read The Odyssey.
by Retta. I’m a fan of the TV show Parks and Rec, so I enjoyed hearing more about Retta’s job. But the language, people. I’m not around folks who that use that much profanity and for that reason, I can’t recommend it. Maybe it would be different to read it than to listen to it, I don’t know. She is funny! And I still love Parks and Rec.
Richard Rohr. I first read this soon after I turned 40 and was living in Beijing, now at age 50 and after many changes, I think I got even more out of it than I did the first time.
by 
by Doris Kearns Goodwin. By far my crowning jewel book of the summer! I will forever associate this book with the summer of 2018 and reading with you. I’m going to write a separate post about this book. I’m so grateful I read it.
by Fredrik Backman took a while to get into, but so worth it! Brilliant writing and translating into English. I’m blogging through it right now at 
by Christopher L. Heuertz. If you are new to the Enneagram, don’t start with this book, but if you are looking to take the next step in understanding harmony triads and (as the subtitle suggests) ways to grow as a Christian and enhance your prayer life, this is the book for you.
