2024 in Books

It’s been a while since my last post! I had a very busy and chaotic fall. I’m fortunate to say that I got a lot of good reading in, though. I also got a lot of good writing in—this fall, I wrote three personal essays covering what I learned about hope after the death of my dear friend, my relationship with clutter and how it relates to family and God, and a series of reflections on intimacy informed by my participation in an eclectic friend group in undergrad. I’m hoping to seek publication for one, if not more, of these, so stay tuned. I also wrote a short story about an academically brilliant and socially inept graduate student who accompanies his advisors on a trip to a poorly managed Italian monastery, from which his professors are secretly trafficking rare books and manuscripts to wealthy buyers on the black market. I must say I’m not entirely pleased with how it turned out in the end, but it was a lot of fun, and I definitely intend to return to it eventually to spruce up.

Since my last installment, I’ve finished Silence by Shusaku Endo, All Things Are Too Small: Essays in Praise of Excess by Becca Rothfeld, The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, The Gospel According to John by Saint John, The Idiot by Elif Batuman, and Intermezzo by Sally Rooney. This brings my reading count for 2024 to 31!

1. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins, a shallow and, in my opinion, poorly paced prequel to the Hunger Games trilogy

2. The Epic of Gilgamesh, author unknown, about a powerful man named Gilgamesh, his friendship with a powerful man named Enkidu who loses his power by being “tamed” by a woman, and Gilgamesh’s search for immortality (extremely good)

3. The Book of Tobit, a kind of comedy(?) that is included in the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Bibles, about a woman who has been wed seven times, with none of the marriages being consummated because a demon who is in love with her slays her husbands on their wedding nights, and the eighth man to fall in love with her

4. The Book of Jonah, an Old Testament book about a prophet who is swallowed by a big fish. Also kind of a Biblical comedy

5. Salient by Elizabeth T. Gray, Jr., a book of poetry about a battle in World War I

6. The Bible and Poetry by Michael Edwards, a book that evaluates the genre of the Bible, advances a very curious argument against systematic theology, and considers the role of interpretation in reading sacred texts

7. The Book of the Dead by Muriel Rukeyser, a book of poetry about the Hawk’s Nest Tunnel Disaster in West Virginia, which killed hundreds (if not thousands) of (mostly black) men during the Great Depression

8. Fear and Trembling by Soren Kierkegaard, a philosophical meditation on the story of Abraham and Isaac, coming to a definition of faith

9. The Interior Castle by Saint Teresa of Avila, a devotional work that imagines the soul as a castle that one must continually clean out in order to reach the center, where one might find closer communion with God

10. Draw Me After: Poems by Peter Cole, a book of poetry consisting of acrostics about linguistics

11. Murambi, the Book of Bones by Boubacar Boris Diop, a novel about the Rwandan genocide told by a plethora of narrators

12. The Book of Ephesians by Saint Paul, a New Testament letter concerning the nature of the church, its duties, and its role

13. On Beauty and Being Just by Elaine Scarry, a book about aesthetics

14. The Book of Psalms, a collection of meditations on God

15. The Book of Ezra, an Old Testament account of the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem

16. American Mother by Colum McCann and Diane Foley, a memoir by the mother of James Foley, a journalist and the first American to be killed by ISIS

17. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens, possibly the worst book I’ve read in the last 5 years; a quasi-mystery set in the Carolinas (I think South) that required an incredible suspension of disbelief to even be comprehended, consisting of terrible and kind of creepy romance and extremely stereotyped characters

18. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, a novel by an old dying pastor written to his young son, recollecting his life, regrets, and hopes

19. The Gospel According to Luke by Saint Luke, a New Testament account of the life of Jesus

20. Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood by Mark Oppenheimer, a journalistic account of the Tree of Life shooting, Jewish life in Pittsburgh and America, and what lies ahead for American Jewry

21. The Need for Roots by Simone Weil, a frankly hard to follow book about urbanization, why France fell to fascism during World War II, and what needs to be done to create stronger nations

22. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, a novel about a Chinese peasant who works his way to becoming quite wealthy, about the ways betrayal and decadence ultimately destroy

23. Gentle and Lowly: the Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers by Dane Ortlund, a nonfiction book considering the nature of Christ as innately merciful, drawing upon various Puritan theologians, from Paul Bunyan to Jonathan Edwards

24. Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton, a novel about a leftist commune that suddenly finds itself interacting with a drone-tech billionaire interested in its work, building to a sickening but very exciting conclusion

25. Digital Liturgies: Rediscovering Christian Wisdom in an Online Age by Samuel D. James, a book about the internet for Christians

26. Silence by Shusaku Endo, a novel about a Jesuit priest in Japan during Edo-era persecution, about the role of suffering and humiliation in a life of faith, about Judas, about betraying God. Since I didn’t cover this in depth earlier, I’ll just say this is definitely worth reading. It’s very upsetting and raises important questions about the relationship between colonialism and religion. It also raises a lot of important questions about faith more generally. One character, a poor peasant, repeatedly betrays the main priest to the authorities for money before returning to confess his sins to the same priest. The narrator considers that this poor Judas would have likely been a holy saint if he lived at a time when persecution was not rampant. I would recommend this to anyone who follows any religion or anyone who thinks about faith. I will probably watch the movie eventually but I’m told it’s quite upsetting.

27. All Things Are Too Small: Essays in Praise of Excess by Becca Rothfeld, a collection of essays about various topics, from monogamy to film to clutter, tangentially unified by being about the theme of whether the material world matters (spoilers: it does). Since I didn’t spend much time discussing this either, I’ll say that Rothfeld has an extremely pretentious writing style that I didn’t enjoy much at all. Some of the essays were very thoughtful and some were pretty meh. I gave this 3 out of 5. I found the essays on clutter and marriage most thought-provoking, and her essay on marriage and consent very moving and beautiful in parts. Rothfeld is a WaPo writer, so you can get a taste of her writing easily online.

28. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, a Sherlock Holmes-type mystery novel set in a 14th century monastery in Italy, during a time of persecutions of various heresies; also very philosophical and extremely fun(ny). I read this as part of a book club, but I fell behind pretty quickly. This was super fun. Eco is a genius. It really does feel like watching a Knives Out movie or something. My edition, which I got from the library, also had a terrific essay at the end by Eco explaining his views on the death of the author and some of his literary choices. I hope to write a longer piece about this book because it was very good and very fun.

29. The Gospel According to John by Saint John, a New Testament account of the life of Jesus. Besides the obvious, this book pairs well with Edwards’ The Bible and Poetry and thinking about language and its role in creation.

30. The Idiot by Elif Batuman, about a Turkish-American freshman at Harvard named Selin in the 90s; her crush on an alluring senior mathematician; very fun(ny). I was given this by a bestie in October and really liked it. It’s kind of slow but very funny and very smart. If you’ve ever had a crush on anyone, you will find it very relatable.

31. Intermezzo by Sally Rooney, a novel about two brothers: Peter, who is a wealthy lawyer, and Ivan, who is a decade younger, just graduated college, and a competitive chess player, and their relationships with each other and with respective women in their lives. I have mixed feelings about Sally Rooney and thought this was the worst of her books that I’ve read so far, which is a bummer because I was so excited for it. I do think Rooney’s prose here is mostly beautiful, though the syntax could be annoying. I didn’t think the characters were fleshed out very well, especially the female characters. I also didn’t think it was nearly as interesting plot-wise or dynamic-wise as Normal People and Conversations with Friends. The ending was also very unsatisfying. Some of the scenes were, however, incredibly beautiful. There’s a description of some birds that comes to mind especially. I previously talked about Rooney here. I think if I had to update my assessment of her, I would say that she’s less reactionary and less political in Intermezzo.

According to my spreadsheet that I began using this year to track my reading more accurately than Goodreads, I read 6,677 pages this year, assuming that one chapter of a book in the Bible equals one page. I read 11 novels, 10 nonfiction books, and 3 books of poetry. 13 of the books I read were written by women, 13 were by men, and 5 by either multiple authors of different genders or unknown authors (who, let’s face it, were likely men). The average page count per book this year was 215, with the longest book being 541 pages (The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes) with the shortest being 4 pages (The Book of Jonah). I read 1,458 pages in August, the most of any month of the year. My average rating this year for my books was 3.58 out of 5.

My favorite books this year were probably The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Bible and Poetry, Fear and Trembling, The Good Earth, The Name of the Rose, and The Idiot. I would highly recommend all of them.

I did a lot of cooking and baking this year as well. My favorite recipes at the moment are probably this arugula salad with peaches, this brown butter lentil and sweet potato salad, sticky gingerbread with cranberries, and these matcha brownies.

Happy new year! Stay warm and healthy, and read a good book! Try to memorize a poem too. I recommend Wallace Stevens.