Tag Archive | memoir

12 Books about Books that I Still Want to Read

Dec31

By the Book: A Reader’s Guide to Life by Ramona Koval. Reviewed by kimbofo at Reading Matters.

Bequest of Wings: A Family’s Pleasure with Books by Annis Duff.

Phantoms on the Bookshelves by jacques Bonnet, reviewed at Stuck in a Book.

Howards End Is on the Landing: A Year of Reading from Home by Susan Hill. Recommended by Beth at Weavings.

Old Books, Rare Friends: Two Literary Sleuths and Their Shared Passions by Leona Rostenberg & Madeleine Stern. Recommended at Book Psmith.

A Passion for Books by Harold Rabinowitz and Rob Kaplan. Recommended by FatalisFortuna.

Reading the OED by Ammon Shea. Recommended at The Book Lady’s Blog.

Soldier’s Heart: Reading Literature Through Peace and War at West Point by Elizabeth D. Samet. Also recommended at Random Wonder.

Walking a Literary Labyrinth by Nancy Malone. Recommended at Indextrious Reader.

When I Was a Child I Read Books by Marilynne Robinson.

A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books by Nicholas A. Basbanes.

Buried in Books: A Reader’s Anthology by Julie Rugg, reviewed at A Bookish Affair.

Don’t all of these sound delicious? What are your favorite books about books?

12 Best Nonfiction Books I Read in 2013

Dec30

Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity by Katherine Boo. Recommended at Book Diary.

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard.

The Little Way of Ruthie Leming: A Southern Girl, a Small Town, and the Secret of a Good Life by Rod Dreher.

Letters from a Skeptic: A Son Wrestles with his Father’s Questions about Christianity by Dr. Gregory A. Boyd and Edward K. Boyd.

The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert by Rosaria Champagne Butterfield.

Wisdom and Innocence: A Life of G.K. Chesterton by Joseph Pearce.

Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief by Lawrence Wright, reviewed at Semicolon.

Death by Living: Life Is Meant to Be Spent by N.D. Wilson.

The Girl in the Picture by Denise Chong, featured at Semicolon.

C.S. Lewis: A Life by Alister McGrath.

Saving a Life: How We Found Courage When Death Rescued our Son by Charles and Janet Morris.

Beautiful Nate: A Memoir of a Family’s Love, a Life Lost, and Heaven’s Promises by Dennis Mansfield.

Two biographies (Chesterton and Lewis), two autobiographies/conversion stories (Denise Chong and Rosaria Champagne Butterfield), two memoirs of the loss of a son (the last two on the list), a couple of inspirational apologetics titles (Boyd and Wilson), exposes of Scientology and of poverty in Mumbai, a narrative history of the assassination and death of President James Garfield, and a memoir of Rod Dreher’s encounter with death and community in small-town Louisiana: those were my favorite nonfiction reads this year. I recommend any or all of them, if you’re at all interested in the subject matter. Ms. Butterfield’s conversion story and Mr. Wright’s book about the history and inner workings of the Scientology movement were particularly thought-provoking.