Reading in 2022
One of the things I look forward to at the end of each year is the sharing of personal book lists for the year. I’m happy to add my little reading log to the litany.
I wrote this time last year about how and why I reclaimed a love for reading in a very busy season of life. Things have only gotten fuller and busier, and reading has continued to be joyful, restful, beautiful, enriching, and absolutely necessary.
Here are some highlights of my reading life this year:
I never set a number-based goal for reading, but I did have a goal to enjoy more long novels, like could-be-used-as-a-doorstop length. It takes discipline to settle into a story for the long-haul, get to know the characters, and break out of the expected rises and falls of the plot of a shorter novel. I think I’m a better, happier reader for it. (Long Novels: Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, David Copperfield, Little Women)
I read several books this year whose stories I have loved since childhood. It’s so interesting to me to read them now as a woman, a writer, a wife, a mother of four, a person actively investing in her community, and see the stories and characters in a whole new light. I have decided that I want to be Susan Sowerby, Marmee, and Old Fezziwig when I grow up. (Long-Loved Books: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, The Secret Garden, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, A Christmas Carol, Little Women)
One of our families most-loved activities since the kids’ earliest days has been snuggling up and reading together. This year, we have started reading more chapter books aloud in addition to our favorite picture books, and it has been so fun. It’s not perfect, we’re not aiming for full reading comprehension, but wow—it’s been so fun to enjoy these stories together. After finishing each family read-aloud, we’d do something fun inspired by the themes or plot of the book to celebrate together. (Family Read-Alouds: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Skunk and Badger, Winnie the Pooh, The Secret Garden, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory)
We built our dream bookshelf (which is pictured above)! It has a sliding ladder. It has room for many more books and pieces of art and plants that I’ve managed to keep alive. In short, we love it.
So without further delay, here are the 60 books I enjoyed this year. I share a brief review of each of them on my Instagram highlights (@daniellemmellema). Anything marked with an * is a book I listened to in audiobook format (not necessarily my preference, but a super helpful way to go in these little years). Anything in bold is a book that has had some ripple effects or good fruit in my life this year.
The Giver of Stars, Jojo Moyes
This Beautiful Truth: How God’s Goodness Breaks into Our Darkness, Sarah Clarkson
Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep*, Tish Harrison Warren
Holier Than Thou: How God’s Holiness Helps Us Trust Him, Jackie Hill Perry
Red Rex, Matthew Mellema (coming in Fall 2024 from Bandersnatch Books!)
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis
A Burning in My Bones*, Winn Collier
Reflections on the Psalms*, C.S. Lewis
That Hideous Strength*, C.S. Lewis
Aging Faithfully: The Holy Invitation of Growing Older, Alice Fryling
Paradiso*, Dante Alighieri
Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk*, Kathleen Rooney
Carved in Ebony, Jasmine L. Holmes
The Churchill Sisters: The Extraordinary Lives of Winston and Clementine’s Daughters*, Rachel Trethewey
The Sign of Four*, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Dark Archive, Genevieve Cogman
A Death in the Small Hours*, Charles Finch
The Remarkable Ordinary: How to Stop, Look, and Listen to Life, Frederick Beuchner
The Last Bookshop in London*, Madeline Martin
Teach Us to Want: Longing, Ambition, and the Life of Faith*, Jen Pollock Michel
Skunk and Badger, Amy Timberlake
The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, Stuart Turton
Tell Me More: Stories about the 12 Hardest Things I’m Learning to Say*, Kelly Corrigan
The Lincoln Highway, Amor Towles
Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, Oliver Burkeman
Fight Like Jesus: How Jesus Waged Peace throughout Holy Week, Jason Porterfield
Where Prayer Becomes Real: How Honesty with God Transforms Your Soul, Kyle Strobel & John Coe
Finding the Right Hills to Die On: The Case for Theological Triage*, Gavin Ortlund
On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts*, James K.A. Smith
Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne
The Power and the Glory*, Graham Greene
Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit: Growing in Christlikeness, Christopher J.H. Wright
Fault Lines: The Social Justice Movement and Evangelicalism’s Looming Catastrophe, Voddie T. Baucham, Jr.
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell*, Susanna Clarke
Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause*, Ty Seidule
David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
Everything Sad Is Untrue*, Daniel Nayeri
The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
Klara and the Sun*, Kazuo Ishiguro
84, Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff
Song of the Lark, Willa Cather
Celebrities for Jesus: How Personas, Platforms, and Profits Are Hurting the Church*, Katelyn Beaty
The Soul of Shame: Retelling the Stories We Believe About Ourselves*, Curt Thompson, MD
A Curious Faith: The Questions God Asks, We Ask, and We Wish Someone Would Ask Us, Lore Ferguson Wilbert
Ordinary Grace, William Kent Krueger
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
No Cure for Being Human, and Other Truths I Need to Hear*, Kate Bowler
The Moving Toyshop, Edmund Crispin
The Lord Is My Courage: Stepping Through the Shadows of Fear Toward the Voice of Love*, K.J. Ramsey
The Life We’re Looking For: Reclaiming Relationship in a Technological World*, Andy Crouch
Small Things Like These, Claire Keegan
The Secret of Home Economics: How Trailblazing Women Harnessed the Power of Home and Changed the Way We Live*, Danielle Dreilinger
For the Life of the World, Alexander Schmemann
The Wintringham Mystery*, Anthony Berkeley
The Lifegiving Home: Creating a Place of Belonging and Becoming, Sally and Sarah Clarkson
The Soul of Desire: Discovering the Neuroscience of Longing, Beauty, and Community*, Curt Thompson, MD
A Hole in the World: Finding Hope in Rituals of Grief and Healing*, Amanda Held Opelt
Anxious People*, Fredrik Backman
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
If you love to talk books, you’re in the right place. I share book reviews and recommendations throughout the year on my Instagram page, and it’s just a lot of fun. Happy Reading!