State of the Bookshelf 2025
Mid-January is not too late to share about the books I read last year, is it? No?! Oh, good, because that is the best I can do this year.
Each year, before I get to my book list, I like to share a few learnings or reflections from my year of reading. In the gift of grace-filled time, anything that we engage in over the course of our days—no matter how mundane—has the possibility to form us toward Christ-likeness and love of neighbor. This includes reading! Deformation through what we read is also possible, so it’s best we pay attention to what we read, how we read, why we read, and how God is reaching for us through what we read. That’s not to say that reading isn’t also meant to be a delight! But seeing as the ability to delight in what is good, true, and beautiful, is a mark of Christ-likeness, it seems to be two overlapping routes leading in the same direction. This brief practice of yearly reflection on reading is part of how God is bringing everything in me, including my reading life, into submission to Christ—to his joy, his wisdom, and the Story he is telling.
First, I learned that I cannot write a book and read a book at the same time. I would work for hours on a chapter of my book, read it over, and realize it sounded nothing like me, but exactly like the voice of the author whose book I had been reading earlier in the day. Hazards of being a ghostwriter as my day job, I suppose. Regardless, I knew that to be faithful to the voice God has given me and the words he has given me to write, I needed to read only the books required to write my book well, and nothing else. So from January to June, I read very little. Sigh.
Second, sometimes silence is more needed than an audiobook. The past six months have been very intense on a number of fronts, and life and my thoughts were dialed up loud. When seasons like that come, I have learned that I need to fill my in-between moments with silence whenever possible, not a few minutes of audiobook listening as is my habit. So driving around town, folding clothes, ironing shirts, stirring soup—all of it was done in quiet, letting my frazzled brain settle down, listening for God’s voice. It was what my soul needed, but it was an adjustment.
Third, God can be trusted with the things we love, the things that feel like a part of how he made us. With almost no reading from January to June and and the need to opt for silence instead of audiobooks from July to December, I read much less in 2025 than I do in a typical year. Since reading has historically been one of the primary means of spiritual formation for me, I felt a little unmoored without it. But God kept coming for me, reaching out for me through the work he had given me to do and the circumstances of my everyday life, even if that didn’t include much reading. Now, as my writing rhythms have adjusted and some of the intensity of these last months has lifted, reading has become more possible. God knows reading is a joy to me, and as he brings it back around again (In his hands, nothing good that we love is ever lost for good.), I am receiving that time and capacity as a grace, and I’m able to hold it a little more lightly after a season of limitation.
Tell me about your year of reading. How have you seen God reaching for you in it?
2025 Reading List:
If there’s a *, it means I listed to the audiobook. If I put it in bold, then it’s a book that particularly delighted me, and I think you should read it. As always, I’ll add this caveat: I like to read widely, and enjoy books from authors who believe differently from me and whose characters make choices I would not. Just because a book is on this list, doesn’t necessarily mean I’d recommend it to just anyone. So just ask me if you have a question about a specific book.
What It Means to Be Protestant: The Case for an Always-Reforming Church*, Gavin Ortlund
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
On the Incarnation, St. Athanasius
Relaxed: Walking with the One Who Is Not Worried About a Thing*, Megan Fate Marshman
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, J.K. Rowling
Establishing Home: Creating Space for a Beautiful Life with Family, Faith, and Friends*, Jean Stoffer
The Extraordinary Deaths of Mrs. Kipp*, Sara Brunsvold
Letters to a Future Saint: Foundations of Faith for the Spiritually Hungry, Brad East
Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life*, Tish Harrison Warren
The Word in the Wilderness: A Poem a Day for Lent and Easter, Malcolm Guite
The Wingfeather Saga: On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, Andrew Peterson
Run with the Horses*, Eugene H. Peterson
Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
The Opt-Out Family: How to Give Your Kids What Technology Can’t*, Erin Loechner
Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster, Jonathan Auxier
Tim Keller on the Christian Life: The Transforming Power of the Gospel*, Matt Smethurst
Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment without Burnout*, Cal Newport
In the House of Tom Bombadil, C. R. Wiley
The Awakened Brain: The New Science of Spirituality and Our Quest for an Inspired Life*, Lisa Miller, PhD
Theo of Golden, Allen Levi
Raising Emotionally Strong Boys: Tools Your Son Can Build On for Life*, David Thomas
Domestic Monastery, Ronald Rolheiser
The PLAN: Manage Your Time Like a Lazy Genius*, Kendra Adachi
Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power*, Andy Crouch
The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien
The Gifts of Imperfection*, Brené Brown
The Labors of Hercules Beal*, Gary D. Schmidt (The audio was incredible, so I’d recommend that option.)
So Late in the Day, Claire Keegan
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, J. K. Rowling
An English Murder*, Cyril Hare
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, Barbara Robinson
Okay, friends—you know I am dying to talk to you about what books you’ve read. Did you read any of the ones on my list? What did you think? (Particularly about Theo of Golden. I still can’t decide if I loved it or not?? I think about it all the time, but I have some issues with it. Please advise.). What books are you recommending to friends these days? Tell. Me. Everything.
And if you want more in-depth reviews of what I’m reading through the year, then you should subscribe to my newsletter.