It find it satisfying to keep track of favorite things. These books have helped shape my thinking, expanded my aesthetic imagination, or comforted me somehow through the discovery of a kindred spirit.
I am a very slow reader, and it's hard to shift my attention from various screens to the printed page, and to be honest, I like writing more than I do reading — so the fact that these have stayed with me is a testament to their quality.
For anyone who wants to know what influences my writing, you may find this list helpful in learning about my point of view. Here are my favorite books:
Nonfiction:
For the unique personal perspective of the author:
This Beautiful Truth by Sarah Clarkson
Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher
Wholehearted Faith by Rachel Held Evans
Devout: A Memoir of Doubt by Anna Gazmarian
All the Colors We Will See by Patrice Gopo
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
James Herriot's Dog Stories (still reading)
For the discussion of mental health and mental illness:
Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence by Anna Lembke
Touched With Fire by Kay Redfield Jamison
Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison
For their treatment of beauty, nature, and grace:
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Color: A Natural History of the Palette by Victoria Finlay
The Invention of Nature by Andrea Wulf
On Beauty and Being Just by Elaine Scarry
To Bless the Space Between Us by John O'Donohue
For their social criticism:
Break the Internet by Olivia Yallop
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
The Struggle for Black Equality by Harvard Sitkoff
The Color of Compromise by Jemar Tisby
The Working Poor: Invisible in America by David Shipler
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown
Where Am I Wearing? By Kelsey Timmerman
Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction by David Sheff
Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones
For their illumination of the world of flowers and industry:
The Florist's Daughter by Patricia Hempl
The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean
Gilding the Lily: Inside the Cut Flower Industry by Amy Stewart
Assembling Flowers and Cultivating Homes: Labor and Gender in Colombia by Greta Friedemann-Sánchez
Fiction:
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
Joy in the Morning by Betty Smith
The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh
Persuasion by Jane Austen
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
The Strange Case of Doctor Jeckyll and Mister Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Mary Higgins Clark books
The "Jeeves and Wooster" books by PG Wodehouse
Poetry:
Poetry books:
The OCD Poems by Dennis Rhodes
Iep Jaltok: Poems from a Marshallese Daughter by Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner
And Yet by Kate Baer
The Small Door of Your Death by Sheryl St. Germain
An American Sunrise: Poems by Joy Harjo (still reading)
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (still reading)
The Ecopoetry Anthology edited by Ann Fisher Wirth and Laura-Gray Street (still reading)
Other favorite poets:
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Mary Oliver
Ross Gay
Debra Marquart
Allison Boyd Justus
Children's Literature:
Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery
Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
Harriet the Spy by Harriet M. Welsch
The "Nancy Drew" books
Flower Fairies by Cicely Mary Barker
Linnea in Monet's Garden by Christina Bjork and Lena Anderson
The Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter
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