Jan. 5, 2026
For some reason, my reading pace slowed as I exited sabbatical and simultaneously launched several ventures over the past year . . . Much of what I’ve managed to read has been for the spiritual direction training program I’ll graduate from this April, after two and a half years. Even when not required, though, I’m drawn to works with a focus on the interior landscape. That, and stories across generations, centuries. The micro and the macro. I read a handful of novels to pass the time in transit or on vacation, but few stuck with me (unlike last year, when I recommended eight!) A few I don’t recommend are listed. And new this year, as I’ve been reading much more poetry, one collection included below.
I realize as I list these all: they’re all old! No one can accuse me of being trendy! I am, however, currently (slowly) working my way through several newer books, which I expect will give next year’s list an altogether different flavor.
And now, here are the top contenders of 2025:
1. “I CAN’T BELIEVE SHE GOT AWAY WITH WRITING THIS” AWARD: GLITTERING IMAGES, SUSAN HOWATCH
That’s right, folks: ENTHRALLING BESTSELLER. This book shocked me: How’d she get away with writing a novel that is like 80% spiritual direction sessions between an early 1900s Anglican priest and his monastic confessor?
As a best seller!?
A secular best seller!?
(If you’re a frequent reader of this newsletter you may recall I mentioned this book over the summer, as a companion piece to that other great cultural work about spiritual direction: K-pop Demon Hunters.)
This is the book I most want to share this year, for how it conveys—via a riveting story—what it’s really like to allow God, through spiritual direction, open up deep places so the true self can emerge. To, ahem, fall into a million pieces and find the beauty in the brokenness. To let the jagged edges meet the light. I know this description still doesn’t do it justice, so how’s this? I lent it to a friend, and he’d ordered the rest of the series before he’d finished.
You heard that right: it’s part one of six, so you’ve got a lot of cozy hours head of you.
2. “MURDER MYSTERIES WITH THE BEST SCENERY” AWARD: WILLIAM KENT KRUEGER, VARIOUS WORKS
True, I’m a sucker for anything with Ordinary in the Title. But to be honest, I only picked up Ordinary Grace, because I’m still in line at the library for the next book in the Cork O’Connor series (also best-selling, I guess its kind of my thing this year), of which Iron Lake is book one. I wouldn’t have thought I’d go for a cop murder mystery series set in the woods of Minnesota, per se—like you might not think you’d like a novel about Anglican priests talking about their feelings. But after hearing Krueger speak, I figured I’d give his writing a try, and was immediately hooked. The mysteries are compelling (any other OG Agatha Christie fans in the house?). But they’re not just mindless paperback to discard on a plane. The books are full of insightful observations about human nature. The characters are engaging and memorable. And the lush descriptions of the snowy natural world they inhabit makes me want to buy snowshoes. Join me in line!
3. “WHISKEY FILLED BON BONS” AWARD: THIRST, MARY OLIVER
This was a gift. As in, I was given the book. Also, the poetry itself feels like a gift, an offering of love. Sweet like (very expensive high quality artisanal) candy, bracing like the hard stuff, this collection of poems chronicling, simultaneously, Oliver’s spiritual awakening and loss of her long term partner is heartbreaking, heart opening, gorgeous. Filled with wild creatures, because it’s Mary Oliver, and more metaphors for God than I can count, it’s repeatedly made its way into words I offer people with heartache and yearning of their own, in friendship and in spiritual direction.
4. “I FINALLY DID IT” AWARD: DOMINION, TOM HOLLAND
So another theme is resisting the urge to judge books based on covers. (I like the covers of the no-thanks books below better.) This hefty book was also a gift, a hand-me-down, reluctantly started on my time-rich sabbatical and only just finished this year, on December 31. Not exactly a topic to breeze through. In this year of surprises, perhaps this was the biggest. I loved Holland’s storytelling. Loved learning about historical eras I’d entirely missed. Loved the expertise with which he zooms in to the finest of illustrative details, then back out to an epic arc, pieced together to, eventually, feel inevitable. That feeling of inevitability, that it’s always been this way and only now you have eyes to see: this, to me, is genius. And this book is a work of one.
5. “MAPPING THE SOUL” AWARD: MANSIONS OF THE HEART, R. THOMAS ASHBROOK
Apparently Teresa of Avila uses more metaphors for God than even Mary Oliver. I haven’t read her original writing, but now I realize how much her ideas have seeped into others who have influenced me. This modern take on her work is not a translation, more like a transliteration, setting her concepts to order, illustrated with story. A good map helps situate you in a broader context, helps you find yourself as it shows where you’ve been and where you’re going. This is what her work does, for the soul. It was incredibly practical, with helpful explanatory power to make sense of differences between spiritual seekers of different seasons. And on a personal note, helped me make sense of things I’ve undergone in previous seasons.
6. “MOST UNDERLINED” AWARD: BEGINNING TO PRAY, ANTHONY BLOOM
If “novel about spiritual direction” doesn’t do it for you—I honestly can’t imagine why not—how about “atheist Russian émigré to France who eventually converts and becomes a Russian Orthodox Archbishop writes a prayer 101 book”? Man, I know how to pick ‘em.
Hear me out. I didn’t expect to like Beginning to Pray (theme!), not only because I think I know how to pray and I’m easily bored. But he had me hooked from the beginning, when he declared that the beginning of prayer is God’s apparent absence. OK, what? You have my attention. Through the entirety of this slim volume I was underlying and creasing page corners, agape at how quickly, humbly, gently, with mystery and humor, he got so deep.
BONUS: INTO THE GIVEAWAY PILE
(Not literally, as I borrowed these from the library, and that would be uncivil, but you get the idea.)
Here’s a pitch: Mysterious character enters shop. Eats meticulously described Japanese meal with a mind-bending array of components. Requests a meal from his/her past be recreated. It seems impossible. Mysterious character returns. Against all odds, request is granted. Cool, huh?
Now, imagine this repeated ad nauseam. Because that’s how The Kamogawa Food Detectives, maybe eightish chapters? felt: in circles, interminable. Little variation or character development. Staggering amounts of Japanese food. It definitely made me want to eat. Read? Not so much.
The other disappointments, if I’m honest, are the Sally Rooney novels. I hadn’t ready any before, and binged them all this year. They sort of blur together for me, like a stream of achy songs sung by a wispy boy with a high-pitched voice you listen to while it rains. They are technically good, I know—I mean, look at her success. And there were lines, whole passages, I wanted to copy and share, use as prompts. But did they give any energy or movement? Did they make me feel anything, or want anything, like, getting out of bed and living life? If so, primarily by contrast of the feeling the books themselves gave me. I feel so terrible saying this. I wanted to get on the bandwagon. I’m probably just too lowbrow to appreciate good art. But there you have it. No accounting for taste.
