Books I Have Read in 2012

I have managed to read a lot of good books this year. One hundred and twenty-four, just one short of last year's total, and I still have all day so maybe I'll have time to finish the one I have started.

Some were biographies (Every Day in the Sun by Dean Faulkner Wells), some were classics (T.S. Stribling's trilogy The Lodge, The Store, and Unfinished Cathedral), and some were historical (Shelby Foote's Shiloh).

Some books were required reading from the library book club: What it is Like to Go to War by Karl Marlantes, Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, Nafertiti by Michelle Moran, plus nine others.

Many, many more were books I read just because they made me happy.

With so many books and so little time to read them all, a book has to be extra special for me to reread it. This year, I reread A Year Down Yonder by Richard Peck, Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson, Twilight by William Gay, and All Over but the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg. It was time well spent.

Some of the books I enjoyed more than others. Here's some that I highly recommend.

Unbroken by Laura Hillabrand
Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
The Heart Mender by Andy Andrews
Oral History by Lee Smith
The Last Girls by Lee Smith
One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus
Man in the Blue Moon by Michael Morris

I challenge all of you to read at least fifty books in 2013, a little less than one a week. Keep a list, and this time next year, you can look back and be proud. It will change you, I promise.

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Amish in Stantonville, Tennessee

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Like every reader, I have my favorite writers. There have been so many that have stirred my emotions and made me a part of their world, and I'm thankful for that. The one is love the best, the one I cherish , is Rick Bragg. Yesterday, Rick was in our area. We were privileged to see a newly released documentary about his life called Out of the Dirt . Afterwards, he talked to us about family and roots. His first book, All over but the Shoutin' , was recommended to me years ago. Very early in the book, I was thinking, "Who is this? He is writing about me, about my family." I have never actually met anyone in the book, but they are all my neighbors and kinfolks. His other books are just as well-written. In his book, Writing for the Soul , Christian author Jerry Jenkins had this to say about Rick Bragg: I read other writers and strive to be like them. I read others, like Rick Bragg, the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist, and simply surrender, knowing I will ...

Faith, Folklore, and Friends

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