Monthly Archives: June 2016

Books

Favorite Books So Far in 2016

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So we’re halfway through 2016. How’s your book reading going?

I’m on a ridiculous pace: 104 books so far this year. Of course I read a lot. If this pace continues, I’ll beat my record of 203 books in 2014. But I don’t really care about that. While I like to talk about the numbers because they’re shocking, I’m not in it to set records. I’m in it to read good books.

I also track the racial and gender diversity in my books. So far this year I’m at 52% racial diversity (books written by or featuring main characters of color) and 54% female authors. Last year, my most diverse year to date, I managed 54% POC and 56% women.

So I’m on track there, which is encouraging. Seeking out diverse books isn’t always easy, but I’m starting to see it pay dividends as I try to understand the world around me and help my kids navigate it.

But enough about numbers. Let’s talk books.

Favorite Fiction Books So Far This Year:

  • Freeman by Leonard Pitts Jr.
  • Copper Sun by Sharon Draper
  • Spirit Car: Journey to a Dakota Past by Diane Wilson
  • Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
  • Pictures of Hollis Woods by Patricia Reilly Giff
  • Roots by Alex Haley
  • Frindle by Andrew Clements

Favorite Nonfiction Books So Far This Year:

  • Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion by Sara Miles
  • Fight Like a Girl: 50 Feminists Who Changed the World by Laura Barcella
  • Night Driving: A Story of Faith in the Dark by Addie Zierman
  • Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: A Psychologist Explains the Development of Racial Identity by Beverly Daniel Tatum
  • Trouble I’ve Seen: Changing the Way the Church Views Racism by Drew G.I. Hart

I’ve got about 25 library books sitting in my to-read stack, so I’m excited to discover some more great books in 2016.

Books, Politics, Society

How Do We Overcome Our Bi-Partisan Ignorance?

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Ignorance stalks us wherever we go. Stupidity too—it’s easy to lash out in anger or dismissiveness. And maybe arrogance as well, to think that none of these apply to us. To me. We—I—live a great contradiction.

It’s so prominent in the political debate in this country right now—filibusters and sit-ins over gun rights, refusing to consider Supreme Court nominees, etc.. One side decries the other side’s actions, even though the first side has used the exact same tactic in the past. Both sides do it.

And so it goes. And that’s just in politics.

I read a lot. Some might say too much. In that reading I come across portrayals of overwhelming ignorance. Just this morning, in a matter of pages I read about The Colored Motorist’s Guide that told black people in the first half of the twentieth century “where they could and could not sleep, in what towns the citizens would shoot them if they stayed after dark,” and then that “deaf schools banished sign language, declared it backward and a threat to the wholesome spoken word, subscribed to the theory that sign language would encourage the deaf to marry only each other and create a perpetuating race of non-hearers, and swaddled the hands of their most defiant students in thick cotton mittens.” Continue reading How Do We Overcome Our Bi-Partisan Ignorance? →