2024 Reading List

Last year I read too many books. This year I was successful in reading less. I owe my success to adjusting to parenthood and using more of my time writing my doctoral thesis. As I have done before, I posted one-sentence reviews of each book on Instagram (still available in my Highlights) and on Threads. Here I have listed all books in alphabetical order by author and organized under five categories. I offer a brief comment about each category, and highlight three books from each category.

I have included Amazon Affiliate links for all the books I would recommend (and are not out of print). If you want to read those books yourself, using the link will help fund my doctoral work (read book addiction).

ACADEMIC:

Books in this category are largely related to my doctoral thesis work or scholarly treatments of topics outside of my teaching.

The Highlight: Women Who Do: Female Disciples in the Gospels by Holly J. Carey. This is a beautiful book examining how the (relatively few) stories about women in the Gospels frequently function to illustrate what faithful and active discipleship looks like. I highly recommend it.

Runners-Up: A New Song: Biblical Hebrew Poetry as Jewish and Christian Scripture edited by Stephen D. Campbell, Richard G. Rolfing Jr., and Richard S. Briggs for some great essays and original poetry, and Show Me Your Glory: The Glory of God in the Old Testament by Rebecca G.S. Idestrom for a great book from a Canadian, Pentecostal, Old Testament Scholar (how cool is that?).

• Doors of Perception: a Guide to Reading the Psalms by Peter R. Ackroyd
• Dynamics of Hebrew Parallelism by Adele Berlin
• Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy by Walter Brueggemann
• Theology from the Psalms: The Story of God’s Steadfast Love by C. Hassell Bullock
• A New Song: Biblical Hebrew Poetry as Jewish and Christian Scripture ed. by Stephen D. Campbell, Richard G. Rolfing Jr., and Richard S. Briggs
• Women Who Do: Female Disciples in the Gospels by Holly J. Carey
• The Suffering of God: An Old Testament Perspective by Terence E. Fretheim
• The Poor of Yahweh by Albert Gelin
• The Poems and Psalms of the Hebrew Bible by Susan E. Gillingham
• On God and Christ: The Five Theological Orations and Two Letters to Cledonius by St. Gregory of Nazianzus
• Show Me Your Glory: The Glory of God in the Old Testament by Rebecca G.S. Idestrom
• The Idea of Biblical Poetry: Parallelism and Its History by James L. Kugel
• Reassessing Selah by Ashley E. Lyon
• Amos: A Commentary (Old Testament Library) by James Luther Mays
• Praying the Psalms by Thomas Merton
• The Land Cries Out: Theology of the Land in the Israeli-Palestinian Context ed. by Salim J. Munayer and Lisa Loden
• Defining the Sacred Songs: Genre, Tradition, and the Post-Critical Interpretation of the Psalms by Harry P. Nasuti
• Pentecostal Experience: An Ecumenical Encounter by Peter D. Neumann
• Pentecostal Hermeneutics in the Late Modern World: Essays on the Condition of Our Interpretation by L. William Oliverio Jr.
• Interpreting Hebrew Poetry by David L. Peterson and Kent Harold Richards
• A Manuel of Hebrew Poetics by Luis Alonso Schökel
• Until Justice and Peace Embrace: The Kuyper Lectures for 1981 Delivered at the Free University of Amsterdam by Nicholas Wolterstorff

CRAFT:

Books in this category help me grow in my ability to teach and to write.

The Highlight: Revelation for the Rest of Us: A Prophetic Call to Follow Jesus as a Dissident Disciple. Scot McKnight and Cody Matchett have offered an unrelenting case against speculative and predictive readings of Revelation in this accessible and sensible book.

Runners-Up: Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction to Thinking and Living Theologically by Beth Feller Jones, an excellent introduction, and Introduction to Biblical Interpretation: Participating in God’s Story of Redemption by Jacqueline Grey and Paul W. Lewis, which I would like to use the next time I teach Hermeneutics.

• The Art of Bible Translation by Robert Alter
• Introduction to Biblical Interpretation: Participating in God’s Story of Redemption by Jacqueline Grey and Paul W. Lewis
• Answering the Psalmist’s Perplexity: New-Covenant Newness in the Books of Psalms by James Hely Hutchinson
• Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction to Thinking and Living Theologically by Beth Feller Jones
• Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott
• Introduction to Theology: Declaring the Wonders of God by Frank D. Macchia
• Revelation for the Rest of Us: A Prophetic Call to Follow Jesus as a Dissident Disciple by Scot McKnight and Cody Matchett
• How Africa Shaped the Christian Mind: Recovering the African Seedbed of Western Christianity by Thomas C. Oden
• On the Book of Psalms: Exploring the Prayers of Ancient Israel by Nahum M. Sarna
• Introducing the Psalms by Klaus Seybold

EXPERIENCE:

Books in this category reflect on peoples lives and experiences.

The Highlight: Reconciling History: A Story of Canada by Jody Wilson-Raybould and Roshan Danesh is a compelling and sobering telling of Canada’s story, largely told through the words of Indigenous peoples and governmental leaders over centuries.

Runners-Up: Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story by Bono, which highlights how odd Bono is, but also has great stories and reflections, and The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism by Tim Alberta, which may have been too optimistic, but offers thoughtful reflection.

• The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism by Tim Alberta
• The First Next Time by James Baldwin
• Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story by Bono
• The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
• The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War by Malcolm Gladwell
• Thrive: How Better Mental Health Care Transforms Lives and Saves Money by Richard Layard and David M. Clark
• How Far to the Promised Land: One Black Family’s Story of Hope and Survival in the American South by Esau McCaulley
• Reconciling History: A Story of Canada by Jody Wilson-Raybould and Roshan Danesh

LITERATURE:

Books in this category include works of fiction, collections of poetry, and plays.

The Highlight: East of Eden by John Steinbeck, who has offered a lengthy and rich reflection on the desires for good and evil within all of us, inspired by Genesis 4:1–16.

Runners-Up: Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution by R.F. Kuang, which could easily also be the highlight of this category, and This Is Happiness by Niall Williams for a simple Irish tale.

• Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky
• Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot
• As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
• Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris
• A Shining by Jon Fosse
• Purity by Jonathan Franzen
• The Apollo Murders by Chris Hadfield
• Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution by R.F. Kuang
• Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
• The Overstory by Richard Powers
• The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling
• Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger
• Way Station by Clifford D. Simak
• The Life of the Mind by Christine Smallwood
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• Everyone in my Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson
• This Is Happiness by Niall Williams

PROCESS:

Books in this catch-all category focus on personal growth and development.

The Highlight: First Nations Version: An Indigenous Translation of the New Testament is a beautiful translation of the New Testament from an Indigenous story-telling perspective. I am looking forward to the publication of their translation of Psalms and Proverbs

Runners-Up: Habakkuk before Breakfast: Liturgy, Lament, and Hope by Brian J. Walsh and the Wine Before Breakfast Community for a great and unique engagement of Habakkuk, and Praying the Psalms with Augustine and Friends ed. by Carmen Joy Imes for a meaningful way to engage the Psalms in prayer.

• Prayer by Hans Urs Von Balthasar
• A Wilderness Zone by Walter Brueggemann
• Palms for Black lives: Reflections for the Work of Liberation by Gabby Cudjoe-Wiles and Andrew Wilkes
• Singing the Psalms with My son: Praying and Parenting for a Healed Planet by T. Wilson Dickinson
• Practicing Lament by Rebekah Eklund
• Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant
• Praying the Psalms with Augustine and Friends ed. by Carmen Joy Imes
• The Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis
• Habakkuk before Breakfast: Liturgy, Lament, and Hope by Brian J. Walsh
• First Nations Version: An Indigenous Translation of the New Testament by Terry M. Wildman

Past reading lists:
2023 Reading
2022 Reading
2021 Reading
2020 Reading
2019 Reading
2018 Reading
2017 Reading
2016 Reading
2015 Reading