Autumn has always thrilled me at a soul-deep level. Every year, when the temperatures cool and the sun mellows, it feels to me like a proverbial homecoming. I relish the inevitable gusty rain of late September that gives way to October’s flaming scarlet glory. I’m rarely happier than I am on a crisp, autumn morning with candles burning and a mug of tea warming my hands. And in recent years, I’ve realized that I want to live well in the posture of autumn. Contemplative yet longing, surrendering yet zealous, content with the present yet hopeful of better things in the future.
Of all the seasons, autumn most embodies what it means to live in the tension of the already and not yet. The sun burns harvest orange as the days shorten and shadows lengthen. It prepares to recede into winter’s mists, but not without burnishing the sky to glowing majesty one last time. As the earth retreats for its long annual sleep, it sings out with wild, red yearning, clothing itself in dazzling color once more. The trees grow fierce and crimson just before winter wraps them in her heavy grey mantle. Though the leaves will curl and drop, they will not go without a passionate reddening first, incantating with bright promise that beauty will come again.
And even as earth surrenders to winter’s grip, beneath the rich mould of fallen leaves, the seed’s marrow and the tree’s sap still flow, making ready new life. Autumn’s colors herald this ongoing yet invisible work, telling me to hold on, to wait expectantly with a melody in my heart for the coming kingdom of beauty that is not of this earth. As I watch the trees burst into fiery autumn splendor, I’m reminded that I, too, can laugh at the time to come even while creation groans. As the shadows deepen, my flickering candles, whistling kettle, and hearty feasts with friends declare alongside the brilliant leaves that death is not the end. In earth’s vivid farewell to the year’s life and memories, I see an invitation to vibrant, vigorous expectancy. I want to meet all of life’s changes, joys, and sorrows with autumn’s amber song of determined hope, looking towards an approaching beauty that will never die.
Well, I’m late to the party, but I’d also rather be late on these kinds of lists than early. I do not understand all of you who share your favorite books of the year at the start or middle of December – don’t you know you have full weeks of prime reading time left in the year? What if you discover a new favorite between Christmas and New Year’s??
That said, I read lots of great books in 2022. As I reflect on another year of reading, I’m struck by the gift that reading is. Because when I think about a year of reading, I don’t just picture an impressive-looking stack of books (though that’s cool to imagine). I think fondly of places I visited via the pages of that stack, of poignant lessons learned, and of friendships grown and strengthened through reading together. I’m already excited to imagine the gifts that my 2023 reading might have in store, and I hope my 2022 reading recap here might inspire you to travel somewhere new through one of these books, or to experience the delights of an old favorite book again, but as if for the first time. So, here are my lists and nerdy book lover stats for 2022 J
Total Books Read (new to me): 40
Books
Re-read: 7 –
Death
on the Nile by
Agatha Christie
Prince
Caspian by C.S.
Lewis
Jane
Eyre by Charlotte
Brontë
Persuasion by Jane Austen
The
Secret Garden by
Frances Hodgson Burnett
Son
of the Deep by
K.B. Hoyle
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
Format
Stats:
Read
the physical book: 24.5/40 – 60%
Listened
to the audiobook: 12.5/40 – 31%
Read the book on Kindle: 3/40 – 7.5%
This breakdown is fairly well back to its pre-2020 normal, but my Kindle is still fighting for its place. And yes, the decimal numbers do mean that I completed one book on 2022’s list –Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh – with both the hard copy and the audiobook. Probably an imperfect estimate, but it’s close.
Other
Fun Stats:
Male-authored
books: 16
Female-authored
books: 24
Most-read
author: a tie between Wendell Berry and Agatha Christie at three books from
each!
Shortest
book: A Child’s Garden of Verses, 67 pages
Longest book: Anna Karenina, 838 pages
Favorites of 2022 (in no particular order):
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy – My first Russian novel, and wow, what a masterpiece. I was intimidated by the big Russian novels for many years, but I was thoroughly, pleasantly surprised and moved by this doorstop classic. Many know Anna Karenina for the titular character’s immoral choices, but I now think it’s more accurate to say that it explores and contrasts the fallout of a life spent pursuing selfishness against that of a life lived in self-denying service of others. If you want an entryway into the Russian novels, I highly recommend this one. I also heartily commend the discussions on it from the Close Reads Podcast. These episodes require a paid subscription, but I promise it’s WELL worth even just a month or two of investment! These conversations were instrumental to my understanding and enjoyment of Anna Karenina, and I’m confident that anyone would get at least twice as much out of it by reading it along with the marvelous literary guides of this podcast.
Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry – Will I ever go a year now without reading something by Wendell Berry? At the moment, I doubt it J Jayber Crow is now firmly in my favorites from him. It wrestles profoundly with faith, home, love, loss, family, and community through the eyes of Jayber Crow, the barber of Port William, Kentucky, and even though Berry says many of the same things in most of his work, somehow, he keeps making them shine anew. I read Jayber Crow with a friend (highly recommend that strategy for this one), and she observed that it’s impossible to speed-read Wendell Berry, which I think encapsulates him well. His writing is so deliberate and focused that it compels slowness. As he reflects on the sacredness of ordinary life, I am obliged to do the same, to my continual good.
All Creatures Great and Small Series by James Herriot – “How did you not grow up with James Herriot?” you might well ask. Well, I’ve been asking the same thing for the last year, I assure you! Somehow the delightful tales of James Herriot’s veterinary adventures in rural Yorkshire completely passed me by in childhood, but I’m making up for it now. I discovered Herriot’s stories because of the charming new TV adaptation of his books, but I’m happily staying for the show, books, and anything more. In 2022, I read the first two books in his memoir series, All Creatures Great and Small and All Things Bright and Beautiful, and yes, I’m counting them both in this list item J
Honorable
Mentions:
Son of the Deep by K.B. Hoyle – A charming, magical retelling of
The Little Mermaid that will make you laugh, cry, and daydream.
The Vanished Days by Susanna Kearsley – Yet another spellbinding journey
through 1700s Scotland that keeps you guessing till the end, in true Kearsley
style.
Rules of Civility by Amor Towles – I dove into Towles’s work in
2022 and was so glad this was my first from him. His exquisite prose and
dynamic characters bring 1940s New York to glamorous life on the page.
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles – A count confined to a luxury
hotel at the height of the Bolshevik Revolution? Some might not buy it, but I
was there for it. The Close Reads Podcast also discussed this one in 2022
and it was one of my favorite sets of episodes (and they’re available for
free!)
The Sisters of Sea View by Julie Klassen – I look forward to my annual
jaunt to England with Julie Klassen’s characters. This one provided a lovely
escape to the Devon coast, and I’m already excited to go back when the next one
in the series comes out this year!
Andy Catlett: Early Travels by Wendell Berry – A moving reflection on the contrasts between our current times and those that came before, explored through the eyes of a young Andy Catlett visiting his grandparents at Christmas. Having lost three grandparents in the last 18 months, I found this one deeply affecting and thought-provoking.
That’s all for now, friends! I hope you find something good to read from among these lists. Please drop your suggestions for my 2023 reading in the comments!
Full
2022 Book List (new-to-me books, listed in the order completed)
Waiting
on the Word by Malcolm Guite
The
Vanished Days by Susanna Kearsley
Letters
from the Mountain by Ben Palpant
Reading
the Sermon on the Mount with John Stott by John Stott with Douglas Connelly
Carved
in Ebony by Jasmine Holmes
All
Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
Aggressively
Happy by Joy Clarkson
Son
of the Deep by K.B. Hoyle
Piranesi
by Susanna Clarke
The
Generosity: Poems by Luci Shaw
Rules
of Civility by Amor Towles
Anna
Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Deeper
by Dane Ortlund
Brideshead
Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
Tess
of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
A
Month in the Country by J.L. Carr
The
Vanishing at Loxby Manor by Abigail Wilson
Murder
at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie
The
Murder of Mr. Wickham by Claudia Gray
Jayber
Crow by Wendell Berry
All
Things Bright and Beautiful by James Herriot
Bloomsbury
Girls by Natalie Jenner
Of
Paupers and Peers by Sheri Cobb South
The
Moving Finger by Agatha Christie
The
Gathering Table by Kathryn Springer
Love
Practically by Nichole Van
Adjacent
But Only Just by Nichole Van
The
Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons
Given:
Poems by Wendell Berry
A
Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
Harvesting
Fog: Poems by Luci Shaw
Crooked
House by Agatha Christie
A
Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson
The
Six by K.B. Hoyle
Holier
Than Thou by Jackie Hill Perry
Beneath
His Silence by Hannah Linder
The
Sisters of Sea View by Julie Klassen
Andy
Catlett: Early Travels by Wendell Berry
The
Windsor Knot by S.J. Bennett
Jane
Austen’s Genius Guide to Life by Haley Stewart
My ideas of home and homemaking used to be small. In years past, I associated such words with a comfortable house in suburban America, complete with a husband and a few children. My current self, living in a house shared with three other women in the middle of a big city, would have likely looked like an alien being to my 18-year-old self. While I’ve certainly grieved that some aspects of that youthful dream of home have not yet come to pass, at the same time, I understand more clearly now that making a home is more. I’ve seen that a home is made by loving well and pouring out. Homemaking is the opening of hands and committing to what the Lord gives in each season. It’s cultivating joyful, loving community wherever you are by bringing others in.
Unsurprisingly, stories have deepened my vision of home and taught me much about what it looks like. I hope to take a few posts to reflect on a few such stories. First up is Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry, which, for all its quiet prose and gentle introspection, truly axed me (as a friend and I once said of Wendell Berry).
I read Hannah Coulter in the spring of 2021, just over a year into COVID-19, which forced many questions of embodied community, loss, and home into sharper focus. I live in Washington, D.C., a city known for transience, politicians on the move, and basement apartments. I’ve said many tearful goodbyes in my years here and wondered if this city truly allows one to build a lasting home. In short, Hannah Coulter convinced me that it’s possible, even here.
That may sound odd, since D.C. is fairly opposite of everything Wendell Berry vocally advocates for – rootedness, enduring community, and commitment to a particular bit of earth. But Hannah Coulter moved me deeply because its characters’ fight for those things amidst shadows of grief and impermanence. The setting of Port William, Kentucky, a fictional stand-in for Berry’s own hometown, certainly sees less turnover than D.C., but even this little agrarian town, emblematic of longevity, can’t resist the march of time or the sting of loss.
Hannah of the title narrates the book as an elderly woman reflecting back on her life, now almost a complete tapestry of interconnected joyful and sorrowful threads. Her marriage to Nathan Coulter and the home she has built with him are things of beauty and endurance, but they have grown out of loss. Decades before, World War II took Hannah’s first husband, Nathan’s brother, and years of Nathan’s own youth. “He saw a lot of places, and he came home,” Hannah muses of Nathan, “I think he gave up the idea that there is a better place somewhere else.” So, they look right in front of them for their “place” and resurrect an abandoned homestead, making their own. Out of another’s loss, they make and commit to a home to love and cultivate and share.
Feelings of unmooring and uncertainty loomed large when I first read Hannah Coulter, and they still sometimes do – D.C. culture does not naturally encourage commitment to anything, and more people than usual left the city between 2020 and 2021. But in that season when uncertainty felt so much sharper, reading about Hannah and Nathan’s intentionality in loving each other, their land, their people, and their house grounded and challenged me. They still remind me that rootedness is often found in pouring oneself out for the place and people right in front of you. I don’t have a plot of land to work and keep, but I do have a house and backyard that I can make beautiful, both by caring for it and by welcoming in others with their joys, memories, and pains. D.C. may be a far cry from Port William’s tight-knit farming community, but I do have a church in the middle of the city that not only encourages, but expects and requires commitment. Deep love amongst members has manifestly followed. I expect to keep saying goodbyes for as long as I stay in D.C., but I can still intentionally love the people around me for as long as we’re all here, even though the leavings hurt.
Hannah Coulter showed me that homemaking is pouring out those very gifts of place and presence. It showed me a tangible example of how loving a place and its people go hand in hand. And that pouring out is perhaps especially important in a place like D.C., where things like deep community and commitment are so much scarcer. Hannah reflects, “There is no ‘better place’ than this, not in this world. And it is by the place we’ve got, and our love for it and keeping of it, that this world is joined to Heaven.” Her story has certainly strengthened me to “love and keep” the place and home I’ve got, city or otherwise.
Hello, friends! I’ve mentioned loosely here and there about my recent experimentation with writing poetry. Reading it has proved so valuable to me over the last two years that I’ve been compelled to try it for myself. Below are my latest attempts, wrought from miscellaneous prompts and desire to capture moments of beauty from life. I hope you enjoy them in all their amateurish eagerness.
“Sunrise in Maine”
Sheltered in a rock face,
Braced against the clifftop wind,
Looking east to promised warmth,
I’m watching, waiting.
Above, a velvet blue canopy,
Flecked in a thousand diamond lights,
Bids frosty welcome to those below.
They’ve traveled far to wait and watch.
Hemmed in by loyal company,
I hold my breath as dark recedes,
And ruby gold outshines night’s crown.
In wordless awe, we stand and watch.
Blazing autumn paints the mountains,
The sea awakens in shimmering dawn.
Watching souls sit soaked in glory,
Enthralled by new mercies
Numerous as the hues of morning.
“Transfixed”
Cabin lights dimmed,
Air sucked dry,
Time suspends
With the wings’ slow dip.
Rolling sore joints,
I peer at the glass,
Smallest of portals
To new country below.
Sloping emerald
Arrests my gaze –
Stories abound,
Both written and waiting.
Dawn’s blue mist
Recedes in welcome
As England’s wild hills
Transfix me quite.
Gliding still lower,
My spirits rise,
Thrilled with hope
Of the tales I’ll find.
“Sacred Wednesdays”
It’s usually the same
When Wednesdays come around.
We’re taught the sacred Word,
We eat and hug and laugh.
And all the while I sit and marvel
At the gift of so much good.
The same good and sacred
Gifts keep giving
When Wednesdays come around.
“Forget”
I often forget the small things,
Like my charger or umbrella,
But, blessing or curse, I never forget
The bigger ones.
Where I met you, whether
You welcomed or shunned,
Throwaway words, if you
Remember my likes,
Your humor and quirks,
My own deep secrets –
For better or worse,
I won’t forget.
“Taste”
Savory soup and tranquil tea,
A fragrant candle or opening bloom,
Stirring tales and tantalizing song,
Ever beckon, softly call:
Taste and see.