This is PART ONE of our epic BEST BOOKS OF 2025 LIST. Part two is coming soon.

Three bits of prelude before our big awards show, naming our favorite books of 2025.

First, thanks to those who have prayed or reached out to us regarding Beth’s breast cancer and chemo treatments. She has had remarkable faith and courage and, frustrating and painful as it is, we’re hanging in there. She continues to work most days and she is truly grateful for the cards and notes (especially those tucked into payments.) We are grateful for your business this past year and glad for your support. We appreciate, now more than ever, orders and prayers, preferably both. Ha.

Secondly, a thank you to those who have shared their appreciation for the informal “Three Books from Hearts & Minds” podcast that we do almost every other week. They are posted, eventually, at the store’s Facebook page, but always at Apple or Spotify podcasts or you can watch us chat at YouTube. My conversation partner — Phil Schiavoni or Sam Levy from the CCO — set me up to talk about three titles (although I do usually manage to sneak a few other title shout-outs and author name-drops — imagine!) A number of folks advised me to do this, so we’ve been doing it for a couple of years without much traction. Maybe this will be the year it takes off. We are grateful for those who appreciate my yapping.

Thirdly, setting up books at off site events has always been part of our vocation and we’re glad to meet people out and about. From a local Presbytery event to a Bonhoeffer event at Gettysburg Theological Seminary to Water Street Mission’s day with Curt Thompson to the inspiring Poiema arts conference here in York to a weekend with Brian McLaren in State College, amongst others, we had a blast lugging boxes and selling books, so we thank those who invite us places.  What a joy to serve God’s people here and there.

A stand-out event this year was the delight we had in being the first bone fide bookstore to show off the then brand new A Beautiful Year by our long-time pal Diana Butler Bass. Diana spoke (accompanied by her very cool and book-loving husband, Rick) at Highland Presbyterian Church in Lancaster and you can hear her presentation about the book HERE. (Watch for my enthusiastic announcement in the beginning, too. Huzzah.)

We’ve again hosted a few online webinars this year, too, and we have two more scheduled soon — stay tuned for information about an online evening with Dorothy Little Greco on her book For the Love of Women (January 27th) and, then, the following week, a live webinar conversation with one of my besties, Steve Garber, discussing his brand new Hints of Hope on February 3rd.

But I’m getting ahead of myself as I wanted to thank those who joined us virtually this fall for a splendid evening with Jeff Crosby talking about his fabulous Paraclete book World of Wonders: A Spirituality of Reading (you can still watch it here) and another online gathering with the altogether lovely and eloquent Kathleen Norris; we talked about her recent book Rebecca Sue: A Sister’s Reflections on Disabilities, Faith, and Love. It is no surprise that I recall it as one of the great privileges of our career, chatting with Kathleen about her sister, Becky.

And speaking of (daunting) conversations with authors (gracious as they always are) we were honored to host Jeff Chu, talking about his splendid, multi-faceted, beautifully written memoir Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand; thanks to local folks who came out to FPC to spend an evening with Jeff with plenty of locally sourced Chinese snacks. Here’s my BookNotes column before the event.

Perhaps the most rewarding event was a quiet pair of talks which were, in my view, among the highlights of the year. The dearest life-long friends of Beth and I include Gail Heffner who, with her colleague at Calvin University, Dave Warners, wrote a university press book last year about their decade-long struggle to build a coalition with college students and many others to help clean up a very polluted stream that flows through Grand Rapids, Michigan. Called Reconciliation in a Michigan Watershed: Restoring Ken-O-Sha and vibrantly documenting their work (both the details of watershed clean up and restoration and the formation of and teaching about what they’ve called reconciliation ecology), we brought them here during Earth Day weekend to partner with two watershed groups in Central PA. It’s a busy weekend for those working in creation care so turn-out wasn’t huge, but the conversations with Gail and Dave, first at a Mennonite church near a famous creek in Lancaster and then the next morning at a cafe near the Codorus Creek in downtown York, were rich and important. You can read my BookNotes column before those events HERE. It’s pretty interesting if I do say so myself.

I could go on, thanking folks as different as the congregation at Duke Chapel who had me zooming in to their adult forum more than once this year to Market Square Presbyterian Church that hosted me doing a four week class on reading as a spiritual discipline and Kingdom adventure. And all of those who have helped us lug in and tear down at big CCO events. You know who you are.

All of these events mean a whole lot to us and when you order books from us (we hope you know) you are somehow joining in this story of a small-town bookstore trying to offer enthusiasm and some degree of wisdom about reading widely in these distressing times. Your support matters, believe me — we need every order we can get!

God’s world and Word are durable, despite the brokenness all around, and we seek — as Garber puts it — hints of hope. At least that, often through good stories and poems and memoirs and history and theology texts and mores about public affairs. Christ is Risen and even in the hardest times of vile political leadership and terrible public policy and war and hunger and pollution and all the rest, we know God is with us. And books help us live into that big story of redemption, joining God’s work in the world, learning from (and even enjoying) the fruits of authors who have shared ideas and dreams and visions (in fiction and nonfiction) with us. What a privilege to serve you as we read widely for the sake of God’s Kingdom coming, “on Earth as it is in heaven.” Thank you for your love of books and your support of our work at Hearts & Minds.

Okay, from webinars and podcasts to big conferences and author events, you know the main day-to-day work is (for you and me both) finding time to read real books, to open pages, to underline and ponder, to enjoy and share, to cherish the printed page. It’s pretty quotidian (a word I first learned from Kathleen Norris.) I hope our weekly reviews help you sort through the clutter and advise you a bit about what to read next.

You know I don’t like top ten lists (even though I did a great countdown with two other brilliant readers and podcasters, which you should listen to HERE. Joshua Johnson’s Shifting Culture work is amazing and you should support his media feeds. ) I don’t like ranking books or saying these are “best.” Some are significant, some are beautiful, some are great, each in their own way. And there’s little account for taste and preference — we’ve sure learned that in our nearly 45 years of bookselling.

So, with that backpedaling and qualification, I’ll share if not the best books, certainly my favorites (to read myself or to proclaim to others.) It’s my quirky bookseller’s list, my picks for something like the Best of 2025. It was a very good year.

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FIRST: MY OWN PERSONAL MOST FAVORITE TOP 16 BOOKS OF 2025

World of Wonders: A Spirituality of Reading Jeff Crosby (Paraclete Press) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19

Of course I have to lead off with this, the most charming and inspiring book about reading I have ever read. Jeff’s clarity and graciousness and eagerness to share why people of faith should read widely is a gift, an antidote to the anxiety we feel when we recall the downward shifts in reading, cultural literacy, education. With brief contributions by several others and fabulous book lists after each chapter, this book is not only a delight but a very, very helpful resource to have and to share.

I want to be an enthusiastic cheerleader for World of Wonders and hope you might consider sharing it with someone you know. Let’s spread the word! See one of my reviews HERE.

The Last Supper: Art, Faith, Sex, and Controversy in the 1980s Paul Elie (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) $33.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $26.40

I suppose this is tentative choice for my favorite book of the year, learned and detailed, almost 500 pages of excellent writing exploring the lives and faith (such as it was) of writers, poets, rock stars, painters, social activists, and artists of various sorts. From Vaclav Havel and Salmon Rushdie to U2 and Dylan and Pattie Smith (and so many more) to Andy Warhol and Martin Scorsese to C. Everett Koop and Act Up, he weaves extraordinary plot lines and connects dots of what he calls “crypto-religiosity.” I could go on and on; the Vanity Fair review says it like this: “Elie’s synthesis of the era is virtuosic and revelatory. And his mini-narratives are set pieces, laid out with such intricate detail that the book, at times, feels as finely chiseled as a work carved from Carrara marble.”

Phil Christman (whose own 2025 book will appear in our next list of honorable mentions)) said in the Chronicle of Higher Education that “Elie rarely encounters an artist about whom he cannot find something intelligent to say . . . The Last Supper is an altogether admirable piece of crypto-religious culture in its own right . . . I finished the book with a renewed appreciation for the way belief itself is a complicated thing.”

Black in Blues: How a Color Tells the Story of My People Imani Perry (Ecco Press) $28.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.19

Imani Perry is one of the great public intellectuals of our day (think of her award winning South to America which I raved about a few years ago) and I’m grateful that she writes so very well and is so able to switch from paragraphs of great historical detail and philosophical depth to beautiful anecdotes and heart-breaking reports and delightful phrases exploring the glories of the ordinary. This deep study of African American culture (and, also, African cultures) and the fascination with the color blue is almost audacious in making an oddball case that a color matters to a people group, and breathtaking in the ample evidence she offers.

Black in Blues has been called everything from exquiste to searing to extraordinary to fascinating to brilliant and is doubtlessly one of the best books of the year. There are glorious passages I read out loud to my wife and bitter studies of ugly slave ships and other degradations; there are lovely reflections on plants and flowers and there are memoir-like ruminations on her own travels, ancestors (and color choices.) There is an extraordinary familiarity with so much — again, Perry is a world-class scholar, teaching at Princeton University —and while some pages of Black in Blues are almost arcane and dense, there are captivating stories of bluesmen and pop songs. There are wise and enchanting comments about stuff you may know about and I assure you there will be eye-opening things you will learn. I loved this book and as painful as some portions are, I very highly recommend it.

“Black in Blues is a stunningly original journey in search of the historical origins of the very soul of African American life and culture. Along the way, Perry shows, with telling detail and in engaging prose, how ‘The Blues’ became Black, and how Black people became ‘Blues People.'” – Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand Jeff Chu (Convergent Books) $26.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.80

How can I not name this, an unforgettable book by my friend Jeff Chu. As noted above, we hosted Jeff here in York this past summer when the book was new, and his relational styled friendly presence was a blessing, even as he did not shy away from speaking hard truths many of need to ponder. As I’ve explained, it is a book about his sense of a call to seminary which ended up focusing on the innovative “Farminary” program at Princeton Seminary. He comes from a family of legendary Chinese cooks (and pastors) but he knew little about agriculture, so this memoir is fun and a real page-turner, even as it explores hard stuff — struggles in seminary to integrate faith and learning, the role of food and cooking in his Chinese-American family culture, stuff about being gay and stuff about racism and stuff about complicated relationships within family systems.

I agree with the many rave reviews who have insisted that this is a glorious book that invites readers in, makes readers feel cared for, reminds us of important truths about love, about grace, about God and goodness. He’s an excellent writer and Good Soil is certainly one of my favorite books in recent years. Enjoy!

Paper Girl: A Memoir of Home and Family in a Fractured America Beth Macy (Penguin Press) $32.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $25.60

I hope you saw my long review of this a few weeks before Christmas as I explain why I so appreciate the solid investigative writing of thereat Beth Macy, and why this book — about her returning to a struggling rust-belt town in Ohio where she grew up — resonated so, and is so very important for all of us. Want to understand, again, the white rage that leads lower income folks struggling with disenfranchisement and addictions and all manner of rural poverty stuff to adopt the MAGA ideology? What a better story of mid-American small town life than, say, Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy? Want to know what happens when a writer known for her concern for ordinary folks — think of her great book about the struggles of the North Carolina furniture industry, Factory Man, or her two books on the opioid crisis, Dopesick and Raising Lazarus — goes home to her own hard girlhood and wonders what would happen if she were a student in that embattled school nowadays? Read Paper Girl for a great, page-turning story of this woman and her old home-town (and the high school reunion committee torn asunder by racism and MAGA stuff) and read Paper Girl for a civic lesson on the ground of middle America and its struggles these days. Unforgettable.

Rags of Light: Leonard Cohen and the Landscape of Biblical Imagination Brian J. Walsh (Cascade Books) $23.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $18.40

I think I said in one of my BookNotes reviews that I’m not that big of a Leonard Cohen fan and,  yet, I adored this incredible book exploring his lyrics (folk and rock music and his published poetry and spoken word work) and comparing and contrasting them with Biblical texts. Walsh, is admittedly, a friend and hero, and I’d read anything he wrote — you should too, perhaps starting with a brand new one coming this week called On Prophets, Priests, and Poets: Christian Formation at the Gates of Hell. But even taking into consideration that I tend to enjoy books written by friends, and I’m a sucker for thinking about faith and popular culture, and I like the idea of relate song lyrics (wisely and fruitfully) to Biblical passages, even though I’m disposed to like this, I wonder if others will like it as much as I did. And I am almost sure of it.

If you want to get into the Scriptures, being activated by a Biblical imagination, and see how the Bible can be opened up well, putting God’s Word into conversation with the 20th century Jewish poet (Cohen died in 2016), Rags of Light is a great guide. Too many handle the Bible poorly (and people quote song lyrics cavalierly, I think.) Walsh does neither; he gets Cohen’s body of work and takes his words seriously, and he’s got a solid and generative hermeneutic of standing within the Biblical text (inspired by the likes of Richard Middleton, who wrote the foreword, and Walter Brueggemann, say.) I’m telling you, there is nothing cheesy or simplistic (let alone a fanboy paean) here, but just a fabulous, fun, inspiring, reflection of the laments of this pop star and a healthy does of Old and New Testament faith.

You should get it, even if you’re not a Cohen fan. And if you are, what are you waiting for? One of my favorite books of 2025.

Makers By Nature: Letters from a Master Painter on Faith, Hope, and Art Bruce Herman (IVP Academic) $28.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.40

I have previously tried to wax eloquent in BookNotes about this exquisite book and am glad to name it now as one of my absolute favorites of the year. Although more can be said, I’ll just say three things about why it is on my short list of best books of the year and why you should consider ordering it.

Firstly it is a beautifully made (paperback) book, one of the best I’ve seen in recent years, with good touches of color and artful design. If you care about books you will love having this. Secondly, although Makers By Nature is written by a renowned visual artist inviting us to think about our creative selves and our role as makers, it does cover so much, with Bruce sharing his years of true, faithful wisdom about calling and prayer and pain and relationships and hope and work and yes, hope. So even if you are not a painter, you will enjoy and benefit from this treasure chest of good writing. Thirdly, it is written as a set of letters to various people; it is a device, I gather (although some of the people are real.) This makes it a personal and tender and dare I say exciting read.  Highly recommended.

The Violent Take It By Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy Matthew Taylor (Broadleaf Books) $32.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $ 26.39

Sadly, I have felt compelled to read a good handful of books these past few years about the extremist right that is so damaging our country, the neo-Nazis and MAGA conspiracy nuts, the lying President and those who have locked arms with him, sexual predator that the has been. Specifically, there have been many books exploring how people of so-called Christian faith have fallen for this far-out, pagan stuff, usually under the rubric of Christian Nationalism. You, I hope, have read at least one of the many critiques of this undisciplined frame of mind, from solid Christian thinkers like Tim Alberta or Amanda Tyler or Dave Gushee or Caleb Campbell or Paul D. Miller. Most of them are jam-packed with revelations and loaded with facts.

Among these many good books, though, there is a missing piece.  There is a major part of the far right anti-democratic movement that has rallied behind Trump and helped with the January 6th attack on the Capitol that few writers have explored and that is what is called the “New Apostolic Reformation” of neo-Pentecostals driven by what they call the “Seven Mountains Mandate.” This plan — to exercise Godly influence over key spheres of society and culture — does not sound bad (at first, to me anyway) until you realize they (a) really view this as a project of conquest and theonomy and that (b) they are pretty spiritually eccentric and at times even heretical about their views of prophecies, dreams, super-natural visions, and alleged direction from the Holy Spirit. The NAR has been theologically exposed as dangerous for years, but now that they are using their networks to (as one put it) “co-opt the way of Jesus for political domination” it is essential we know about them. The Violent Take It By Force (a Bible verse that Taylor reports was all over twitter the day of the Capitol riot, affirming the rampage) is an amazing book that fills the needed gap with incredible detail.

Taylor is a good journalist (with charismatic experience himself) and he goes into riveting detail about each of the major players in this politicized NAR movement. He looks at Paula White,  Lance Wallnau, Cindy Jacobs, Dutch Sheets, Peter Wagner, Ché Ahn, song-leader Sean Feucht, and others who have literally millions of followers all over the world. The “charismaticization of the far right” is one of the most significant and unexplored topics of our age, and this book nails it. I couldn’t put it down and I am sure I will remember it as long as I live.

Art Is: A Journey Into the Light Makoto Fujimura (Yale University Press) $30.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $24.00

I do not have to say much about this splendid, rich book. We were very glad to get many pre-orders from our previous announcement in BookNotes. Mako is an admired painter, a great voice for a creative and generative view of faith and culture, and a friend of Hearts & Minds. We have sold quite a few of his several books over the years — his first, Refractions, was re-issued in an anniversary hardcover edition in 2024 — and his excellent Yale University Press, Art and Faith: A Theology of Making (with a good forward by N.T Wright), that came out in 2021 came out in paperback this year. Art Is is his follow up and is one of his most handsome and perhaps best books he has yet done. He is inviting us to ponder how art might (to put it prosaically, as he never does) inspire us. It is, as Christopher Rothko put it on the back cover, that “Art is awareness, a journey of looking and listening that encompasses the worlds around and within.”  As art is a door to the imagination and faith, this is a stellar reflection on how and why that is.

So many have raved about this; listen to Joyce Yu-Jean Lee of the famous NY Pratt Institute, who says,

Through an intimate studio tour, Art Is invites creative souls into Mako’s painting process — fusing the alchemy of light with his theology of making. This luminous, heartfelt reverie fosters an embodied connection with God, humanity and nature–an inspiring read.

Bear Witness: The Pursuit of Justice in a Violent Land Ross Halperin (Liveright Publishing) $31.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $25.59

It took me a while to explain the details of this detailed, journalistic report of a multi-faceted Christian public justice ministry in Honduras; it is a big book and my long BookNotes review didn’t even do it justice. I wish my efforts there to promote it were somehow circulated more widely as people the world over should know if this amazing effort. A couple from Calvin College (now University) in Grand Rapids, Michigan, started this heroic effort to fight corruptions, gang violence, drugs, violent cops, political complicity, election fraud, and more, and this reported risked years of his life following them and their local allies there to tell this riveted story of faith and justice and peacemaking and hope.

It is sticky and messy and complicated. They don’t always get it right and they don’t always succeed. They consult with the likes of IJM’s Gary Haugen and hammer out ideas, week by week, month by month, year by year. (Kurt Ver Beek’s fruitful thinking, based on years of experience in the barrio, can be seen in a book he co-wrote with his Board member Nicholas Wolterstorff, an impressive Christian political philosopher. That 2019 book is fabulous and is entitled Called for Justice: From Practice to Theory and Back. Of course we reviewed it at BookNotes and have it still.)

If you read one book about what wholistic Kingdom efforts might look like in an unjust land, Bear Witness should be it. This gripping story is hard to beat. Kudos to a secular publisher doing this story about evangelical Christians, and kudos to Kurt Ver Beek and his team for following God’s call to make a difference in their lifetime.

The Mythmakers: The Remarkable Fellowship of C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkien John Hendrix (Abrams Fanfare) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99

If you have been paying attention at all, you surely know of this beautiful graphic novel-type, illustrated volume. I’ve touted it time and again, on podcasts and at BookNotes, taking it to nearly every book display we’ve done, anywhere, this year. It really is a treasure to see and a joy to watch people browse through it. I’m not going to lie — it’s nice when they order a few, as folks often do once they see it.

Hendrix is a very talented graphic designer, perhaps most known for his well-executed and powerful paperback The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler (which has been a bestseller since it came out in 2018.) Pitched as a cartoon book for kids, Mythmakers is ideal for thoughtful middle school or older teens, but, to be honest, I suspect we’ve sold as many to adults. It is, to put it simply, about the creative process of Lewis & Tolkien’s as they collaborated to make stories. Their epic mythmaking, Hendrix seems to suggest with the sidebars and cartoon speech bubbles, is not merely for fun or even merely the art of doing fiction. Behind their friendship and artfulness and writing and mythmaking is a scheme, a vision to push back against the sterile reductionism of secularized modernity.

Yep, offering myths like Narnia or the Ransom trilogy or the legendary stories of Middle Earth and the Lord of the Rings series is, this colorful, fun books illustrates, is a way to fight the erosion of goodness and beauty and truth and virtue and God that is lost in the modernist worldview. They saw this in the dark days of the mid-twentieth century and their faith (one famously Protestant, the other Catholic) allowed profound fellowship and a last aesthetic of storytelling that truly has changed the lives of countless readers. This fun book explores how it all worked.  Hooray. How many might you get?

Barn Gothic: Three Generations and the Death of the Family Dairy Farm Ryan Dennis (Island Press) $30.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $24.79

I wrote about this at length in a BookNotes column before Christmas and I can’t stop thinking about this well told, down-to-Earth, poignant memoir about a colorful family of dairy farmers in Western New York. I know that some Hearts & Minds friends know the farming world; we even have generations of dairy farmers in one side of our family. This book tells the drama and danger and daily joys of running a dairy farm with keen insight and fabulously interesting ruminations.

Barn Gothic really does help readers be reminded of the hardship of farming in this modern sort of capitalist culture; yes, it rails against the infamous “go big or go home” push from the awful Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz (under Nixon) and the vast (!) repercussions  of industrial farming. (And know this, Trump’s Sonny Perdue is just as terrible, pushing farm consolidation and profiteering from the seed and petrochemical businesses.) However tragic all this is, making the work harder and less fulfilling, Barn Gothic is no Wendell Berry-inspired screed or public policy manifesto (although there is a short appendix that is the best history of all this I’ve seen.) No, this is a memoir, a family tale, a story about family and community and work and play and rural life and — perhaps most poignantly — a story about fathers and sons.

The third main man in this generational story, the author Ryan Dennis, grew up wanting to work the farm and  excelled at his good work with the planting and the herds, the milking and the repairs, the harvesting hay and meeting with the co-ops, etc. etc. Alas, he soured on it a bit, and, simultaneously, developed a passion for writing. He goes off to college, eventually get an MFA and a PhD (in Galway, Ireland.) He returns home when he can, but he will not take over his father and mother’s farm. He has become a writer. And what a book he has given us, a tender gift, sad and true and, oddly, a joy to read. Highly recommended.

American Bulk: Essays on Excess Emily Mester (W.W. Norton) $17.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $14.39

Most years I am enamored with fresh writers who can turn a phrase, and we have been early fans of writers who eventually became household names (at least in some circles.) We met Barbara Brown Taylor when she only had a few collections of sermons in print and to this day I quote from The Preaching Life. We loved the writing of Kate Bowler before her first book came out; Anne Lamott, Nadia Bolz-Webber, and Sara Miles are wordsmiths whose prose often blows us away.

Although not writing with a theological orientation and offering little of direct spirituality, American Bulk is so thoughtfully done, deeply considered, and gorgeously, energetically written, that I almost think of Ms Mester in a league of our other favorite writers. She has been called “sly”, “humane” and “dryly witty.” She is a bit punchy, has a great, easy-to-follow storytelling style, loves Costco, but brings a cultural and even philosophical heft to a few of her curiously captivating stories. This book is much more memoir than critical essays, but the genre of storytelling does yield to some analysis of the American tendency to hoard. Yep, this is a poignant, passionate, funny, and at times profound study of materialism and compulsive shopping. And did I mention hoarding?

What happens when consumption starts to consume you back?

Inquisitive and deeply observed….In a late-stage capitalism heaving with choice, Mester assumes the role of a millennial Virgil with both style and grace. Mester forges a compassionate route through brand-name overabundance to better understand the impulse to consume. — Shelf-Awareness

American Bulk is composed of some of my favorite nonfiction essays on family, capital, love and dysfunction that I’ve ever read. It’s a refreshing and needed reframing of what all these things mean, today, right now, as the neon haze of fast-food signs flicker from their long-time dominion of the American experience. Mester examines our compulsion to consume with careful incisions that I kept highlighting and coming back to, just to whisper the words to myself to make their clear-eyed cleverness my own. — Arabelle Sicardi, beauty writer and author of the The House of Beauty: Lessons from the Image Industry

A Beautiful Year: 52 Meditations on Faith, Wisdom, and Perseverance Diana Butler Bass (St. Martin’s Essentials) $28.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.40

You know this one, perhaps our biggest seller of 2025, even though it only came out in November. We’ve posted a bit about it and highlighted it in podcasts. Thanks to Diana and Rick — big name authors with a hugely popular Substack — for suggesting that folks order from us. We picked up some new customers and friends though that and got to send out a boatload of this lovely and thoughtful weekly devotional on the church calendar.

In my introductory comments above I suggested that you check out a video (from Highland Presbyterian Church in Lancaster, PA) and watch Diana discuss why she wrote this book and the subversive public theology that can emerge from simply paying attention to a truly Christian view of time. As you would expect, she puts it wonderfully. We can think more creatively and faithfully about our way in the world when our imaginations are shaped by a different calendar, and this set of Biblical readings following the liturgical may be the best book of it’s kind.

Diana is not the first to do this sort of year-long collection readings around the church year, but A Beautiful Year is a watershed book, very highly recommended.

The Uncool: A Memoir Cameron Crowe (Avid Reader Press) $35.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $28.00

I wondered if I should list this thinking it was a guilty pleasure, and when I was a guest on Joshua Johnson’s amazing “Shifting Culture” podcastI was a little chagrined and excited to hear that he listed this among his favorites of the year. Well, me too, brother, right on. It is, if you haven’t heard, the life story of the famously young (he was in high school) writer for Rolling Stone in the early and mid 1970s. The film Almost Famous was made about him, and Cameron Crowe — who had scored rare interviews with everybody from Dylan to Greg Allman to Zeppelin to Bowie to Joni — went on to make several important films. To say he was a wunderkind is putting it mildly.

Cameron was a lovable kid, a true lover of rock and roll, an ardent fan of the sort who had so many albums that said so much about his identity. (I relate, friends, I relate.) He was a very good writer in his day, and would tour for weeks on end (yes, skipping school) with Yes or The Eagles or Kris Kristofferson to get a good interview. I loved the stories about the magazine, about the politics and culture of the 70s, but, mostly, about the music and the stars. What a story.

Of course, as a good memoir, there is much more going on. He had a sister (who loved the Beach Boys and other lovely songs) who took her own life. His mom was a wild one, eccentric and unique (and wanted him to go to law school.) As he ages and goes into film, the story stretches out and I didn’t want it to end. It was a tender, good story, despite the occasional scenes of drugs and such which were surprisingly less influential than I even expected.

The book starts with a memory of the first time he heard Dylan (with his mom!) and then, in real time, was writing the liner notes for the first major boxed set of Dylan albums (Biography.) Oh my, I thought, this is going to be a heckuva read, at least for boomers like me. Hooray.

Roots and Rhythm: A Life in Music Charlie Peacock (Eerdmans) $32.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $26.39

If I ended the year with a fun music memoir (the above-mentioned Uncool by young Rolling Stone reporter Cameron Crowe)  I almost started it with an advanced copy of a book that released in February 2025, the incredible Roots and Rhythm by CCM artist, producer, thought-leader, and cultural creative, Charlie Peacock. I did a long review of this marvelous book last winter but I name it now as surely one of the great reads of the year. I enjoyed it, I learned much, I admired Charlie even more than I did, and I marveled at how God has worked in this artist’s life. What a read!

Charlie, as you may know, was both a punky sort of alt rocker as a young kid, new to Christian faith, who put out several really good albums in an era of CCM (contemporary Christian music) when much was stupid, derivative, sloppy, or cheesy. Yet there were true stars, serious artists, people wanting to be “in the world but not of it” in their rock and roll worldview. Charlie was a leader in those years, playing with bands and helping many. He became a producer and worked with — as he says on page after page after page of this fascinating autobiography —names that are recognizable as stars in the CCM world (Amy Grant, say, or Switchfoot) and whose names you would know from AM or FM radio. Yep, he has worked with rockers and jazzmen, with soul singers, and has met everybody from Al Green to Jackson Browne to Bono to Grammy winners The Civil Wars. He’s not only met them, he’s produced some of their recordings!

It isn’t every Christian book published by Eerdmans that ends up getting reviewed in Variety magazine (which called it “absorbing and exquisitely written”) along with an incredibly interesting interview. So this is a book that tells of his own journey to faith, his thoughtful sort of discipleship as a creative (he is friends with Steve Garber, for instance, who has an nice blurb on the book) and how he has promoted this thoughtful vision, with his wife Andi, by forming these Art House places in a few key cities, spaces for good conversations about faith and life and justice and art.

Roots and Rhythm: A Life in Music is a good retrospective of a colorful life of a real do-er, a guy who left his mark (and is still doing so, despite chronic headaches — pray for him, please.) He names gear and tech stuff from the recording studios, he names record label execs and talks about deals and offers and plans and betrayals. It is fascinating for those of us who follow pop culture, and more for those who want to hold up examples of people who have lived with integrity in a particular profession. He’s a good thinker, a fine writer, and an admirable person. Praise be to God.

8 UNFORGETTABLE BOOKS I READ THIS YEAR THAT WERE PUBLISHED PREVIOUSLY

In some cases they came out in paperback in 2025, so it counts…

Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted Suleika Jaouad (Random House) $20.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.00

We had this book with its great hardback cover for a year and I told folks I started it, but I never really read it seriously until this year, now that it is out in paperback. Friends, this story of a woman who gets a rare and debilitating sort of Leukemia as a college student and her love-life and family struggles as she goes through treatment is — I am not exaggerating — one of the most unforgettable books I have ever read. I adored it, even if her life and worldview is very different than my own. This is what a book can do, give you a glimpse, an entertaining glimpse, even, of some of the most horrible stuff faced by some of us. That my wife had just been diagnosed with her breast cancer as I had started this one seemed like a weird coincidence and I am glad Beth’s prognosis and treatment was nothing like Jaouad’s. But still, this book meant a whole lot to me this year.

The last third of the book (a tiny bit of spoiler) is about a road trip she takes, meeting people who had written to her (when she became known as an online cancer celebrity of sorts, due to a New York Times column she did about being a young adult with serious chronic illness.) This road trip is a blast and incredibly poignant making for a very satisfying read. Not overtly religious or theological, of course, but I still recommend this to our Hearts & Minds friends.

(Have you seen American Symphony, the documentary made by her husband, Jon Batiste? Yep, that’s her, and their falling in love is part of the second half of Between Two Kingdoms.)

Paul: A Biography N. T. Wright (HarperOne) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99

We announced this when it first released with enthusiasm knowing what we knew about Wright and his work on Paul — I’ve read some of his academic stuff — and was so happy for it, but never got around to reading it in earnest. It got rave, rave reviews, called majestical and erudite and compelling, etc.

It is one of the only ones of his more popular level titles that I had not read but it wasn’t until I was doing an adult ed class in my church this Fall that I realized I needed this big picture of the life of Paul. I had a dozen books spread out before me, and this one captivated me more than all the others. I read from it out loud in many of the weekly classes, and I couldn’t put it down. Maybe you are like me and go in study phases — the prophets for a season, maybe the Gospels on you do a deep dive into the Psalms or whatever — and this opened up so much of the New Testament letters that it has become one of the vital books in my list of must-reads.  I made me care about Paul even more and understand his essential Kingdom work in those years. I made me admire Tom that much more, again, too. What a book.

Read it along with The  Challenge of Acts: Rediscovering What the Church Was and Is, perhaps, or The Day the Revolution Began, but Paul: A Biography is the best book on Paul and an introduction to his life and message and work that I have read.

Embrace Fearlessly the Burning World Barry Lopez (Random House) $20.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.00

Barry Lopez is an excellent wordsmith, a great travel writer, a passionate naturalist, a vivid reporter who embeds with researchers studying, oh, say, wolves in the Arctic or the temperatures in Antarctica. He has traveled in rural Africa, the jungles of Asia, the deserts of the great American Southwest. He is observant, thoughtful, eloquent, at times nearly spiritual. I have long adored his writing and his gracious bravery— I think it was, to be honest, Eugene Peterson who first turned us on to him. Peterson had ordered a bunch of Lopez books from us, and said something about how he admired him as a person and as a writer of both fiction and nonfiction. I was fascinated

I hadn’t read much Barry Lopez since that first little bit decades ago, so when this posthumously published collection of pieces came out — some from travel magazines, some from more scholarly journals, some from outfits like National Geographic or maybe Orion, I knew I wanted to pick this up. I thought it was going to be essays about climate change and such, and it sort of is, as the “burning world” is the backdrop for his courageous research and writing. But if there is any theme to this collection it is the “embrace fearlessly” and the humility to do so. There are standout pieces about Alaska, and an incredible story or two about Antarctica — so interesting!

Lopez did not take the task of writing lightly. . . . Sentences shimmer and punch. . . . In one of the 27 essays that are collected here, he tries to pin down the point of it all: ‘The central project of my adult life as a writer,’ he says, ‘is to know and love what we have been given, and to urge others to do the same.’  He loved this world, and did his best, and pointed us the way. — The New York Times

Mesmerizing . . . The book reviewer runs out of superlatives, quailing before the work of the nature writer, essayist and fiction writer Barry Lopez (1945-2020), whose insight and moral clarity have earned comparisons to Henry David Thoreau. . . . To read Barry Lopez is to put yourself in the hands of a master observer who is enthralled by the strange beauty of our fragile planet, and who will be the first to tell you how little he actually knows. — The Wall Street Journal

How to End Christian Nationalism Amanda Tyler (Broadleaf) $27.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.39

This was, by all accounts, one of the classic recent works on the dangers — religiously to our Christian message about the gospel and politically to our fragile institutions that uphold our Republic —of so-called white Christian Nationalism.  It came out in 2024. Tyler is a hero for many, a Baptist from Texas who has studied theology and has a law degree and has often advocated for a robust (Christian) understanding of pluralism and the health of the public square. Like many Baptists she is passionate about the separation of church and state and has now become one of the leaders of a movement offering a solidly Christian appraisal and alternative to this hybrid / syncretistic idolatrous worldview of religious nationalism.

Yet, although I knew she was wise and prudent and thoughtful and solid, I hadn’t read the book. Until we were asked to bring a batch (and other such titles) to a lecture she was giving at a Bonhoeffer conference at the United Lutheran Seminary in Gettysburg. I figured I should bone up on the book before I met her and am I ever glad I did. It was spectacular, clear, thoughtful, wise, balanced, all that I had hoped. And she was an excellent presenter, sharp and Biblical and passionate and strategic.

Tyler bought some books from us and we enjoyed meeting her. Importantly, I became a fan of her book and want to name it here as one of the most important resources we’ve discovered this year. I hope you know it. We have plenty, ready to send them out. Colossians 2:8 notwithstanding, I think your going to need them…

In God’s Good Image: How Jesus Dignifies, Shapes, and Confronts Our Cultural Identities J.W. Buck (Herald Press) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE= $15.99

Again, it is sometimes hard to keep up with the releases of so many good books and, like you, we have an endless stack of what online folks call their TBRs (to-be-read.) This was on my stack when it came out last year and I just didn’t get to it until 2025. It is a good read, not exactly an anti-racist title, but a deeper dive into the broader question of ethnicity and identity and what it means that we are made in God’s image. A gospel-orientation can help (as the subtitle puts it) dignify and shape our cultural identity. Oh yes, and confront them if they are distorted or become idolatrous.

In God’s Good Image by an author whose other book we read a a year or two ago, Everyday Activism: Following 7 Practices of Jesus to Create a Just World and loved how he wove together deep piety and faith with habits of activism. With a big view of redemption and how spirituality can infuse action for justice, deeply evangelical but a true activist, Buck was a rather rare bird, or so it seemed, common-spirit. His degree was from the evangelical school Biola, which itself is fascinating.

This book about cultural identity must have emerged from his academic work and his dissertation advisor has a great forward. Buck himself tells about his own experience as a white guy in this diverse class of folks from all over the world. Being of a majority race or ethnicity is a very different experience than it is for those who are minorities, and this book will help us understand and respect that. For those doing multi-ethnic ministry or racial reconciliation work, this will be a real asset. If you are new to this, I’d very highly recommend it.

Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See Bianca Bosker (Penguin Books) $19.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.20

I hope you recall the big review I did of this at BookNotes earlier in the year. There’s a few things that might offend some delicate readers, but, mostly, it is an immersion in the world of high art — museums, studios, galleries — mostly in sophisticated postmodern New York City. The author did a similar book on the often arcane and colorful world of high-end wine culture and this, too, is her grappling with a skepticism about the whole scene.

Bosker starts the book admitting that as an educated and cultured person she knew enough not to say out loud (when looking at an abstract art piece) that “my four year old could have done that” but, yep, she thought it. She wondered, really, if that is art. What is art. Who knows? Who decides? And why do some seemingly simplistic splashes of color sell for a thousand dollars while maybe another might go for a million or more? And yet another is mocked. Who’s to say?

The colorful and brave Bosker (also a wife and mother) soon learns that the serious art scene is skeptical of outsiders and with access hard to come by. Many are wary of critics and there are spies and operatives and such, who can make or break openings or showings. There is money and there are drugs, although sometimes little of either and sexism and bias. There is, though, always art, and colorful connoisseurs, aficionados, critics, reviewers, writers, buyers sellers, and artists and the occasional celebrity. She spends a year or more hanging with them all and what she learns is amazing. She is an interesting, revealing, witty writer and you’ll be pulling for her as you learn a lot about a world you most likely don’t know at all. Wow. What a blast. Hold on.

Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma Claire Dederer (Vintage) $17.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $13.60

I am glad I read this late this year and was still finishing it last week (granted, in 2026) when the sad, sad news broke about Phillip Yancey’s affair, which brought this book into relief in a big way for me. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to name it as one of my favorite reads this year but it certainly is one of the important ones. I have a friend or two who won’t stop talking about it and I think it is a very significant bit of thinking and a very impressive bit of writing.

Monsters is a long meditation about what we do about art that we love when we learn that the artist was a bad person, who has done terrible things. From Woody Allen to Miles Davis to Picasso, from David Bowie to Michael Jackson, to Richard Wagner, to dozens more, she asks what to make of their important art (art that you may love, that you may even find life-saving) knowing what you know about their abuse or racism. She calls them Monsters and she talks about what she calls “the stain.”

I get it. In our own world we’ve had to ask, do we return the good books of serial rapist Ravi Zacharias? Yes. Do we continue to put money in the pockets of known abusers? Insofar as we can help it, no. We never liked Mark Driscoll and his macho, manic ugliness, anyway, so, obviously not. But what about the fine early books of Eric Metaxas who has gone off the deep end with election conspiracies and a weird adoration from Trump that is nearly devoid of reason, let alone Biblical fidelity? What about writers who are addicts, say?  What about Philip Yancey?

Ends up that Dederer doesn’t have easy answers, either. It is complicated, and this is, partially at least, a study about the nature of fans, for fans. She talkes about different sorts of failures of humans, and different sorts of loyalty fans have; and, more than ever, our knowledge of the biographies of the artists color our perception of their work. She has a long chapter about women writers who leave their children (as she has done at times) and in another dazzling piece, she ends up realizing she had to stop drinking, as she was betraying her family and herself through her daily boozing. She calls herself a Monster, suggesting that we all are, after all. She doesn’t seem to know anything about Christian theology but this is a study, finally, of sin and grace. As she eloquently pokes around the themes of the brokenness of humans and of the need for some kind of mercy for us all, she almost sounds, well, you know; Christian.

Dederer is a very intellectual writer and literary critic with long pages of dense prose (naming critics I never heard of and authors I hardly knew) suggesting to me that she is in a fairly insular world of highbrow literature of a certain era, assuming her readers know what in the hell she’s talking about. I skipped a bit, annoyed. But then I backtracked, got the vibe again, and was riveted by her stories of coping with good art done by bad people. To laugh at Annie Hall or not? To value the cinema of Roman Polanski? To listen to Bowie’s middle period or not? Her chapter on Miles Davis is amazing. I was gobsmacked by her revelation of her own excessive drinking and her realizations of what we might call the human condition. Her love for her teen kids and their friends is evident and her care about right and wrong in a #metoo world is deliciously commendable. I really loved most of this important work.

She spends some time exploring the role of subjectivity in art appreciation (duh) and seems to know only certain sorts of texts about aesthetics, making me smack my head at times. Her passion for an ethical sort of love for art — poems, novels, rock or jazz or classical albums — is beautiful and inspiring, but the book is at its best when it moves from highbrow critical theory and tells the stories about her watching a movie with a friend, or how other women felt about hearing stories of this or that artists abusive ways; her chapter on Raymond Carver was stunning. I suspect this is a question all of us face at one point or another — what do we do about books or movies that we love created by broken people. What’s love got to do with it?

This heady book will help.

Star Spangled Jesus: Leaving Christian Nationalism and Finding True Faith April Ajoy (Worthy) $19.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.99

As I said above I have read and written about many books on the foibles of those involved in the Christian nationalism world. From truly evil stuff like some of Trump’s followers putting up with neo-Nazi antisemites and ugly hatred for people from other countries, to conservative Christians who end up seduced by a certain sort of political worldview without understanding much about civic ideologies and what the Bible demands of us to resist the ways of the world, I have read many. I skipped this one — okay, I’m going to be honest here — because I didn’t like the cover. Or the title, even. I saw some great reviews by people I respect, but just couldn’t pick it up. Don’t judge a book by its cover, I often way, but I hated those sparkles, even if they were ironic.

Earlier this year I was trying to find just the right book for a customer wanting to explore this topic, a customer who was really part of the conservatively evangelical megachurch world, a pretty traditionalist reader who wanted to move into some awareness of the dangers of blending too much right wing stuff with authentic Biblical teaching. I started to read this story of this Christian gal who walked away from that stuff and — behold! — I couldn’t put it down. From Ajoy’s childhood singing a patriotic song on Jim Bakker’s PTL show on through her participation in the “March for Jesus” rallies and cheesy campaign videos for Republican candidates, she tells it all with verve and self-awareness. It was, like the blurbs had promised, an amazing read, fun and funny, energetic and Godly, a perfect memoir about an evangelical who loved Jesus and realized she needed to get rid of some of this nationalistic ideology from her walk. I realized the power of the cover, even, and this became a favorite title for those who want this sort of a read.

If you only have time to read one book on the state of American Christianity this year, it should be Star-Spangled Jesus. — Jonathan Merritt, author of Learning to Speak God from Scratch

Star-Spangled Jesus is the Rosetta Stone for understanding white Christian nationalism. Behind all the stats and the polling are the people who subscribe to this ideology, and few will even come close to April Ajoy’s first hand experience in the movement. Star-Spangled Jesus will help you understand white Christian nationalism’s hold on so many people and the danger it poses to democracy and the church. — Jemar Tisby, author of The Color of Compromise and The Spirit of Justice

9 GREAT BOOKS FROM 2025 THAT I INTENDED TO FINISH THIS YEAR BUT DIDN’T (YET)

but I can assure you they are fabulous, of a notable, award-winning calibre.

Your Soul is Required: The Theology and Sermons of C.T. Vivian edited by Joanna Walker et al (Fortress) $39.00  // OUR SALE PRICE = $31.20

Anyone who knows anything about the civil rights movement or 20th century African American history knows the importance of C.T. Vivian. His Black Power and the American Myth is still read, 50-some years after its initial publication and his memoir It’s in the Action remains a vital glimpse at his relationship with his fellow leaders of the movement. This book fills a huge gap, a collection of his sermons and some assessment of his theological views. Compiled by friends and family, it is a recent tribute and excellent resource. I’ve dipped in and will continue to read them as the Spirit moves.

Against the Machine: On the Unmaking of Humanity Paul Kingsnorth (Thesis) $32.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $25.60

This book will have you hooked on the first page; it is so well written and interesting and even captivating, I have turned the pages eagerly, delighted that such an important critique of the myths of science and technology and progress that have shaped the secularized modern West, is also so charming and gracious. Kingsnorth is amazing, a person who has come to Christian faith (in part through his reading Wendell Berry.) Yes, he is concerned about “the machine” and how, now, the big question is what it means to be human.

While there are some wise insights showing how both the left and the right sides of the political spectrum have (by and large) carried water for The Machine and this damaging worldview, he gets a little cranky about progressive’s legitimate concerns about social justice and multi-ethnic justice. I set the book down reluctantly to ponder more and need to finish it soon.  I will have no difficulty as it truly is well written and an enjoyable (if learned) read. Some of the great social critics alive today have raved about it. (And other reviews, delighting in his great prose and capacious mind, have still called it “vexing’ and “overwrought.” I get that.) Read one thoughtful review (in Mere Orthodoxy) that worries about what seems to be an uncharacteristic blind spot by Felicia Wu Song: here.

What Is Wrong with the World? The Surprising, Hopeful Answer to the Question We Cannot Avoid Timothy Keller (Zondervan) $29.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.99

Yes, this is about the doctrine of sin and as theological discourse goes, Tim Keller is one of the most engaging and accessible popular theological writers in our lifetime. Although not an academic work, it is intellectually sound and stimulating and vital, enough for me to name it as a favorite this year. It was released late in the fall and good as it is, I needed to set it aside for a bit. Is it fair to say a book about sin is a fun read? That a book asking one of the deepest questions we can ask is a good read? Yes, indeed.

Many these days seem to have rejected much of evangelical theology in part because of an understandable revulsion to how some conservative preachers have failed to honor the goodness of humans, the joy of being alive, the common grace that has allowed for great beauty in the world. Keller doesn’t miss that stuff. Others have left the faith because they think the way some have described the work of Christ on the Cross has been nearly abusive, as if a mean-spirited God needs to get some pound of flesh. Granted, these are concerns, and if anybody can articulate the historic doctrines of sin and redemption with winsome balance and compelling exploration, it is Keller.

I suspect some will find it too traditional (he was traditionally Reformed, after all, a PCA church planter, trained at Westminster Theological Seminary.) Still What Is Wrong With the World is a book that needs to be grappled with. Agree or not, I hope you agree it is one of the worthwhile books of the year.

Twelve Churches: The Unlikely History of the Buildings That Made Christianity Fergus Butler-Gallie (Avid Reader Press) $30.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $24.00

I am not alone in singing the praises of this mammon studio church history, a deep dive into twelve different places, reflecting on how a certain sort of faith and a certain theme within church history developed over time at that particular place. We study beauty and justice and renewal and sex and violence and evangelism and all sorts of topics by way of looking at churches in Africa, Europe, Palestine, the US, Asia, South America, the Caribbean — all over the world!

This big, fat, book is a treasure trove of incredible learning and you’ll have a blast reading about these congregations, some dating back to the earliest days of Christianity. There is great beauty and goodness to be found in these places, and much weariness and corruption. From the blood-wash marble of Canterbury Cathedral to the bombed out windows of 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham to the glories of Hagia Sophia (in Istanbul) or St. Peter’s in Rome, Twelve Churches looks at twelve places and twelve eras.

The Devil Reads Nietzsche: A Public Theology for the Post-Christian Age Michael McEwen (B+H Academic) $27.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.39

Inspired by the brilliant work (and title, The Devil Reads Derrida) by James K.A. Smith this fabulous little (but meaty) book came out in the Fall and it look me a while to get to it. I’ve got my excuses. Once I studied the footnotes, I knew he was drawing on the best Christian philosophers (even Dooyeweerd) and contemporary thinkers like Jamie Smith, so I knew I wanted to see where this was going. There are a number of interesting Christian studies of the great atheist philosopher, and efforts to learn from his rebukes about Christianity. I haven’t finished this yet (I said it was meaty) but I’m sure that it is one of the best books of this sort to come out this year.

Here is how the publisher describes McEwen’s project:

The Devil Reads Nietzsche intends to both excavate Nietzsche and explicate how American culture has selectively adopted and appropriated Nietzschean ideals into its stories, symbols, and practices. To be clear, this project is more than a historical excavation of Nietzsche; it’s primary aim is to disciple readers to engage with cultural ideologies from within the biblical-theological narrative, and an interaction with the grandfather of postmodernism and deconstructionism will serve as a “case study” of how we might do this charitably, wisely and winsomely.

Dordt College professor Justin Ariel Bailey, author of Reimagining Apologetics and the excellent Interpreting Your World, says that the sort of public theology that McEwen is working towards, is “clear-eyed, irenic, and hopeful, inviting that, after all has been heard, Christianity’s story is more capacious than Nietzsche’s parodies…”

Practicing Life Together: A Common Rule for Christian Growth Paul J Gutacker (MoodyPress) $16.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $13.59

I am very glad to name this as one of the most important small books of 2025 for a couple of reasons and while I admit (sadly) to have not finished it yet, I couldn’t be more grateful for this particular bit of work. Gutacker, for starters, is, by all accounts, a gem of a guy, a gentleman and a scholar. He mentors students in an important think-tank like community, a study center at Baylor University in Texas called The Brazos Fellows. In his work there — affirming the life of scholarship and bringing faith and learning together in fruitful ways — he ends up needing to guide young academics into this vibrant life of the mind done for the glory of God. The book he wrote about forming a rule of life for fellowship groups of young adults — a rave review on the front cover is by Alan Jacobs — is a rare blend of theological thoughtfulness and gracious attentiveness to the life situation of young adults. He invites students to grow wisely in faith and uses contemplative and classic spiritual practices as ways into forming community and lasting friendships.

Although the setting is the Christian Study Center movement, it is, in a way, Life Together for any 21st century young adults, bringing Bonhoeffer’s little classic to life for today. As the back cover says, perhaps with a potent play on words, “left to our devices, to our whims and impulses, we find ourselves distracted and discouraged.” The only way to build a rule of life, he says, is to do it together.

From life at the table to the life of prayer, from learning to wonder and learn to the “lifelong project of discernment” Gutacker serves the Brazos Fellows and this little book has come out of this real-life experience of helping groups commit to specific practices that can be formative and life-giving. If you know anybody who is interested in building Christian community, if you’ve read Life Together (or done the excellent four part “Community Practice” offered by John Mark Comer’s Practicing the Way curriculum) then Practicing Life Tougher is the next book you need. Short, powerful, important, I tip my hat with joy.

Brooding Upon the Waters: A Memoir of Farming, Fishing, and Failure in America’s Lost Landscape Howard Schaap (Slant Books) $22.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $17.60

The editor of Slant Books wrote me a note a while back along with an advanced copy of this manuscript, insisting that it nearly had Hearts & Minds name on it. He knows us well, and knew I would like the format of memoir, the feisty, vivid prose, the ruminations on small town and rural life, even the Dutch Calvinism of the writer, a professor at Dordt College in Iowa. The pathos of this story — a story of mental illness, connected to a place and a landscape, a dad and a troubled family farm in an often suffocating faith tradition — is poignant and makes for a powerful reading experience.

Oh, how I recommend it for a meaningful glimpse of life in this part of Minnesota, near what some call The Driftless region. But, more, the joy and delight of memory, the memory of farming and fishing, overrides the failures, especially fishing. I’m part way through this beautiful book and had to stop in order to read more books in this list and write. But it is on my bedside and I’m dipping in whenever I have a free moment. It is a bit rare — Slant should be more widely known — and it is extraordinary.

Once in a great while, the story of one man’s hard life can explain the demise of an entire culture. A hauntingly tragic tale told with immense tenderness, Brooding Upon the Waters sheds the light of grace upon our troubled times. Never have I read a more beautifully written, profoundly loving memoir from the heart of America’s heartland. — Paula Huston, author of The Hermits of Big Sur

On Holy Ground: Finding Your Story of Identity, Belonging, and Sacred Purpose Keith Anderson (Cascade) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

Often, when I hear of a new book, I order one to skim through, wondering if it might catch my attention and be useful for others. Will I love it? Can I sell it? As a bookseller, that’s always the question — will a book, no matter how nicely written, be helpful, and worth a person’s limited finances? Will anybody care?  I’m aware that there are plenty of fine books designed to help people grow in their faith and while I mean no disrespect, they are a dime a dozen.

I didn’t have to wonder, really, about On Holy Ground as I have followed Keith Anderson for much of our career and have read other books he has done. He has not churned out dozens, but has only written when he needed to, short, wise books of Christian discipleship and daily Christian living. Basic but mature, accessible but well written. I trust this guy. And, wow, this one is bringing together themes he has worked on much of his life.

Here is a sense of what this book brings together, a spirituality of the ordinary that allows us to be so sure being loved that we belong, and can therefore be used by God to love others well, working for a redemptive “ecosystem.” Read this:

There is a universal human need to understand our identity and find belonging and sacred purpose in the most daily moments of our lives. When we know our identity as the beloved of God, our lives take on practices that are urgently needed in our divisive culture today, starting with compassion, hospitality, and discourse, and joining a movement to boldly proclaim Abba’s love. Sacred purpose involves everything we do on holy ground, which is where God walks with us, before us, and alongside us–in time and place. As we enter the fray, we find ways to live as people of justice, grace, and conviction, seeking the kingdom of God as our priority as we address those issues that are so charged and divisive today: race, inclusion/exclusion, individualism, and trauma. Within the image of an ecosystem, we understand that — Scripture (the living word) points us to Jesus (the incarnate word), who calls us to sacred purpose (a living relationship of following Jesus), at our own altars in the world, for all of our lives.

Over a long lifetime, I have known no one wiser than Keith Anderson. On Holy Ground is a resounding call to embrace what it means to be human and gift others with the face of God. There has never been an era where it is more important to rediscover the roots of our reason to be on this earth and to do so with wonder and joy. This profound and beautiful book will do far more than transform your life–it will set a course for a kinder world. — Dan B. Allender, founding president, The Seattle School of Theology and Psychology

Spellbound: How Charisma Shaped American History from the Puritans to Donald Trump Molly Worthen (Forum Books) $32.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $25.60

I trust you’ll understand that I have not finished this big book of remarkable history by one of the great young public intellectuals and scholars writing today. Over 430 pages, Spellbound works out a complex thesis, about the role of charisma, a distinctive aspect (she shows) throughout American history.

She goes to good lengths explaining what she means by charisma — it has to do with leadership, sure, but a certain sort of persona who has some sort of power to engage listeners and make them followers. This may be a natural born sort of charm and ability to influence or it may be crafted and used for good or evil. That the ancients and the Bible refer to charisma (even as an anointing of the Holy Spirit of God) her usage is more broad (yet not unrelated.)

The riveting opening sequent in the lengthy and potent introduction is set in1634 with that memorable woman in Puritan New England, Anne Hutchinson. Her Bible study is attracting more or more people and they are critical even of local clergy and their sermons.

She moves quickly to October 1919 when Marcus Garvey was shot, only to live and lecture about liberation exuberantly in Philadelphia a few weeks later. The crowd went wild.

Next up is a scene in Florida from Donald Trump’s campaign in the fall of 2016. She narrates it well. These glimpses span nearly four centuries and “encompass wildly different ideas about supernatural and worldly power.” This, also, is what this amazing book is about, trying to see how people have attempted to “understand and harness the invisible forces that infiltrate their lives.”  What is the relationship between God and charisma, between leaders and followers, between different manifestations of power, even the supernatural sort and the overtly political sort?

Years and years in the making, this hefty book deserves many accolades here at the end of 2025. It will continue to sell and be talked about in 2026, I am sure.  Worthen is a professor of history at the University of North Carolina, a freelance journalist and scholar, and, recently, was appointed as a Fellow of our Trinity Forum. Her fairly recent adult conversion to Christianity, I have been told, developed while writing Spellbound.

 Spellbound is a wild and satisfying romp through the history of American religion and politics, and a simultaneously sober and hopeful appraisal of the present moment.  —Los Angeles Review of Books

Elegant and insightful, Spellbound is an important contribution to the urgent project of understanding America in our time. — Jon Meacham, author of And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle