I was cutting my hair this week and some of the pieces of hair stuck to the scissors. So I turned the water on and just washed it down the sink. I was instantly transported back to my childhood living room with various members of the family sprawled out on every available piece of furniture and the floor. Each lounger with their own unique piece of literature. The Sunday Comics, a National Geographic Magazine, a novel from 1902, an Encyclopedia. There was “The Reading Chair”, one of the only pieces of furniture that Mom ever bought brand new. It had an ottoman, a side table and lamp. This chair must be surrendered to an adult. The same rule applied to the couch. This fixture that allowed the most seating was most commonly yielded to Dad, who occupied his territory in the supine recumbent position. There was no noise save for the steady rustle of turning pages, and the occasional internal laughter that manifested itself often in shaking and catching of breath. It was not uncommon for a reader to address the entire household with an impromptu reading of a passage selected for the edification of he that hath an ear.

“Archeologist find intact hair on a 3,000 year old mummy.” Dad read from his text.

“Y’all quit washing hair down the drain.” He gave the practical application and then slipped back into his silent reading.

I smiled and decided to not wash any more hair down the drain as I recalled this scene.

So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading. Nehemiah 8:8

I still enjoy reading. I still believe that it is important. I have a habit of reading my favorite books again and this year I reread Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, and Hie To The Hunters by Jesse Stuart. I also enjoy audiobooks.

Sometimes you need to read something to just escape the present tasks that are pressing in upon you. So you choose to read something light and entertaining. Then there are books that truly challenge your thinking, cause deep introspection, bring fresh ideas, and promote a positive change in your life. This is the kind literature that I am interested in reading. Here are some books that I read this year that fall into that category.

Atomic Habits by James Clear

I am late to the party on reading this best seller. To say that I was inspired by this book is a gross understatement. I am persuaded that our daily habits have the power to shape our identity. I strongly recommend this book. The one takeaway that I would like to share from this book is concept of identity based thinking. You can think your way into a new behavior and vice versa.

Mr. Clear also references a book called Talent is Overrated, which provides research that supports the importance of practice over natural propensity toward a task. I have noticed this over the years with children that may quickly grasp the concept of guitar or a piano, but that alone is not sufficient to make them a master. There is no avoiding practice. The practicers usually advance.

This is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession by Daniel J. Levitin

I am fascinated by the brain. I enjoyed my psychology course in college so much that I would have changed my major but I did not want to lose my scholarship to study business. Levitin is a neuroscientist and musician. He writes that music in the brain almost behaves like a language. For example, you use one part of your brain to play music, and a different part of your brain to speak English. What is interesting to me is that you must use a third part of your brain when you put musical concepts into English. This explains why some people can play an instrument but struggle to tell someone else how to play. Or why someone may speak English and Spanish but have a hard time teaching one or the other.

This book convinced me of the importance of early music education. Whether or not a child becomes a great musician is not the issue, although early music education will certainly work in their favor toward mastery. More significantly is that children who took early music lessons scored better in other subjects as well. In short learning music makes you a better learner.

This book is continuing to challenge and inspire my thinking and musicianship. It has also prompted me to seek out and listen to How Music and Mathematics Relate by David Kung and Bach and the High Baroque by David Greenberg. Both of these are from the Great Courses series offered by the Teaching Company. I highly recommend This is Your Brain on Music to every musician.

Reflections on the Revolution in France by Edmund Burke

Unless you have a firm grasp on the history of the French Revolution as well as English history, you will be totally lost if you pick this book up. Mr. Burke was writing to his contemporaries about current events now two centuries removed. This book made the list because Edmund Burke makes me want to be a better writer. I will warn you that his rhetoric may seem boring or stuffy to many modern readers, but I found myself not only agreeing with him-he was pretty accurate about The French Revolution-but admiring his writing style. It made me question my writing style. Am I consistent? Am I clear and coherent? What would make someone want to read something I wrote?

I don’t have all the answers to these questions but I did ask ChatGPT to describe the writing style of zanewells.com.

The writing style of Zane Wells is characterized by its thoughtful, reflective tone and his ability to seamlessly blend humor and introspection. The website’s content often explores complex or abstract topics, but does so in a way that is accessible and engaging to a broad audience. The author’s prose is typically well-crafted and evocative, employing vivid imagery and sensory detail to bring his ideas to life. Additionally, the writing is often marked by a sense of curiosity and wonder, with the author frequently expressing awe and appreciation for the natural world and the mysteries of human experience. Overall, the writing style of Zane Wells is distinctive and memorable, reflecting a deep sense of thoughtfulness and an abiding sense of wonder about the world around us.

Not quite Edmund Burke, but I’ll take it.

The Great Debate by Yuval Levin

I read this book because I wanted to know more about Edmund Burke. Levin addresses the question of why there is clear division of major political, moral, and social issues between the American Left and Right. For example, if someone is pro-gun rights they’ll probably be also be pro-life. Levin endeavors to get to the heart of why these generalizations or stereotypes ring true. At the foundation we find the argument between the liberal Thomas Payne and the conservative Edmund Burke. Levin proposes that what someone thinks about the origins of human government-God ordained, or human ordained-has a profound impact on what they think about many of the current issues today.

I have read Common Sense by Thomas Payne as an adult and a teenage student in AP American History. I can appreciate that he wrote in a manner that was accessible to uneducated people and no one can deny his influence on the American Revolution. Yet the more I study about his concepts of human government the less I agree with him. This is not to say that I fully agree with Edmund Burke on every issue. I can say that this book was very thought provoking and I will probably read it again in a couple of years. And I encourage every American to read this book.

Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman by Richard P. Feynman

This was recommended by Audible because of a string of audiobooks I had listened to about the Manhattan Project, in which Feynman played an important role. Aside from hearing his name, I wasn’t really sure who Richard Feynman was. This is essentially his autobiography. I learned to appreciate his sense of humor. I found myself laughing out loud at some of Mr. Feynman’s experiences. If you remotely enjoy physics, the Manhattan Project, or good storytelling, then you will enjoy this book.

A key takeaway from this book is The Feynman Technique, a method of independent learning.

Choose a concept to learn
Teach it to yourself or someone else
Return to the source material if you get stuck
Simplify your explanations and create analogies

After I finished this audiobook I pulled up a few of his lectures on YouTube and was impressed by his manner of teaching. I also learned a little bit about Physics. I recalled some of my favorite teachers throughout my academic journey. The best teachers loved their subject material, but they also had a strong sense of connection with the student.

I recommend this book to all of my teacher friends.

American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird, Martin J. Sherwin

I have been eyeing this book for a while since you cannot discuss the Manhattan Project without discussing J. Robert Oppenheimer. This Pulitzer Prize winning biography is able to go into such fine detail because this man’s life was closely scrutinized and documented by the FBI. This work left me with a deep sense of the cruelty of politics.

To read the biographies of great men is to take a close look at their lives and in doing so take a broad look at world history during their lifetime. In seeing J. Robert Oppenheimer we see World War II, the dawn of the atomic age, the birth of the Cold War, and American politics of the mid 20th century.

The life of J. Robert Oppenheimer makes me not want to hold any grudges.

Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford

Genghis Khan is a singular example of one man who changed the world. He may not have been a good man, but he was a great man. The lasting impact of the Mongol Empire that followed him can still be felt in the world today. I’m not sure that I want to glean any character traits from Genghis Khan, but I did find his history very intriguing. I was also inspired to begin trying to fill in the substantial gap in my understanding of Asian history. If you read this book and enjoy it, you will probably also want to check out Barbarian Empires of the Steppes by Kenneth W. Harl from the Teaching Company.

I listen to a lot of audio books during my daily commute and while performing menial tasks. Although I worked from home three out of five days for much of the year, according to Audible I still managed to listen to audio books for 23 days 5 hours and 5 smokin’ minutes. Now I know there is a lot of debate over whether listening to a book is the same as reading a book. This is a silly argument. According to my Reading Specialist Mother-in-law, “The same area of your brain is used whether you are reading or listening.” There is nothing like sitting in a comfortable chair in a quiet room and reading a real hard back book with typeset printing. Alas, I spend ten hours a week on the road and I try to make the most of that time with audiobooks.

Rather than give you the huge list of books I finished this year-some of which were duds-I’ve tried to narrow it down to the five titles that resonated most with me.

The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill Defender of the Realm by William Manchester and Paul Reid

This was the first audiobook that I tackled back in January. This 53 hour behemoth covers the life of Winston Churchill from 1940-1965. Which is to say that it covers world history from that time period. It inspired me to listen to several of Churchill’s speeches and read a host of other books about World War II. If I could only recommend one of those books it would be The Last Battle by Cornelius Ryan.

While the book obviously focuses on Churchill, it goes into great detail about his relationships with other world leaders like Stalin and Roosevelt. I found it interesting how Roosevelt, ever the politician, slowly and steadily dismantled the British Empire.

Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens

I love Charles Dickens. His books are fun to read, but there is something marvelously appealing to me about listening to a great narrator read in all the Dickensian accents. I like to listen to Dickens whenever I finish a truly heavy work of non-fiction like Night by Ellie Wessel.

Why Little Dorrit made the list is not because of the great storyline-it’s good, but it’s not Dickens at his best to me. This book made the list solely because of his invention of The Office of Circumlocution. Anyone who has ever been frustrated with inefficient government bureaucracy will appreciate Dicken’s satire. It is worth thumbing through if only to read those passages.

Conquistadors by Michael Wood

Of the five books I completed this year in this area of study, this title is an excellent sampler. I found this subject so interesting that I’ve started studying Spanish again after I realized that all the hard words were Nahuatl anyway. This book focuses on Hernan Cortes, Francisco Pizzaro, Francisco de Orellana, and Cabeza de Vaca. It also spurred my curiosity to learn more about people like Father Sahagun, and Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, and events like the Valladolid debate between las Casas and Sepulvida.

It is amazing how these conquistadors were all more than a little bit rogue. Hernan Cortes was actually fleeing from the governor of Cuba when he began what became the conquest of Mexico. Orellana led a rebellion from a failing expedition and became the first European to sail the Amazon River- from West to East no less.

Perhaps most interesting though is the story of Cabeza de Vaca, who washed up on an island off the coast of Texas after the ship returning from an aborted expedition into Florida sank in a storm. The natives that rescued him insisted that he could heal people. He attempted to refuse, but then eventually began to pray for people when he realized that they would not take no for an answer. For the next few years he walked to through Texas and Mexico healing people on his way back to Spanish civilization. There were even reports of the dead being raised.

This book had one statement that stood out to me. I am paraphrasing, ‘The native peoples were unfamiliar with the concept of separation between the natural and spiritual worlds. They believed that the spiritual world could break in on the natural world at any moment.”

As a Christian, I strongly share this feeling.

The Sultans by Noel Barber

This book helped fill a large gap in my knowledge about the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Turks often receive praise for being efficient administrators of such a vast empire, but we must remember that they did not establish their empire. They overtook a fully functional empire from the Byzantines, who called themselves Romans, who received it from the Greeks, who won it from the Persians, who took it from the Babylonians. In essence the Ottoman Empire-and a lot of the rest of the world-is the scrappy leftovers of the most glorious empire in history: Babylon. (See Daniel chapter two)

The book follows the Sultans from Sulieman the Magnificent, to the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk). The Sultans were a colorful lot as far as characters go. Their biographical sketches read like fantastic story book material, albeit not for children. For all their piety many of these Sultan’s exemplified the basest elements of human nature. I suppose a few could be called supervillains. It is a fortunate thing for western culture that the Ottoman empire slowly self-destructed by fratricide.

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl

My brother recommended this book to me. Aside from the Bible, this is the most important book that I have read this year. Dr. Frankl was already an established psychiatrist prior to World War II. He survived a number of concentration camps during the war, although many of his family members did not.

In this book he argues that as long as man has meaning-something to live for-he can endure the worst circumstances. He uses his harrowing experience in the camps to support this idea. Without meaning, man loses the will to live and will die. Dr. Frankl states that every person’s meaning is different, and it is up to the individual to find that meaning.

I believe that there is an ultimate meaning that supersedes the elusive personal meaning that Dr. Frankl is describing.

That ultimate meaning can only be found in serving Jesus Christ.

“Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power: In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.”
‭‭Colossians‬ ‭2:8-12‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Tag: book list

Books of 2023