This is an entry in The Good Books, Post-Ev Post’s book-centric vertical.
I have a Notion database that is now woefully out of date where I once tried to track my reading. The header image for that database was this frame from the classic Twilight Zone episode “Time Enough At Last,” where the main character awakens to a world that has ended, and he is finally alone with a pile of books. Because it’s The Twilight Zone, at the very end he breaks his glasses and can never read them.
Our world ends anew every day, but there is still time for books.
The last half of 2023 was very busy for me as I worked to finish my own manuscript, and in that time there were some really wonderful books published that I wasn’t able to feature on the podcast or here in the newsletter. There are even more that will continue to come out over the next several months as well. Here is a small sampling of some of those books, and I’ll continue to do this moving forward.
Here are some recent books I’m looking forward to reading/keep reading:
The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living and Leaving the White Evangelical Church by
This book releases today, and I’ll release my interview on Exvangelical with Sarah later this week. In the meantime, you can listen to Sarah talk about the book on Fresh Air—and while you’re at it, check out
talking about Christian nationalism on Fresh Air as well.Devout: A Memoir of Doubt by Anna Gazmarian
This book is next on my TBR pile—it just came out last week, and it’s a memoir dedicated to faith crises and mental health struggles. I’m happy to see these types of stories being published.
God Gave Rock & Roll To You: A History of Contemporary Christian Music by
.This book by Leah Payne was just published in February. There are so many ways to write about religion & society, and I am excited to get to this one in short order. My only regret was this wasn’t already published when I was working on my book (more on that soon!), because I’m sure I would have cited it.
Hell Is a World Without You by
This novel by Jason Kirk, published in December 2023, will drop you into the tumultuous headspace of a teenage evangelical. The inner monologue that Kirk employs for the main character is sometimes a little too real—especially the intrusive thoughts that take the form of being “convicted by the Spirit.” Kirk donated the first three months of sales to The Trevor Project, which is incredible.
I have been reading Stankorb’s book, published in August 2023, for quite some time. It’s well-reported, inspiring, and heart-breaking all at once.
That will do it for this post - let me know what books you’re excited about in the comments!
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Hi Blake,
Thanks for these suggestions. Can you add one more to the list?
The Light of the Self: A Memoir of a Spiritual Awakening, by Kenneth Rose. Ph.D.
https://www.amazon.com/Light-Self-Memoir-Spiritual-Awakening-ebook/dp/B07MZJ3KSS
From the book's description of the book and a couple of reviews: An unexpected spiritual awakening at nineteen led Kenneth Rose on a journey of spiritual discovery to a Hindu devotional movement, a conservative Bible college, a Catholic monastery, Harvard's Center for the Study of World Religions, and India, where he had a spiritually decisive audience with the Dalai Lama, experienced the radical teaching of nondual awakening in an encounter with satsang teacher Papaji, and encountered the living presence of the Hindu saint Sri Ramana Maharshi in his ashram in the shadow of the sacred mountain known as Arunachala. At each stop on his unique journey, Kenneth Rose gained liberating insights into the spiritual life. But the radical differences between the many spiritual traditions that he encountered raised the question of which—if any—of these paths is ultimate.
"A great spiritual autobiography, a worthy companion to books like The Seven Storey Mountain and the Autobiography of a Yogi. The book is so vividly and poetically written that I felt as if I was reading a kind of spiritual 'On the Road.' It sits well with Kenneth Rose's scholarly work on mysticism, as it contains so many beautiful descriptions of his own mystical experiences. I hope that the book gains the wide readership it deserves." Steve Taylor PhD. author of The Leap and The Calm Center.
" . . . will resonate with readers who are interested in and struggle with the search for divinity . . . . fans of Thomas Merton and Alan Watts might enjoy Rose's tussle with multiple religious traditions and intense spiritual episodes"—Publishers Weekly