Reading Resolutions: A Good Start to 2018

Reading. It is a pretty regular item in our annual Christmas Resolution deliberations. And though it is sometimes formed into a very general goal (as in “Read more quality stuff”), it usually becomes much more specific with certain authors, genres, or booklists becoming targets.

Last year, for instance, my reading-oriented resolutions included a new “read through the Bible” regimen with Claire, re-reading a lot of C.S. Lewis, re-reading The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, and re-reading a Shakespeare play every month. Regarding that last goal, I only managed to get to 8 of them. But I was still pleased for even though I didn’t quite make it, I certainly read more than I would have if I never made the goal in the first place! Also, I scored very well with my other resolutions and so I’m pursuing my 2018 goals with an encouraging wave of momentum and, I’m delighted to say, January has proved a good start to the year.

Here’s a quick rundown.

* Claire and I started in again on January 1 with the same “read through the Bible” plan (and strategy) we used last year. That means reading 2-4 chapters a day while drinking tea, munching on our Paleo power bars, and listening to the narration of the same passage by Alexander Scourby.

* My first book read in 2018 was the 4th book in Jan Karon’s Mitford series, Out to Canaan. I have found these novels very pleasant, very comforting, but also enlightening and spiritually challenging.

* The month was a bit of a “play month” for me with one of my favorite dramas of all time (Thornton Wilder’s Our Town) and three I had never read: Joseph Addison’s Cato, Arnold Ridley’s The Ghost Train (which Claire and I listened to in an audio version one snowy night), and, from ancient Greece, Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes.

* My major project in January was a re-reading of the 2 volumes of Memoirs by Ulysses S. Grant. This, by the way, is a masterful work of literature as well as history.

* Though I prefer reading a real book to a Kindle version, I am nevertheless greatly pleased by the technological breakthrough Kindle represents, especially because it allows me to read (often for free) very old books that I would never be able to afford if, that is, they could even be found. The books in this category that I read in January were two by an English mystery writer of the very early 20th Century, R. Austin Freeman. Those 2 were Dr. Thorndyke’s Cases and The Red Thumb Mark. I also enjoyed another early 20th Century mystery from Anne Katherine Green, The Forsaken Inn.

* I have long had Antonia Fraser’s King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table in my library but I only got round to it this month. It was a provocative and elegantly written retelling of the great legends, but often with Fraser’s unique twist. I think I'm going to read more of Dame Fraser's books this year.

* Also through Kindle in January came another freebie, this one from one of my favorite writers, John Buchan. It was quite different than anything I had ever read of his but I found it quite interesting. It was A Book of Escapes and Hurried Journeys.

* I read Tom Clancy’s modern classic The Hunt for Red October shortly after it was published in the late 1980s and I have told myself many times over the years to read it again. I finally listened to myself and did so. And I’m glad I did. It is a superb thriller -- and with none of the psychotic, sex-crazed, serial killers that so dominate that genre nowadays.

* And finally, I should mention that January’s reading also included two excellent theological works, Randy Alcorn’s Happiness and Francis Schaeffer’s No Little People. However, I’m reading them both carefully and just a bit at any one sitting and so I’m not yet finished with either one.