Books I Read in 2015

Original. Imaginative. Creepy at times.

Profoundly moving, tragic tale. Progressive psychiatric illness relentlessly drags a bright attorney away from his family into a wandering homelessness.

Two Yale Law School professors argue convincingly that, in the U.S., a minority group is disproportionately successful to the degree that it has the triple package: a sense of group superiority, a deep feeling of insecurity and well-practiced impulse control.

Examines the stressful life of a Chinese spy, a mole, working in the US CIA, and it's profound impact on his family members in both countries. Told very effectively by two voices that alternate chapters.

Read to my two older sons. Fine piece of historical fiction. Katharine, a young governess, wrongly jailed in England, escapes to a new life in Maine, and joins the rebel cause after witnessing the burning of Falmouth by British warships in 1775.

Powerful thought provoker. Forgiveness is everything.

Inspirational. Think, evaluate, save, invest, allocate, diversify, give, grow and enjoy a permanent income for a full and fulfilling life.

An overgrowth of his internet viral essay "The Disadvantages of an Elite Higher Education." Makes a few good points, but critically weakened by a overarching, exaggerated and almost whining cynicism regarding everything about our top colleges (especially Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford) and the culture that supports them; while offering little in the way of workable suggestions for improvement. "Is there anything I can do, a lot of young people have written to ask me, to avoid becoming an out-of-touch, entitled little shit. I don't have a satisfying answer, short of telling you to transfer to a public university."

1979. Exploration with examples of the idea that current psychological difficulties develop from repressed traumatic interactions with the mothering parent during infancy.

Very superior story-telling. Irresistible story.

Great journalism. Thoroughly annotated. It's long past time to end the war on drugs.

One of our greatest stories. Read aloud to my two older sons.

Classic meditation on life and death, men and women, pain and forgiveness, grief and acceptance.

Musings of a master.

Outstanding, profound, delicious.

Profoundly gripping tale from one of our best!

Funny, serious stories. Paley may be the William Faulkner of New York City.

Gripping if a bit gruesome.

The autotelic self sets goals, becomes immersed in the activity and pays attention to what is happening.

In rural Mexico, mothers pretend their girls are boys, then very ugly girls, attempting, all too often in vain, to avoid their being "stolen" to become slave-mistresses to the drug traffickers who still control too much of that county. Scary story, very well told.

Let's replace carrots and sticks with autonomy, mastery and purpose.

Superior piece of historical fiction for young readers. 2011 Newbery Award winner. Read to my two older sons.

Wonderful little piece of historical fiction told in first person plural. Their husbands were secretly creating the first atomic bomb.

Classic thought-provoking tale of our friend Strether on his mission in Paris.

Very impressive first novel, 2012 Pen/Bellwether Prize finalist, successfully blends elements of historical fiction, personal tragedy and dreamlike fantasy.

Best story about running! What it feels like to be a young, serious, top notch, competitive miler.

1. We live for holiness (purpose, righteousness, virtue), not happiness. 2. Know that we are flawed creatures. 3. We have the capacity to struggle with ourselves and overcome sin. 4. In this struggle, humility is the greatest virtue. 5. Pride is the central vice. 6. The struggle against sin and for virtue is the central drama of life. 7. Character is the set of desires and habits built during the struggle against your weaknesses. You become more disciplined and loving. 8. Character traits endure: courage, honesty, humility. We are able to love unconditionally and commit permanently. 9. We cannot do it alone. We need God, family, friends, rules, traditions. 10. We are ultimately saved by grace. You are accepted. Grateful. 11. Defeating weakness means quieting yourself. Requires self-effacement-reticence, modesty, obedience to a larger thing-and a capacity for reverence and admiration. 12. Wisdom starts with epistemological modesty. Experience is a better teacher than pure reason. 13. A good life must be organized around a vocation. Look outside yourself and recognize what life is asking of you. Focus on being excellent at work that you are called to do and that is intrinsically compelling. 14. A wise leader is a steward who tries to pass his organization along in a slightly improved condition. 15. Struggling successfully against weakness and sin leads to maturity. A settled unity of purpose.

Wonderful children's book based on the true story of a young Nicoleno Native American girl left alone on San Nicolas Island for 18 years. Newbery Award winner, 1961. Read aloud to my sons.

Superb piece of work! Like looking over the shoulder of John Quincy Adams and experiencing history unfold.

Classic story of the poor farmer family of Anse Bundren and the death and eventual burial of his wife, Addie. Anse and his children and some others alternately relate their unique, personal perspective on the unfortunate misadventures they suffer as they struggle for many days and nights to cart Addie's coffin in a mule-driven wagon to her chosen burial place.

Great, gripping spy thriller!

Excellent story within a story. Both compelling. Are you man enough to forgive?

Warm, moving story about 10-year-old Opal, deserted by her mother, learning to survive and make friends in a new town with her preacher father. Read to my two sons.

Irresistible page turner! Haruf surrounds us with unforgettable characters and tells their story with language elegantly simple but precisely accurate.

Enjoyable way to review lots of fascinating insights in psychology and sociology by applying them to the lives of a realistic fictional couple.

Beautiful, sad, moving story, very well told.

Excellent, funny, rewarding book read to my two oldest sons.

Thoroughly marvelous piece of work looks closely into and discusses openly the life and work of one of America's most prolific writers. A must-read for all serious John Updike fans.

Yes! Superior story telling. Unforgettable characters.

Heart warmer read to my sons.

Classic masterpiece. Best WW II novel. Very honest and compassionate.

A beautiful, sad, hopeful little story, so simply, directly, perfectly told.

National Book Critics Circle Award winner, 2005. Profoundly moving work based on interviews taken a few years after the event by the 2015 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.

National Book Award finalist, 2014. Superior page turner. Life before and after a deadly virus wipes out more that 99% of us.

Be what you want. All that you are. Be what feels good. See The Desire Map online.

Very good page-turner. Fictional re-telling of the Tawana Brawley story.

Cursed by a homeless madman, a Nigerian family suffers tragic losses. Gripping.

Yanagihara wants us to feel that his extraordinary characters really exist. Even the brilliant, but permanently traumatized, self-mutilating Jude St. Francis. He succeeds masterfully!

Former Marine who served in Iraq telling it like it is with this fine collection of hard-hitting stories!

Very fine piece of work, based on 8 years of in-depth study in China, from New Yorker writer Osnos.

Two priests help the NBI find a serial killer. Debut novel, winner of the Philippine National Book Award.

Wow! Quite a trip!

Very nice story of budding girl scientist in 1899 Texas. Read to my two oldest sons.

Jamaican drug gangs, their dons and associates at home and abroad in Miami and New York. Told like it is from several inside points of view. "If it no go so, it go near so."

Wonderful collection of unforgettable, poignant stories from the brilliant, inimitable Joyce Carol Oates! "It is the purity of desire, that requires another person to coax it into blooming."

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