The Best Books I’ve Read So Far This Year

Photo by Florencia Viadana on Unsplash

It’s the end of March, which means one quarter of the year is gone already. They weren’t kidding when they said time seems to move faster as you get older. I never feel like I have enough time in my day to do everything I need and want to do.  

I do, however, make time for reading every day. I’ve read 15 books so far this year, although many of them were actually finishing a Buddhist course I started in 2022, so it’s a bit off.  Although they were amazing, I’m not including any of them here since they aren’t going to be especially interesting to a lay reader.

These are the ones that make the list as the best so far in nonfiction and fiction: 

Nonfiction 

The 5 Second Rule – Mel Robbins. Mel is my new jam. I came across the 5-second concept a while ago, but only now have gotten around to reading the book. The premise is simple: that when our mind thinks of doing something, we have 5 seconds before that thought gets hijacked by an emotion. Not a problem, except when that emotion is fear, or simply “not feeling like” doing the thing, leading to a barrage of very rational-sounding excuses that prevent us from moving forward. Mel’s rule is, as soon as you think the thought, to count backwards 5-4-3-2-1-GO. This helps activate your neo-frontal cortex – the part of the brain responsible for “higher” decision making, and liberate it from the amygdala, the part of the brain that wants to protect you from anything painful or uncomfortable. You can 5-4-3-2-1-GO in any aspect of your life, from getting out of bed in the morning, to doing your creative work, to speaking up in a meeting, or talking to someone you really want to meet. Not giving ourself time to think is a huge blessing. No motivation required – you just have to act.  

Ways of Being: Animals, Plants, Machines, and the Search for a Planetary Intelligence – James Bridle. I feel like I would need several re-reads to truly understand everything Bridle is saying in this book. At root, he argues that human intelligence is not the only form of intelligence out there, and that we are, in fact, intertwined with every other form of being on the planet, whether we acknowledge or understand it, or not. He gives fascinating examples of animal and even plant forms of intelligence, and discusses the emergence of “artificial intelligence” and its possible repercussions. This is a teeny-tiny sliver of the iceberg that is this book, but I encourage you to read it if you want to really begin to see and understand the world around you with more compassion. 

The Snow Leopard – Peter Matthiessen. An oldie, but one I had never gotten around to reading. It’s a memoir of Matthiessen’s journey through Nepal with a biologist studying the blue sheep of the Himalayas. They also, of course, hoped to glimpse the elusive snow leopard of the title. It’s a spiritual journey as much as a physical one, as Matthiessen himself was a practicing Zen Buddhist. It gorgeously evokes the beauty, splendor, and bleakness of the mountains and the people they encounter, as well as his own deepening understanding of the roles of suffering, grief, and impermenance in our lives.   

Fiction 

Shrines of Gaiety – Kate Atkinson. It seems I’ve read mostly historical fiction this quarter – not on purpose, but that’s what I’ve been drawn to. This, like the next book on the list, is fiction drawn from historical accounts of real people. It tells the story of Nellie Coker, a ruthless queen of post-WWI London nightlife, and her six children. It vividly brings to life that glittering period between the wars, and the differences in life between the well-to-do and the poverty-stricken. You end up rooting for Nellie as she tries to defend her mini-empire and rule her children, and also for the other characters who are just trying to get by and find success however they can claw it to themselves. It’s been called “Dickensian” with good reason – but it’s more fun than the Dickens you remember from high school. 

Horse – Geraldine Brooks. This is a book of both historical and contemporary fiction, surrounding the life of Lexington, arguably the greatest racehorse who ever lived. It tells Lexington’s story through the eyes of the young Black trainer who trained and cared for him in the antebellum and Civil War South; the painter who painted several portraits of him; and a number of other people who discovered those portraits over the years, tracing their provenance into the present day. It’s a sweeping story, but so deeply characterized that each section feels like a mini-portrait itself. It also traces a through-line of the Black experience, from the enslaved trainers who were responsible for many of racing’s most successful horses, to the present day often fraught interactions between Black and White communities. Just so, so good, as a history lesson, and a light on our contemporary society and ways it has and hasn’t changed since the 19th century.  

The Spring of the Ram/Race of Scorpions – Dorothy Dunnett. Okay, I snuck two in there, the 2nd and 3rd books of the House of Niccolò series. I’m enjoying this series far more the second time around (haven’t read it in over 20 years). These books are set in 15th-century Trebizond and Cyprus, respectively, and paint a luminously detailed portrait of these lesser-known realms. Lots of Byzantine (in every sense of the word) plot twists and shenanigans, as Nicholas de Fleury moves from being a lowly apprentice dyer to high positions of intrigue at royal courts, excelling in trade and military matters. It’s really impossible to summarize these books, but if you like densely-plotted and uniquely characterized historical fiction set it lesser-known times and places, this is the series to pick up.   

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