Last year I did not do anything for Lent. Not a thing. Maybe because the year before I sent out thank you notes to some friends for Lent. I ended up scaring a few dear friends who thought I was sending out final farewells before I did something awful. My apologies dear friends. I did not mean to freak you out and I have learned my lesson.
So what to do this year? I was not going to give up anything. Caffeine, sugar and phenylalanine are the few things standing between me and sanity right now. And I had sausage for breakfast on Ash Wednesday so that whole no meat thing is shot to, um, heck.
As I was struggling to come up with something I remembered that a while ago I decided to read all the books in my home. I did a pretty good job but really just scratched the surface. So, for Lent this year I have decided to read 40 books. Thanks to Sundays I will have more than 40 days to complete them but not many more. I will include audio, but any audio will be unabridged. But it is going to be tough. I hope I can make 40, and will do my best. It allows me to cut my television watching without giving up television. Okay, so I am not exactly pious. Then again, I never claimed to be.
And so I don’t cheat and “accidentally mark” one of the following books down as read during Lent, I have decided to post the books that I know I have read in the last several months that are not included in one of my two monthly roundups. There may be more but if I did not photograph them for my well intended yet misguided monthly roundups or have them listed as purchases on my Amazon audible and Kindle accounts I have lost them to my incredibly bad memory.
I will include the audio book I am listening to and the book I am currently reading for my Lent list this year. But not included are the following books.
Codicil 1: If you are interested in a particular title and want my take, just message me in the comments and I will be happy to share my opinion.
Codicil 2: And no, I won’t apologize for any of the following but I will concede that my taste in non-fiction is eclectic.
Print
The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life, by James Martin
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, Rachel Joyce
The Father of Forensics: The Groundbreaking Cases of Sir Bernard Spilsbury, and the Beginnings of Modern CSI, by Colin Evans
Thunderstruck, by Erik Larson
Satchel, by Larry Tye
The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York, by Deborah Blum
Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History, by Antonio Mendez and Matt Baglio
Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape, Jenna Miscavige Hill with Lisa Pulitzer
You Are What You Wear: What Your Clothes Reveal About You, by Dr. Jennifer Baumgartner
The Orphan Master’s Son, by Adam Johnson
Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
Kindle
Outliers: The Story of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell
The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, by Malcolm Gladwell
Drinking & Tweeting: And Other Brandi Blunders, by Brandi Glanville
Animals Make Us Human, by Temple Grandin
The Total Money Makeover, by Dave Ramsey
Old Before My Time: Hayley Okines’ Life With Progeria, by Haley and Kerry Okines
Half-Assed: A Weight Loss Memoir, by Jennette Fulda
Simply Divine: A Guide to Easy, Elegant and Affordable Entertaining, by Lisa Vanderpump
Diabetes: The Silent Killer: How I Survived, by EK Ray
The Happy Minimalist, by Peter Lawrence
Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls, by David Sedaris
Audio
Whitey: The Life of America’s Most Notorious Mob Boss, by Dick Lehr and Gerard O’Neill
Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europs, 1944-1956, by Anne Applebaum
The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget’s Thesaurus, by Joshua Kendall
On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes, by Alexandra Horowitz
The Man Who Saved the Union: Ulysses Grant in War and Peace, by H.W. Brands
Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power, by Jon Meacham
Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief, by Richard Wright
The Forgotten Man, by Amity Shlaes
Walking, by Henry David Thoreau
The Art of War, by Sun Tzu
The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are, by Brene Brown
Living A la Mode 
I can’t help noticing that there are no books by Ursula K. Le Guin on your list. That’s just wrong.
Shocking, I know. Perhaps after Lent. The books I am going to read are the ones currently around my house and in my kindle and audible accounts
Seriously ambitious! I’m writing a few if these down. Also – please let me know how the Brandi and Vanderpump ones are 😉 Love!!!
These are ones I have already read. The Brandi one was really good, I was pleasantly surprised. The Vanderpump one was meh. It was an entertaining/lifestyle book that really offered nothing new. First book I am finishing for Lent is Bat by Jo Nesbo. I put it aside and never went back. Which is shocking for a Nesbo. I am listening to Born to Run, and that one is wonderful.
One book that I read that I came across while looking for my next one is Daily Rituals: How Artists Work, by Mason Currey. The only reason I still have it is that I enjoyed it so much I want to read it again before it heads to the Salvation Army.
i don’t know why i can’t ever seem to post on that thing! did you like the gladwell books? i love him. feel free to drop off any of the physical ones at Dad’s house! 😉
Date: Fri, 7 Mar 2014 01:23:10 +0000 To: anastasia_doyle@hotmail.com
I love that your avatar is euthie! Most of those have already been given away but the Gladwell ones are on my Kindle so we can figure out how Meg and I can share so you can read them.