Authors and Books

It is no secret that I love to read, and I am always on the lookout for new authors and new titles.  Of course, my “to read list” grows at a rate faster than I can actually read, but nothing beats the recommendation from a friend about a book, “you must read!”  I particularly enjoy discussing a book with a fellow reader.   Meaningful and rich conversations occur when we discuss the characters and their motives and choices, the themes covered in the story, and figuring out why the author wrote the novel in a particular way. 

So this blog entry is devoted to sharing some of my favorite authors and books with the hope you will find a new one to add to your list or that it will inspire you to read if it has been awhile.   I’ll admit this is a hard list for me because I hate “top ten” lists—they’re so limiting!  Some of these books I will write about more in depth in future entries, but for now a list will suffice.

  Authors and Books (in no particular order):   Anne Lamott (all of her non-fiction; not so crazy about her fiction), Barbara Kingsolver, The Shipping News by Annie Proulix, Susan Howatch’s series on the Church of England, Bel Canto by  Ann Patchett, any food/travel  memoir that takes my taste buds and mind to a new place, Wallace Stegner, particularly Crossing to Safety, The Help by Kathryn Stockett,  A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg, The Barefoot Contessa cookbooks, Cold Tangerines and Bittersweet by Shauna Niequist, Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt (and others in the series),  A Time to Read  by Mary Ruth Wilkinson and Heidi Wilkinson Teel, and finally Hidden Art by Edith Schaeffer who started me on the path of recognizing the sacred in the ordinary.