Tsundoku is a word for “stacks of books you’ve bought but haven’t read.”
It’s slowly making its way into the English language. (Not yet a household word, but probably should be. It has its own Wikipedia entry, which may eventually help.)
This particular tsundoku ate the New Year’s resolution that gave rise to the “Read Me” Project List in the first place. The list now includes the original titles from January 2018, plus the new additions, less the removals.
The removals have outgrown their original index and have overflowed into separate lists (for 2021, 2022, 2023, … we’ll see how long that lasts; they do seem to help with keeping track).
I’ve been working on this for a few years now. “Read Me” Project Updates are here (2019), here (2020), here (2021), here (2022), and here (2023).
The “Read Me” Project Reading List
Akyol, Mustafa. The Islamic Jesus: How the King of the Jews Became a Prophet of the Muslims. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2017.
Arnstine, Donald. Philosophy of Education: Learning and Schooling. New York: Harper and Row, 1967. added 09.2018
Baggini, Julian and Jeremy Stangroom. Do You Think What You Think You Think? New York: Plume, 2006. added 12.26.2018
Baker, Mark C. and Goetz, Stewart. The Soul Hypotheses: Investigations Into the Existence of the Soul. New York: Continuum, 2011.
Baldwin, James. Giovanni’s Room. New York: Vintage Books, 1956.
Barna, George. Revolution. Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House, 2005. added 09.2018
Barnstone, Willis, ed. The Other Bible (Jewish Pseudepigrapha, Christian Apocrypha, Gnostic Scriptures, Kabbalah, Dead Sea Scrolls). HarperOne, 2005. added 09.13.20 – we actually went to a bookstore in person; technically, this is a birthday present. And a reference book.
Barrett, Leonard E., Sr. The Rastafarians. Boston: Beacon Press, 1997.
Barry, William A. and Connolly, William J. The Practice of Spiritual Direction. HarperSanFrancisco, 1996 (??) added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Baumgardner, Jennifer and Richards, Amy. Manifesta: Young women, Feminism, and the Future. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002.
Beck, Richard. Hunting Magic Eels: Recovering an Enchanted Faith in a Skeptical Age. Broadleaf Books, 2021. added 09.05.2022
Bejarano-Gutierrez, Juan Marcos. Against the Greeks: Understanding the Classical Jewish Worldview. Kindle. 2017.
Belfoure, Charles. The Paris Architect. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks Landmark, 2013.
Bellis, Alice Ogden. Proverbs. Wisdom Commentary, Barbara E. Reid, OP, General Editor. Sarah Tanzer Volume Editor. Liturgical Press, 2018. added 06.17.2020 – happy birthday from my teacher!
Berke, Joseph H. The Tyranny of Malice: Exploring the Dark Side of Character and Culture. New York: Summit Books, 1988.
Bill, J. Brent and Booram, Beth A. Awaken Your Senses: Exercises for Exploring the Wonder of God. IVP Books, 2011. added 03.21.21.
Birkel, Michael. Qur’an in Conversation. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press., 2014.
Bolz-Weber, Nadia. Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People. New York: Convergent, 2015.
Brown, Jonathan A.C. Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenge and Choices of Interpreting the Prophet’s Legacy. London: Oneworld, 2014.
Burke, James Lee. A Private Cathedral. Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2020. added 06.19.21
Butler, Pamela E. Talking To Yourself: Learning the Language of Self-Support. Harper & Row, 1981. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Callahan, Kennon L. Visiting in an Age of Mission: A Handbook for Person-to-Person Ministry. HarperSanFrancisco, 1994. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Campbell, H.M. John Dewey. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1971. added 09.2018
Campbell, Joseph. with Moyers, Bill. Betty Sue Flowers, ed. The Power of Myth. New York: MJF Books, 1988. added 08.31.2019, and don’t judge …
Catapano, Peter and Critchley, Simon. The Stone Reader: Modern Philosophy in 133 Arguments. New York: Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2016.
Cohn-Sherbok, Dan. The Vision of Judaism. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon House, 2004.
Conti, Joseph. Holistic Christianity: The Vision of Catholic Mysticism. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon Press, 2005.
Cooke, Tim, ed. National Geographic Concise History of World Religions: An Illustrated Time Line. National Geographic Partners/Brown Reference Group, 2011. added 12.22.19 Christmas.
Cooper, Derek. Twenty Questions that shaped World Christian History. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2015. added 06.14.2019
His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2005.
Dean, Jodi. The Communist Horizon. Verso, 2018. added 08.16.2019 – because bookstores (in this case West Bank Books, St. Louis) are tourist attractions for us
de Bellaigue, Christopher. The Islamic Enlightenment: The Struggle between Faith and Reason, 1798 to Modern Times. New York: Liveright, 2017. added n.2018 – Barnes & Noble’s topical displays seem to work.
Deming, Will. Rethinking Religion: A Concise Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2005. added 06.14.2019
DeMoss, Nancy Leigh. Lies Women Believe and the Truth that Sets Them Free. Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2001. 09.2018
Dennett, Daniel C. Consciousness Explained. Back Bay Books, 1991. added 09.13.20 – actually visited a bookstore in person; noticed a gap in my education that needed filling.
Dewey, John. Human Nature and Conduct: An Introduction to Social Psychology. New York: Modern Library, 1930
Dick, Philip K. Time Out of Joint. Gollancz (Orion Publishing Group), 2003 (1959). added 01.08.2022
Doctorow, Cory. Walkaway. New York: Tom Doherty Associates, 2017.
Donin, Rabbi Hayim Halevy. To Pray as a Jew: A Guide to the Prayer Book and the Synagogue Service. Basic Books: 2018. added 09.05.2022
Ecker, Gisela, ed. Feminist Aesthetics. Boston: Beacon Press, 1985.
Edmonds, David. Would You Kill the Fat Man? Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014. added 12.26.2018
Fabry, Chris. Spiritually Correct Favorites. Inspirational Press, 1999. 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Farley, Wendy. The Wounding and Healing of Desire: Weaving Heaven and Earth. Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Pope Francis. The Name of God is Mercy. New York: Random House, 2016.
Freeman, Emily P. The Next Right Thing: A Simple, Soulful Practice for Making Life Decisions. Revell (Baker Publishing Group), 2019. added 09.13.20 – we actually visited a bookstore in person; a book in the self-help/spirituality section that seemed intriguingly non-nauseating.
Fretheim, Terence E. Deuteronomic History. Interpreting Biblical Texts. Abingdon Press, 1983. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Friedman, Thomas L. The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century. Further updated and expanded. Picador/Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2007. added 03.20.2022
Friedrich, Otto. The End of the World: A History. Fromm International Publishing Corporation, 1982. added 03.20.2022
Gonzalez, Justo L. A History of Christian Thought, Volume II: From Augustine to the Eve of the Reformation. Nashville: Abingdon, 1970.
__________. A History of Christian Thought, Volume III: From the Protestant Reformation to the Twentieth Century. Nashville: Abingdon, 1970. added 02.03.2018 – free to a good home.
Gordon, Joseph K. Divine Scripture in Human Understanding: A Systematic Theology of the Christian Bible. Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 2019. added 07.2020 – Happy Belated Birthday bookstore gift cards to me!
Goss, Robert E. and West, Mona, editors. Take Back The Word: a queer reading of the Bible. Pilgrim Press, 2000. added 06.03.2022.
Gottwald, Norman K. The Tribes of Yahweh: A Sociology of the Religion of Liberated Israel, 1250-1050 BCE. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1979. added 02.03.2018 – free to a good home.
Gould, Sam. Being Christian in the Twenty-First Century. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2017. added 01.17.2019
Grenz, Stanley J. and Franke, John R. Beyond Foundationalism: Shaping Theology in a Postmodern Context. Westminster John Knox Press, 2001. added 12.27.2022 – Merry Christmas!
Hall, Douglas John. What Christianity is Not: An Exercise in ‘Negative’ Theology. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2013. added 06.14.2019
Hart, Josephine. Catching Life By the Throat: How to Read Poetry and Why. Great Britain: Virago, 2011.
Harvard Business Review. On Making Smart Decisions. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2013.
Harvey, David. The Enigma of Capital and the Crises of Capitalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
Heinrichs, Jay. Thank You for Arguing: What Aristotle, Lincoln, and Homer Simpson Can Teach us About the Art of Persuasion. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007.
Helm, Thomas E. The Christian Religion: An Introduction. Prentice-Hall, 1991. added 08.2018
Henry, Patrick. The Ironic Christian’s Companion: Finding the Marks of God’s Grace in the World. Riverhead Books, 1999. 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Herrnstein, Richard J. and Murray, Charles. The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life. New York: Free Press, 1996.
Highfield, Ron. Great is the Lord: Theology for the Praise of God. William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008. added 10.07.2021 after seeing it on ifaqtheology
Hirsch, Edward. How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry. San Diego: Harvest Books/Harcourt, 1999.
Howard, V.A. and Barton, J.H. Thinking Together: Making Meetings Work. Quill/William Morrow, 1992. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Husain, Ed. The House of Islam: A Global History. New York: Bloomsbury, 2018. added n.2018 – Barnes & Noble’s topical displays seem to work
Imber-Black, Evan. The Secret Life of Families: Truth-Telling, Privacy, and Reconciliation in a Tell-All Society. Bantam Books, 1998. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
James, William. The Meaning of Truth. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1997.
Janin, Hunt. Four Paths to Jerusalem: Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Secular Pilgrimages, 1000 BCE to 2001 CE. Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Co., 2002. added 12.25.2018
Jansen, John Frederick. Exercises in Interpreting Scripture. Philadelphia: The Geneva Press, 1968. added 02.03.2018 – free to a good home
Jones, Stephen. Daoist Priests of the Li Family: Ritual Life in Village China. Three Pines Press, 2017. added Christmas 2020
Kilby, Karen. God, Evil, and the Limits of Theology. Bloomsbury, September 2020 wish list
Kitagawa, Joseph M. The Religious Traditions of Asia: Religion, History and Culture. London: Routledge, 2002.
Kwok, Jean. Mambo in Chinatown. New York: Riverhead Books, 2014.
Lemann, Nicholas. The Big Test: The Secret History of the American Meritocracy. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000.
Leonard, Annie. The Story of Stuff. New York: Free Press, 2010.
Levy, Naomi. Einstein and the Rabbi: Searching for the Soul. New York: Flatiron Books, 2017. added 09.2018
Lipton, Bruce H. The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter & Miracles. Carlsbad, CA: Hay House, 2008.
Maimonides. The Guide for the Perplexed. Translated by M. Friedlander, with an introduction by David Taffel. New York: Barnes and Noble, 2004 (1190). added 09.2018
Mayer, Catherine. Attack of the 50 Ft. Women: How Gender Equality Can Save the World! London: HarperCollins, 2017. added 11.2018
McGowan, John. Postmodernism and Its Critics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991.
McIntosh, Gary L. One Size Doesn’t Fit All. Grand Rapids: Fleming H. Revell (Baker Books), 1992. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
McKay, Matthew, Davis, Martha, and Fanning, Patrick. How to Communicate: The Ultimate Guide to Improving Your Personal and Professional Relationships. Third Edition. MJF Books, 2007. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Meek, Esther Lightcap. A Little Manual on Knowing. Cascade Books, 2014. added 03.08.2022
Milgram, Stanley. Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View. HarperPerennial (Harper & Row), 1974. added 08.16.2019 – because bookstores (in this case West Bank Books, St. Louis) are tourist attractions for us
Moore, Thomas. Care of the Soul. HarperPerennial, 1994. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Murata, Sachiko and Chittick, William C. The Vision of Islam. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon House, 1994.
Naipaul, V.S. The Masque of Africa: Glimpses of African Belief. New York: Random House, 2010. added 09.2018
Orlean, Susan. The Library Book. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2018. added 02.04.2018 – when the family member for whom I bought it for Christmas finished reading it and passed it on
Park, Andrew Sung. The Wounded Heart of God: The Asian Concept of Han and the Christian Doctrine of Sin. Abingdon Press, 1993. added 12.27.2022 – Merry Christmas!
Patterson, Kerry; Grenny, Joseph; McMillan, Ron; and Switzler, Al. Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. Second edition. New York: McGraw Hill, 2012. added 02.03.2020, an adjunct to the Golden Rule 2020 congregational book study
Pauketat, Timothy R. Cahokia: Ancient America’s Great City on the Mississippi. Penguin Library of American Indiana History. Penguin, 2009. added 08.13.2019, the day we visited the Cahokia Mounds on our way to our vacation in St. Louis, which was also the day we hauled ourselves up the 160 steps to the top of Monks’ Mound despite our age and mobility issues, after we’d walked all through the museum in the visitors’ center and wondered what evidence leads the archeologists to say this or that artifact “would” or “must” have been used for this or that purpose, and then found this book in the gift shop, which will perhaps answer that question.
Pechilis, Karen and Raj, Selva J. South Asian Religions: Tradition and Today. London: Routledge, 2013.
Quine, Willard Van Orman. Elementary Logic. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980.
Radin, Paul. Primitive Man as Philosopher. New York: New York Review Books, 2017. (1927, 1955, 1957)
Rainey, Lawrence, ed. Modernism: An Anthology. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2005.
Renard, John. Islam and Christianity: Theological Themes in Comparative Perspective. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011.
Ricoeur, Paul. The Symbolism of Evil. Boston: Beacon Press, 1967.
Rosenzweig, Franz. The Star of Redemption. Translated from the Second Edition of 1930 by William W. Hallo. University of Notre Dame Press, 1985. added 05.16.2020 – happy birthday from my sister-in-law
Rothstein, Richard. The Color of Law. Liveright Publishing, 2017. 03.27.2022
Sandel, Michael J. Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do? New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009.
Segovia, Fernando F. and Tolbert, Mary Ann. Teaching the Bible: The Discourses and Politics of Biblical Pedagogy. Fortress Press, 2009 (1998). added 12.27.2022 – Merry Christmas!
Schaller, Lyle E. 44 Ways to Increase Church Attendance. Abingdon Press, 1988. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Sibley, David Allen. What It’s Like to be a Bird. Alfred A. Knopf, 2020. added Christmas 2020
Sontag, Susan. Regarding the Pain of Others. Picador (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), 2003. added 08.16.2019 – because bookstores (in this case West Bank Books, St. Louis) are tourist attractions for us
Spiro, Melford E. Culture and Human Nature New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1994.
St. Clair, Kassia. The Secret Lives of Color. New York: Penguin, 2016.
Stenger, Victor J. God and the Folly of Faith. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2012.
Stevenson-Moessner, Jeanne. The Spirit of Adoption: At Home in God’s Family. Westminster John Knox Press, 2003. added 12.27.2022 – Merry Christmas! (coming recommended by Pastor Cindy)
Stone, Howard W. Brief Pastoral Counseling: Short-term Approaches and Strategies. Fortress Press, 1994.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ. Zondervan, 1998. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Faith. Zondervan, 2000. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Sutherland, John. How Literature Works: 50 Key Concepts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Talisse, Robert B. Sustaining Democracy: What We Owe to the Other Side. Oxford University Press, 2021. added 12.27.2022 – Merry Christmas!
Tammet, Daniel. Every Word is a Bird We Teach to Sing: Encounters with the Mysteries and Meanings of Language. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2017.
Tara, Sylvia. The Secret Life of Fat: The Science Behind the Body’s Least Understood Organ and What It Means For You. W.W. Norton & Company, 2017. added 12.26.19
Taulbert, Clifton. Eight Habits of the Heart. Penguin Books, 1997. added 03.13.2020 – cleaned out the storage locker
Taylor, Jodi. Just One Damned Thing After Another: The Chronicles of St. Mary’s. New York: Nightshade Books, 2013.
The Carbon Almanac Network. The Carbon Almanac: It’s Not Too Late. Foreword by Seth Godin. Portfolio/Penguin, 2022. added 07.20.2022
Tuchman, Barbara W. The Guns of August. New York: Ballantine Books, 1962.
Tweed, Thomas A. Crossing and Dwelling: A Theory of Religion. Harvard University Press, 2008. added 10.14.2021
Wade, Nicholas. The Faith Instinct: How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures. New York: Penguin, 2009.
Walton, Douglas. The New Dialectic: Conversational Contexts of Argument. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998.
Ward, Keith. God: A Guide for the Perplexed. OneWorld, 2002. added 09.01.2020. Recommended by another book.
Image: “Book Tower,” by Deror_avi [CC BY-SA 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons
Matters of Interpretation 