Best Books of 2022

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Of the 27 books I read in 2022, these are my top selections:

Best New Book (published in 2022):

What Is a Woman? (Matt Walsh) - Walsh meticulously examines the circular reasoning and irrationality dominating today’s discussion of gender. He also exposes the tragic damage done to those sold a bill of goods by the surgeons profiting by mutilating sexual organs. (See also a previous best book, Abigail Shrier’s Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters.) The companion documentary is also well worth watching.

 

Best Older Books (published 2021 or earlier):

12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos (Jordan Peterson) - Peterson draws from a deep well of philosophical and religious traditions, woven with personal and clinical anecdotes, in recommending an ordered way of living. Christians will not agree with all of his reasons, but there is much wisdom here.

The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor’s Journey into the Christian Faith (Rosaria Champagne Butterfield) - Butterfield, once a practicing lesbian and leftist university professor, tells the story of her remarkable conversion to Christianity. A patient, loving pastor wrote to her some respectful questions, and continued to show her respect and hospitality. This delightful, entirely human telling of her story has much to teach the church about “the other side” and the importance of caring for the person and confessing the truth without compromise or animosity.

 

Worst Book read in 2022:

How to Be an Antiracist (Ibram X. Kendi) - It’s difficult to read this book without sadness. Kendi attended briefly a Lutheran school, and had parents who loved him and sought to give him an upbringing that many children today are denied. An undercurrent of Kendi’s development of “antiracism” appears to be a rejection of his own father’s values and beliefs. Authentic Christianity is presented as doing the work of liberation, a clear repudiation of the Christian gospel. The ideals many of us were taught in the 1970’s and ‘80’s—including MLK’s dream that we would look at the content of a person’s character, not the color of their skin—are now itself deemed racist. As in American politics in general, the sharp lines being drawn by Kendi increases the polarization of America. By making enemies out of possible friends, Kendi sets back the racial healing America had been progressively enjoying since the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. Racism was and is a serious problem. Kendi’s sharp turn away from racial harmony makes this is a tragic book.

 

Dishonorable Mention:

Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America (John McWhorter) - McWhorter’s book had the potential to be an excellent antidote to Kendi’s. McWhorter exposes the irrationality of the CRT movement, while showing the impossible position of “whites” attempting to satisfy the contradictory demands of CRT activists. Yet McWhorter fundamentally misunderstands the nature of religion and especially Christianity, making the premise of his book flawed from the beginning.

 

Best Reread:

Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (Neil Postman) - Postman’s indispensable analysis of American culture turned thirty-five last year. Most books of this type would be hopelessly dated by this point, but Postman’s classic now reads more like the prophet Isaiah: once the prophecy has come to pass, the prophet appears more essential than ever. Postman looks at the transition from a culture based on the printed word to a television culture. Everything he says about the deleterious effects of television on society is even more applicable to the malignant narcissism of social media.

 


Other Books Read in 2022:

  • Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy (Andy Ngo)

  • The Borgias: The Hidden History (G.J. Meyer)

  • A Darkness More Than Night (Michael Connelly)

  • The 6:20 Man (David Baldacci)

  • Angels Flight (Michael Connelly)

  • The Terminal List (Jack Carr)

  • Trunk Music (Michael Connelly)

  • Step on a Crack (James Patterson)

  • The Last Coyote (Michael Connelly)

  • Thank You, Jeeves (P.G. Wodehouse)

  • Effortless: Make It Easier to Do What Matters Most (Greg McKeown)

  • The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase (Mark Forsyth)

  • The Concrete Blonde (Michael Connelly)

  • Laptop from Hell: Hunter Biden, Big Tech, and the Dirty Secrets the President Tried to Hide (Miranda Devine)

  • The Intrusion of Jimmy (P.G. Wodehouse)

  • Gay Girl, Good God: The Story of Who I Was, and Who God Has Always Been (Jackie Hill Perry)

  • Worship in the Name of Jesus (Peter Brunner)

  • The Dead Drink First (Dale Maharidge)

  • Digital Minimalism (Cal Newport)

  • The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership (Steven B. Sample)

  • After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory (Alasdair MacIntyre)

My current reading list is here.