Year of Books

As 2017 is a big year for the reformed tradition, I wondered what I could do to mark it and came up with the thought of inviting any who wish to join me in a virtual book club that would span 2017.

Some of you will be in real time book clubs and reading groups and I don’t want to get in the way of that.  But I was inspired by the fact that in 2015 Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, wanted to stress the value of books alongside social media and so set up a virtual 'reading group'. The challenge was to read a book every two weeks, and a new title was announced approximately fortnightly. In the end the list included 23 books. I decided to join in with this and found myself reading some fascinating books that I would otherwise never have discovered. The vast majority were non-fiction. Inevitably I was more interested in some than in others. At least one I abandoned, others are still pending, but I read at least three quarters of the suggested books. 

So I thought I would share some of the books I will be reading over the next twelve months or so, in the same way that Mark Zuckerberg did, and perhaps challenge myself to read a few that I might not have without this methodology. None will be too long or too expensive - and, if you are looking for academic reading, this is probably the wrong place for suggestions.  If you want to join in, you will find me blogging about this at http://easternsynodyob.blogspot.com/

Feel free to add comments.  I am starting early, so this month, and will run through to January 2018, so will suggest 16 in all.  At the moment, I only know the first for sure, though I do know the likely second and third.  The first is Rowan Williams’ recent book “Being Disciples”.  I have only read the first chapter so far – but it is shaping up to be a great read about discipleship – and whether you read one of the books, all 16, or none, let us encourage in the discipleship to which Jesus calls us as he says to us, as to the twelve of old, and others, follow me!