As I looked back over our list of books for this year, I could hardly believe it. Our family shared over 35 books together as read-alouds this year! How on earth did we do that?!?
Well, I attribute it mostly to the Libby app (which is also available to you if you have a library card) and the fact that we now drive an hour to church. We’ve had a lot of listening time in the mini-van this year, which we have lovingly nicknamed the Black Carriage (a reference to the Wingfeather Saga).
We’ve read an assortment of genres and wanted to share a bit about our favorites. For the complete list of books we read this year, click here.
The Favorite Family Favorite
Our favorite family favorite for the year was The Wingfeather Saga. For some time now, this has been a favorite series of our second son (who is also the writer/creative genius in our home). I’m not sure why it took us so long to read it together. To tell you the truth, I was skeptical that it would fare well, since we had just finished up The Hobbit read/performed – incredibly and wonderfully – by Andy Serkis (who is the voice of Golem in the movies). But Wingfeather was most excellent, and we have had so many discussions about sacrifice, and about brotherhood, and about what it means to be a throne warden of your family (among other things). Just beautiful. And… we also re-read the entire Chronicles of Narnia series, which is always a favorite for us.
Books of Humor
The funniest books we read were Adventures with Waffles and A Season of Gifts. Both have delightful elderly characters and fantastic themes of friendship. Note: A Season of Gifts includes a bullying/hazing scene (which was not presented as funny), a scene involving drunkenness (but not presented in a good light), and a vague reference to a shotgun wedding.
Most Unique Storyline
Echo tells four completely different stories involving a harmonica, and it all comes together into a wonderfully woven masterpiece in the end. If you love classical music, this one is sure to be a hit with all its references to composers! Although we listened to this via Libby, I ended up purchasing the book for us to reference and look back through. It’s just a very unique story.
Top Three Missionary Stories during 2021
We’ve studied history, religion, cultures, and geography through inspiring true stories of missionaries, and I can’t tell you how much these stories have impacted our lives! Jacob DeShazer ties into World War II (the Doolittle Raiders), Sundar Singh ties into India and its religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism), and Nate Saint (a pilot who served alongside Jim Elliot) ties into a study of South America. These are not our top overall missionary stories from all time, but it’s the top three that we read this year. For a complete list of our favorite missionary biographies, click here.
Best Historical Fiction Series for Our 7-Year Old
Our whole family enjoys listening to the short (1-2 hour) I Survived… historical fiction series. It’s a great way to reinforce history – and remember it long-term.
Other Thoughts and Personal Reading
As for other thoughts regarding our reading for this year, all the books we read this year were great. Our 13-year-old loved Poppy so much that he asked for all the remaining books in that series and read them all within about 3 days. (This series fits the bill for a pretty specific genre: his favorite type of book is one that is told from the perspective of animals, but he doesn’t like it when the animals die.) Also, I originally struggled to get into the book A Place to Hang the Moon, but by the end, I absolutely loved it. Precious, precious, precious!
In addition to all the preview-reading we do for our Mission: Great Commission curriculum program, I’m starting to compile a list of my favorite books for personal reading. There aren’t as many here because I spend a lot of time reading and re-reading and studying and writing quotes and thoughts. And I’m only including my favorites on this list. Click here for my ongoing list of favorite reads – some on education, some on parenting, some on faith.
Do you have questions about reading aloud to your family? Questions about any of these books? Or do you have any recommendations for what should be in our queue for 2022? If so, we’d love for you to hop down and leave us a comment!