I enjoyed compiling my list of books read this year and remembering some I had forgotten.

This has definitely been the year of the audiobook for me. I mentioned in my thoughts on audiobooks that generally I still prefer paper books, but audiobooks have greatly enriched my life this year. I generally listen to them while driving or getting dressed and ready for the day, sometimes while cooking, but there have been a few that I have carried around with me because I couldn’t wait to see what happened next.

I’ve also read more ebooks this year than before. I enjoy getting free or very inexpensive ones but sometimes have to remind myself that they’re there in my Touchpad or iPhone.

Before I get to my top ten, here are the tops in some categories:

Most humorous: The Big 5-Oh! by Sandra Bricker, reviewed briefly here.

Most balanced and helpful: The Discipline of Grace by Jerry Bridges.

Best suspense: Full Disclosure by Dee Henderson, reviewed here.

Most philosophical: C. S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy: reviewed here.

Coziest: Tie between At Home in Mitford by Jan Karon, reviewed here, and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, reviewed here.

Best narrated audiobook: Tie between Roots, narrated by Avery Brooks, reviewed here, various narrators for The Help, reviewed here, and The Hobbit narrated by Rob Inglis, here.

Would’ve made top ten if not for some concerns: The Help by Kathryn Stockett, reviewed here (language issues), and When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin, reviewed here (character issue).

It has been hard to come up with a top ten, but here are the standout reads for me this year, in no particular order. Some are new, some are older classics I’ve reread; some fiction, some nonfiction:

Infinitely More by Alex Krutov, true story about an abandoned orphan in Russia whom God brought to Himself, reviewed here.

Not By Chance: Learning to Trust a Sovereign God by Layton Talbert, reviewed here.

Full Disclosure by Dee Henderson, reviewed here. Suspense novel about a cold case in which new evidence suddenly comes to light.

Wildflowers of Terezin by Robert Elmer, reviewed here. WWII story set in Denmark, based on true events. A Lutheran pastor thinks the best way to survive the Nazi invasion is to lay low, until he is confronted by the reality of human suffering and must get involved.

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand, reviewed here.

Wives and Daughters  by Elizabeth Gaskell, reviewed here.

Anne’s House of Dreams by L. M. Montgomery, reviewed here. Next to the very first book in the series, this is my favorite Anne book, covering her first few years of marriage.

At Home in Mitford by Jan Karon, reviewed here. First of the beloved Father Tim books.

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, reviewed here.

Roots by Alex Haley, reviewed here.

What are your top ten books read in 2012?

(This list will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books, where she’s allowing us to post what we’ve read this year, and Booking Through Thursday .)

If I don’t count audiobooks, I read 60 books this year: if I add them, the total comes to 78.  The 60 total is a little less than last year (due probably to playing games on my iPhone during times I would normally have been reading. :oops:), but I am pleased with the overall totals and the variety.

Here is what I have read this year:

Nonfiction:

Daily Light on the Daily Path, a devotional book of Scripture verses compiled by Samuel Bagster.

The Discipline of Grace by Jerry Bridges: did not do an overall review but weekly chapter discussions are here.

Everyday Battles: Knowing God Through Our Daily Conflicts by Bob Schultz, reviewed here.

Feminine Appeal by Carlyn Mahaney, reviewed here.

Grace for the Good Girl: Letting Go of the Try-Hard Life by Emily P. Freeman, reviewed here.

His Ways, Your Walk, an as-yet unpublished book by my friend. Lou Ann Keiser. Coming soon!

I Remember Laura [Ingalls Wilder] by Stephen W. Hines, reviewed here.

Infinitely More by Alex Krutov, true story about an abandoned orphan in Russia whom God brought to Himself, reviewed here.

It Is Not Death to Die: A New Biography of Hudson Taylor by Jim Cromarty, reviewed here.

Laura’s Album: A Remembrance Scrapbook of Laura Ingalls Wilder by William Anderson, not reviewed.

Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room by Nancy Guthrie.

Little House in the Ozarks: the Rediscovered Writings of Laura Ingalls Wilder, compiled and edited by Stephen Hines, reviewed here.

Mentalpause…and Other Midlife Laughs by Laura Jensen Walker. Not reviewed.

Not By Chance: Learning to Trust a Sovereign God by Layton Talbert, reviewed here.

Practical Happiness: A Young Man’s Guide to a Contented Life by Bob Schultz, reviewed briefly here.

Raising Real Men: Surviving, Teaching, and Appreciating Boys by Hal and Melanie Young, reviewed here.

Saving Graces: the Inspirational Writings of Laura Ingalls Wilder edited by Stephen Hines, reviewed here.

Thriving at College: Make Great Friends, Keep Your Faith, and Get Ready for the Real World! by Alex Chediak, reviewed here.

Unless It Moves the Human Heart: The Craft and Art of Writing by Roger Rosenblatt, reviewed here.

When Christ Was Here: a Woman’s Bible Study by Claudia Barba, reviewed here.

When You Come Home: The True Love Story Of A Soldier’s Heroism, His Wife’s Sacrifice and the Resilience of America’s Greatest Generation by Nancy Pitts, not reviewed.

The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie by Wendy McClure, reviewed here.

Fiction:

Allerednic: A Regency Cinderella Tale–In Reverse by Chautona Havig, not reviewed.

Belonging by Robin Lee Hatcher, reviewed here.

The Big 5-Oh! by Sandra Bricker, reviewed briefly here.

The Bridesmaid by Beverly Lewis, reviewed here.

The Bridge by Karen Kingsbury, not reviewed.

Chasing Mona Lisa by Tricia Goyer and Mike Yorkey, reviewed here.

The Christmas Dog by Melody Carlson, reviewed here.

Coming Home by Karen Kingsbury, reviewed here.

The Fiddler by Beverly Lewis, not reviewed.

Full Disclosure by Dee Henderson, reviewed here.

The Discovery by Dan Walsh,reviewed here.

Downfall by Terri Blackstock, brief review here.

In Every Heartbeat by Kim Vogel Sawyer, reviewed here.

Loving by Karen Kingsbury, not reviewed.

The Maid of Fairbourne Hall by Julie Klassen, reviewed here.

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, reviewed here.

Rare Earth by Davis Bunn, reviewed here.

Remembering Christmas by Dan Walsh, not reviewed.

Psmith in the City by P. D. Wodehouse, reviewed here.

Safely Home by Randy Alcorn, reviewed here.

Serenity by Harry Kraus, M. D., reviewed here.

Walking on Broken Glass by Christa Allan, reviewed briefly here.

When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin. reviewed here.

Wildflowers of Terezin by Robert Elmer, reviewed here.

With Every Letter by Sarah Sundin, reviewed here.

Wonderland Creek by Lynn Austin, not reviewed.

Classics:

Anne of Ingleside, reviewed here.

Anne’s House of Dreams by L. M. Montgomery, reviewed here.

C. S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy: Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength, reviewed all together here.

Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, reviewed here.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin, reviewed here.

The Horse and His Boy by C. S. Lewis, reviewed here.

Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder, reviewed here.

Little House on the Prairie is by Laura Ingalls Wilder, reviewed here.

Rainbow Valley by L. M. Montgomery, reviewed here.

Rilla of Ingleside by L. M. Montgomery, reviewed here.

The Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis, reviewed here.

Audiobooks:

At Home in Mitford by Jan Karon, reviewed here.

Beyond the Shadows by Robin Lee Hatcher, reviewed here.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, reviewed here.

Freckles by Gene Stratton Porter, reviewed here.

A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter, reviewed here.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett, reviewed here.

The Hobbit, reviewed here.

Intervention by Terri Blackstock, briefly reviewed here.

Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott, reviewed here.

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, reviewed here.

Lost Melody by Lori Copeland and Virginia Smith, reviewed here.

Never Again Good-bye by Terri Blackstock, not reviewed.

North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell, reviewed here.

Roots by Alex Haley, reviewed here.

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand, reviewed here.

Vicious Cycle by Terri Blackstock, reviewed here.

Wives and Daughters  by Elizabeth Gaskell, reviewed here.

A Wrinkle in Time, reviewed here.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens was Carrie‘s December Book Club choice. I don’t know if I have ever actually read the book before: I think I may have long ago. But I have seen it almost every year for the last several (my favorite is the George C. Scott version). So it was nice to actually go through the book this year. I started out reading it but then switched over to the audiobook when LearnOutLoud.com offered it for free this month. It was well done: the narrator was very expressive, but her voice got just a bit irritating at the height of some scenes. But overall it was enjoyable.

It’s hard to review it per se because the story is so well known, but if you are not familiar with it, it’s the tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, a tight-fisted, cold-hearted, miserly, miserable person. Though he is well-off, he doesn’t live extravagantly: he doesn’t even live comfortably, keeping his office cold to avoid using coal. He has no warm or charitable thoughts for anyone, begrudges his employee a paid holiday, returns his nephew’s “Merry Christmas” with a “Bah, humbug,” flatly turns down those seeking aid for the poor, saying the work houses and such are taking care of them.

As Scrooge heads for bed on Christmas Eve, the ghost of his dead business partner, Jacob Marley, visits in him chains forged during his lifetime, and warns Scrooge that a similar fate awaits him if he doesn’t change. To encourage his reclamation, three ghosts will visit him that night. The Ghost of Christmas Past takes him back to scenes of his youth, before his heart was hardened. The Ghost of Christmas Present shows him the true state of his long-suffering clerk, Bob Cratchit and his family, including crippled Tiny Tim, happy though poor. In both the Cratchit family and his nephew’s family, Scrooge hears some not-so-flattering sentiments about himself. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows him Cratchit’s family without Tiny Tim and calloused reactions to his own death. All of these scenes work together to open his eyes, soften his heart, and cause him to change. Not only do his actions change in that he is now more generous and concerned for others, but he is now filled with joy.

This tale was published in 1843 and has been a favorite ever since. Perhaps we can all rejoice in a selfish miser getting his comeuppance, but more than that, the story can speak to our own hearts about our own self-focus and lack of concern for and generosity towards others.

I’ve spent some time pondering whether Scrooge’s change was more of a reformation, a turning over a new leaf, or a true conversion. I’m not sure what Dickens’ religious beliefs were, though he does have Christian elements in many of his books: of course, he wrote this just as a morality tale rather than a religious story, so this is just my own ruminations. There does not seem to be much mention of God, though there is reference to being like a child at Christmas because its great Founder became one, and a joyous “Heaven and Christmas Time be praised” when Scrooge realizes the visions are over and he is safe at home in bed. But at the end of his time with the last Ghost, Scrooge says, “I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse.” His change of heart comes on gradually as his eyes are opened: it’s not just a fear of death in the last scenes, though that’s a part of it. That’s what I hope people see: he didn’t just decide to start being generous financially, but he is a totally changed man.

I enjoyed revisiting this story and finding out that the films I have seen of it have been remarkably close to the original.

I almost didn’t review Little Women by Louisa May Alcott since it is already so familiar to many people. But I couldn’t resist. It’s one of my all-time favorite books and one of the first classics I remember reading. I don’t know how many times I’ve reread it.

If you’re not familiar with the story, it’s basically about four sisters growing up in a poor family in the 1800s, based loosely on Alcott’s own family:

Meg (short for Margaret) is 16 when the story opens. Pretty, proper, lady-like, domestic, works as a governess, good except for a tendency to covet other girls’ nice things.

Jo (short for Josephine) is 15, tomboyish, spirited, clumsy, creative, dramatic, short-tempered, likes to write.

Beth, 13, is quiet, painfully shy, musical, and doesn’t venture far from home and family.

Amy, 12, is artistic, ladylike, vain, and a little pompous.

Some years ago when this story came up in a conversation, a friend said, “They were so perfect, weren’t they?” No! They were realistically flawed, but each knew their faults and tried to work on them (and did make progress during the course of the book). One scene where everyone is being fractious for various reasons while the mom (Marmee) is trying to get some mail ready that has to go out that day was very true to life in the way family life sometimes goes, even though the specifics from that time to this are different.

The family had been prosperous but suffered some financial reversals. As the story opens the father is away as a Union chaplain in the Civil War and the girls are lamenting that there is no money for Christmas presents. They each have a small amount and decide to buy something special for themselves, but later decide to use their resources to get something nice for Marmee. Those kind of struggles come up repeatedly in the book — facing some temptation (often the tendency to be dissatisfied) and the opportunity to overcome it or succumb. Sometimes they do one, sometimes the other, but always they learn from it.

When I read this as a child, I was enthralled with the activities the girls amused themselves with (their own newspaper, plays, etc.) and the striving to be good. When I read it as a young woman, I identified with Meg just after she married — the hilarious scene when the jelly wouldn’t gel after working with it all day, and tired, frustrated, and at the end of herself, that’s the day her husband brings a guest home to dinner unexpectedly. She had told him to feel free to do so and wanted to be a good little wife, but the desire clashed with reality that day. Then another day she overspent and dreaded having to tell her hard-working husband (I had a similar experience as a newlywed). At this reading I still identified with Meg a lot (in personality I’m a combination of Meg and Beth), but I found more in common with Marmee, trying to raise these spirited young people. But I also identified with Jo — not so much in her boyish tendencies but in her bumbling growth and her writing. The scenes where she is so lonely (for a couple of reasons which I don’t want to give away, if you’ve not read the book) and looking for what to do with her life are full of pathos.

In my earlier reading I had thought this book had a Christian underpinning. Later I learned that Alcott’s family were Transcendentalists. I’m still not entirely sure what that is: Wikipedia wasn’t much help. I would disagree about the inherent goodness of people (since the Bible says we are all inherently sinful and need a Savior). My friend Ann teaches high school English and discusses this — I’d love to hear that lesson! (In lieu of that maybe you could send me your notes, Ann. 🙂 ) There are spiritual principles mentioned and reference to asking God for help.

Other themes include hard work, individuality, the pleasures of home, the benefits of poverty, ministering to those even poorer than themselves. Some say there are early feminist tendrils in this book — I need to read more about Alcott some time to know what her views were. The Wikipedia article on her says she was involved with women’s suffrage, and that kind of thinking is clear in the book,  but I don’t think she was into the extreme feminism of eschewing marriage and homemaking, especially since she does magnify home life and domesticity. She does show that every woman’s life and personality may not look exactly the same, and I’d agree with her there. Meg and Jo clash over this more than once.

I enjoyed re-experiencing many scenes, but I was surprised at some I had forgotten. One was a time when the girls were longing not to have to work, and Marmee gave them their way for a week or so. At first they reveled in their freedom, but soon grew restless. Then Marmee further reinforced the lesson by taking a short vacation herself to let the girls experience what happens when all those little humdrum duties aren’t taken care of. In this and other ways the book is a little more didactic than modern readers tend to like, yet this book has been beloved for over a hundred years.

I also rewatched the Winona Ryder version of the film Little Women during the course of this book. It did differ from the book much more than I had remembered — some lines show up in different situations than in the book, some scenes are out of order, Jo doesn’t write that kind of book at the end (in that I think they followed one of the older films, either with Katherine Hepburn or June Allyson as Jo — I think the former). There is one scene with Jo and Professor Bhaer discussing transcendentalism and German philosophers which was not in the book (I think designed to show the author’s background a bit) that was not in the book, but otherwise they didn’t add in unnecessary and irrelevant scenes and people, and I think they kept close to the spirit of the book. I still enjoy it despite the differences, and some scenes are very close to the book (Jo attending a dance with a burn mark on the back of her dress, which she tries to keep hidden, and meeting Laurie in the process, Amy’s near-drowning).

I listened to the book this time via audiobook. This type of book — a classic that I love to reread but can’t always work into my regular reading — is one of the best uses of audiobooks for me. I wasn’t thrilled with this particular narrator: she was okay but didn’t do much with different voices. But overall I thoroughly enjoyed learning and growing again with Little Women.