Listen (3:16)
December 16, 2024
Many blogs begin in January when the new year is full of possibilities, wonder, and capacity for pleasant surprises. With over 600 million blogs globally and approximately 3.2 million new blog posts published every day, one would require assistance to make a good case for thinking that adding to the verbiage was, in fact, a good idea. And yet, undeterred by common sense, 507 more words have flowed from my digital pen and inkwell to reassemble in what is hoped to be an agreeable order right here in this humble corner of the interwebs.
A new blog debuting at year’s end written by a musician should list favorite albums or best musical compilations, right? Well, that is precisely what the contents of the next installment will do, and it is also why the quote from the opening line of T.S. Eliot’s second poem in his Four Quartets was selected as a gamp for these thoughts (Spoiler Alert: I’ve nicked the last line for the next one). Like one of my musical heroes, Neil Peart, “Before I had music, I had words.” This far into the journey, the realization that both are sometimes needed to capture the depths of human emotion, though not necessarily at the same time, has become suddenly understood.
Now that the lead has been properly buried, it is a good, old-fashioned, over-hyphened, end-of-the-year book list upon which you have stumbled. None of the books on the list below was a favorite this year, and they were all published in 2024, which was the only criterion imposed on this task, including only new word assemblages read from an actual book made of paper, ink, and glue. The word ‘important’ does a better job rationalizing these selections and not strictly from a personal standpoint. Words like ‘best’ and ‘best-selling’ in lists like these miss the mark on so many levels, not the least of which is the smack of corporatism that makes independent musicians (and readers) like myself wince.
Lists of this nature often mask accidental hierarchies, and although I don’t think this one does, and the listing is intentionally alphabetical, others will disagree. Not only is that great, welcome, and lovely, but also another reason for this 507-word disturbance in the Force: to say, however cleverly, clumsily, or even covertly, “I like this - and you might, too.” Rest assured that your intelligence will not be insulted by links to purchase (and that no death-by-hyperlinked-search-engine-optimization insults have been hurled up to this point in the prose) because presuming upon your readership is a fate worse than a life without books.
And with no ability to publicly comment, like, or re-tweet, you can bask in the knowledge that your opinion in these matters is the only one that needs to be fussed over. If the spirit moves one to communicate or share words about these selections, a vintage e-mail is the perfect means.
By the Fire We Carry
The Generations-Long Fight for Justice on Native Land
by Rebecca Nagle
Enlightenment
by Sarah Perry
Knife
Meditations After an Attempted Murder
by Salman Rushdie
My Poetics
by Maureen N. McLane
The Pursuit of Happiness
How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America
by Jeffrey Rosen
Listen (3:16)
December 16, 2024