The Best Book I Read This Month: The Light of the Midnight Stars by Rena Rossner

The best book I read this month was an inspiring work of historical fiction. Set in Eastern Europe during the 14th century, Rena Rossner’s The Light of the Midnight Stars is a story of survival, perseverance, and magic.

Hannah, Sarah, and Levana live with their parents near the Hungarian woods. Each daughter has a magical gift, as do their parents. Their family is part of a magical Jewish sect called Solomonars, descendants of King Solomon and inheritors of his magic.

As the story opens, a darkness called the Black Mist is spreading across Eastern Europe and, as is often the case in European history, the Jews are blamed for it. A violent confrontation forces the three young women and their parents to flee into the woods and eventually to Wallachia, supposedly a haven of religious tolerance.

In Wallachia, the sisters deal with the trauma of the antisemitic violence they escaped while also hiding their identities as Jews. They each pursue a different path forward, and as they do, they find their way back to their magical selves. To say more would provide spoilers.

I loved the idea of magical Jewish women. I needed the story of perseverance and survival. At a time when I am exhausted by the world, this book fed my soul.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Micro Activism by Omkari L. Williams

The best book I read this month was short and powerful: Micro Activism by Omkari L. Williams.

Monday’s presidential inauguration left me feeling helpless. The subsequent executive orders overwhelmed me. I wanted to do something. I needed to do something. But what? I have limited time, finite resources, and no connections. How would I even begin?

Enter Omkari Williams’s Micro Activism. I’ve had it in my TBR pile for a while, and thank goodness I did. I pulled it out and read it in one night. It was just what I needed.

Micro Activism is an accessible, practical handbook for figuring out what each of us can do to improve our community, our country, our world. The idea is that we don’t have to do big things. We can make a difference by doing focused small things, as long as we do them consistently.

I found Williams’s advice very down-to-earth and her exercises very helpful in making my own plan. I discovered that things I’ve been doing for other reasons, like volunteering with a local animal rescue, are in fact activism. I found that discovery rather comforting. Equally comforting was Williams’s advice to take care of ourselves and to focus our efforts on one or two causes so we don’t burn out. There is a lot of work to do, and it’s going to take a long time to do it. We need to sustain ourselves so we can make it through the long haul.

I highly recommend this book. It’s helpful in finding a path to activism, and it’s validating for those who are already in the fight.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Shutter by Ramona Emerson

The best book I read this month was a mystery by Navajo (Diné) author Ramona Emerson. Shutter follows photographer Rita Todacheene as she gets caught up in and tries to solve a series of murders in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Rita is literally haunted by her work. She sees dead people, and these ghosts both help and hinder her pursuit of justice.

It took me a little while to get into this story, but once I found the rhythm, I couldn’t put it down. The mystery was well-crafted, and I love the way Emerson wove in not only Rita’s personal history but also her Navajo culture.

Rita both accepts and rejects her culture. The tension she feels between living and working in white society and being true to her roots informs much of the story. Should she listen to her grandmother’s warnings about the ghosts she sees? Should she give up her job with the Albuquerque police in favor of a job that doesn’t bring her in contact with death all of the time? Rita wrestles with these questions as she tries to solve the gruesome murder of a young mother and of a judge and his family. Ultimately, it is this pursuit of answers that endangers Rita’s life.

I don’t know if this is the first in a series, but I hope it is. I like Rita. I adore Rita’s grandmother. I want to spend more time with both of them.

The Best Book I Read This Month: The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon

The best book I read this month was a gripping tale inspired by real events. In The Frozen River, Ariel Lawhon tells the story of Martha Ballard, a midwife who lived in Maine in the late 1700s. The story focuses on Ballard’s efforts to win justice for a rape victim, a preacher’s wife who named two of the town leaders as her attackers.

The story opens with a death—a murder, to be precise—and the story unfolds from there. Lawhon paints a striking picture of life in the early years of the United States, especially the lives of women. Ballard is an exception in that regard because of her profession. Being a midwife bestows privileges on her that other women are denied, such as the right to speak in court. Ballard only has that right because as a midwife, she is considered a medical professional. Throughout the story, she uses that privilege to push for justice for the preacher’s wife.

Martha Ballard was a real person, and she did testify against a town leader in a rape trial. We know this because of the diary that Ballard left behind. That diary became the nonfiction book A Midwife’s Tale by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, and Ulrich’s book led to Lawhon’s. I was so intrigued by Ballard that I ordered Ulrich’s book before I finished Lawhon’s.

It’s tempting to say that Ballard was an extraordinary woman, but she wasn’t. She was an ordinary woman who made the most of what was given to her. And that makes her a very compelling main character in a very compelling story.

The Best Book I Read This Month: Wild Faith by Talia Levin

The best book I read this month was perhaps not the best choice to read before this year’s presidential election, as it ramped up my election anxiety exponentially. Having said, that, the book is definitely worth reading. Talia Lavin’s Wild Faith: How the Christian Right Is Taking Over America recounts the rise of Christian nationalism in the United States and the movement’s efforts to reshape the nation, its government, and its society in their image. It is eye-opening and terrifying and enraging.

At this point, I don’t have more words than that. I’m still digesting what I read. But it left me with an even stronger conviction that the Christian right—Christian nationalists, Christian fascists—are the greatest danger this country faces in our lifetime.

But don’t take my word for it. Read Wild Faith. Lavin lays it all out very clearly.