My Favorite Books of 2024!

Hello ladies and gentlemen! It’s that time of year again: the time to look back over the prior year and pick out some favorites. Today I am going to be talking about my favorite books of 2024.

(If you want to see my favorites from 2023, you can do so by clicking the buttons below)

Without further ado, let’s get into it!

~ My Favorite Non-Fiction Book: The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis ~

A little over a year ago I began to ask myself: what is love? This question came about because of the skewed version of “love” that we see displayed in books and media today (I would go further into this topic, but it is best left for another blog post). My questions led me to the Bible and to this book.

It took me over a year to read it, but I am so glad I did. C.S. Lewis offers such interesting insights into what love is and what its forms are.

The main concept that stood out to me is: There are four different kinds of love: Affection, Friendship, Romantic love, and Charity and those four loves each break into a further category: Need love, and Gift love. Need love is a love that loves because it needs something in return. That thing could be the satisfaction one feels when they feel like they gave something away, or the gratification one feels when someone else looks to them for love. That being said, C.S. Lewis is clear that need loves should not be completely discredited because they come from that place of need. But I think this distinction between the two is important because it points out that the love of our Savior isn’t one that stems out of a need to have us love Him, but comes from a place of pure love that loves even when nothing is expected in return.

Because of this concept over the last few months I have been praying “Lord, let me love like you love… teach me to love like that.” I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to love as He loves for I’m sure my flesh will come between me and such a pure love, but yet I will pray, for just to have my fingertips barely brush such a love would be better than living my life never looking for such a thing.

But, I digress, so I think it would be best if I stepped off my soapbox and moved on to some quotes from the book:

“St. John’s saying that God is love had long been balanced in my mind against the remark of a modern author… that ‘love ceases to be a demon only when he ceases to be a god’; which of course can be re-stated in the form ‘begins to be a demon the moment he begins to be a god’. This balance seems to me an indispensable safeguard. If we ignore it the truth that God is love may slyly come to mean the converse, that love is God.” (Pg.8)

“The proper aim of giving is to put the recipient in a state where he no longer needs our gift.” (Pg.65)

“When we see the face of God we shall know that we have always known it. He has been a part to, has made, sustained, and moved moment by moment within, all our earthly experiences of innocent love. All that was true love in them was, even on earth, far more His than ours, and ours only because His. In Heaven there will be no anguish and no duty of turning away from our earthly Beloveds. First, because we shall have turned already; from the portraits to the Original, from the rivulets to the Fountain, from the creatures He made lovable to Love Himself. By loving Him more than them we shall love them more than we now do.” (Pg.178)

~ My Favorite Theological Book: The Great Divorce by CS Lewis ~

Yes, I know, CS Lewis again, but what can I say, great books must be recognized for their greatness.

I began reading this book thinking that it was going to be nonfiction, but I quickly realized that this book is quite clearly fiction. It is a fantastical look at heaven and hell, which speculates that perhaps our view on the two is not quite correct. Perhaps we give hell too much of a priority in our mind.

Some of my favorite concepts from the book are: that hell is a place where people build houses and things in hopes to separate them from others, (or because they long for more ‘stuff’ thinking that it will make them happy)… but in reality all the things they build are only imaginary.

Another concept I appreciated is that hell is infinitely smaller than heaven and heaven is far more real and tangible than anything we’ve ever known.

I won’t go into further detail on the concepts because I think it would be best if you just read the book. 😁

~ Favorite Continuation of a Series: The Secret of Lillian Velvet by Jaclyn Moriarty ~

This is another installment in the Kingdoms and Empires series by Jaclyn Moriarty. (The Stolen Prince of Cloudburst is one of the previous books in the series and was on my list of favorite books for 2023). This is my second favorite book in this series (The Stolen Prince of Cloudburst is my favorite). The characters are well developed and the book doesn’t shy away from showing the impact hard situations can have on our life.

The premise of this book: A girl named Lillian lives in the ‘normal’ world but on her birthday is given a jar of coins that let her go to different worlds. Each time she travels she has to pay with her coins in order to stay in that world. But, secrets are being kept from her and as her jar starts to dwindle down to the last few coins it becomes clear that someone is out to get her.

I really liked Lillian, she is kind, determined and sweet and will do anything to protect those she cares about. I also thought the character development was well done.

All in all, a fun light read!

~ Favorite Reread: The Penderwicks In Spring by Jeanne Birdsall ~

This is my third (or possibly forth) time reading this book and I know it won’t be the last.

The whole series is fantastic, but this book is my favorite out of them all because I see a lot of parallels between the main character (Batty) and myself. On top of that, the way the father acts in this book makes me cry (There have been very few times that I cried when reading a book and this is one of them). His kindness toward his daughter and the way he helps bring her out of a very dark place reminds me of the way my father helped bring me out of (and walk with me through) a very dark time in my life.

All in all, a great book. Timeless, sweet and fun, yet meaningful. This whole series is one that I hope to read to my future children and grandchildren.

~ My Favorite Contemporary Novel: Grief in the Fourth Dimension by Jennifer Yu ~

First off, let me start by saying that this book is emotionally intense. The book begins with two teenagers dying and appearing in a bare white room. The only thing in the room is a TV and on that TV they can see what is happening back on earth. The two teenagers then watch as their families and friends grieve their losses and try to grapple with the reality that they will never again get to see that person they love so dearly.

The book is beautifully written and it captures the emotions of grief so well. I love that it looks at different ways people grieve and the different stages of grief: anger, hopelessness, etc. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a deep yet not too heady read.

That being said, I have a few quibbles. The first is that there is a medium one of the character’s goes to in hopes that she can reach her lost son, (and she is able to do so). The other quibble is that the book views religion as a “whatever you want to believe works” type of thing, and while it didn’t bother me too much (as the book focuses more on the aspect of grieving instead of focusing on what happens after death), it is a rising belief these days that I feel should not go unnoticed.

~ My Favorite Trilogy: Daughter of Arden by Loren G. Warnemuende ~

I read this trilogy at the beginning of the year and absolutely fell in love with the characters and the world Loren Warnemuende created. The author spent years writing and refining these books and it shows!

I would describe the book as being a medieval fairytale that dips its toes into fantasy (with magical powers and the like). The premise is that a spoiled princess gets locked in a tower for years so that she will be kept safe from impending war, she then emerges after the war to find that her kingdom has been laid to waste.

My favorite thing in the book: The characters! They are so well developed that by the end of the series I felt like I was having to part ways with some well loved friends… and don’t get me started on the romance. It is done in such a sweet wholesome way that is so rare in books nowadays.

All in all, a wonderful series!

And those are my favorites for 2024! Do you have a favorite book you read last year? If so please comment it below!