March Books: The Excellent, the Good, and the Given Up On
Jonathan Haidt's The Anxious Generation, Brad Wilcox's Get Married, Rob Henderson's memoir, and To Kill a Mockingbird were favorites of this month
The Excellent
This month, I read three excellent new books in sociology and psychology that shared similar perspectives, arguing for similar countercultural ideas.
The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt
I’ve been looking forward to Jonathan Haidt’s new book arguing that adolescent’s mental health issues stem from a “rewiring of childhood.” It was SO good, and I pretty much read it in the two days after it came out. He argues that kids and teens have been overprotected in the real world (helicoptering at the playground, not allowing them to walk across town) and under-protected online (allowed on social media sites that are proven to harm.
Instead of having play-based childhoods, kids have phone-based childhoods (or any kind of technological internet-device). These massive changes have led to the biggest social experiment on children ever performed, and there is so much data proving how harmful this is to all ages but especially developing brains. It is remarkable that all sides are agreeing, yet there has not yet been much change aside from elites.
I have really appreciated Jonathan Haidt ever since his book Coddling of the American Mind came out in 2018. He bridges a political divide and is appreciated and praised by people of both sides of the spectrum. He has been very effective in communicating academic studies and data to the masses and has taken the information out of the ivory tower. He uses public Google documents and publishes findings for all to see on Substack. I love academics like him who do their work to serve the general population and are not concerned with their status among the academic elites.
Get Married: Why Americans Must Defy the Elites, Forge Strong Families, and Save Civilization by Brad Wilcox
Brad Wilcox is another academic who does his work in service of the masses and writes in a very readable way. I would want every teenager to read this book to help them get a long-term perspective on what a successful life looks like. I’d also assign it to any couples doing premarital counseling because it shows how to be successful in marriage and not get divorced.
Wilcox argues that marriage ought to be seen as the standard way to live a happy, successful life. He considers all the arguments against it and shows the data for a traditional view of families. Some of his statistics were just bit jaw-dropping for me, such as the strong correlation between single parenting and poverty, crime, and a lack of education.
Wilcox’s book is not a how-to on getting married but stays at the broader cultural level, addressing everything from the Andrew Tate “manosphere” view and the Elizabeth Gilbert hedonistic view. I found it especially encouraging to keep putting family first, even though the human tendency is towards self and hedonism. The data is clear that living a sacrificial life for your spouse and choosing to have children is key to long-term happiness.
Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class by Rob Henderson
Rob Henderson writes a memoir about how he he escaped a troubled childhood to getting his Ph.D. at Cambridge in Psychology and now has a very unique perspective on social issues. He was abandoned by his biological parents, went through tumultuous years of foster care, and then again abandoned by his adoptive father.
He demonstrates that there is nothing better for a child than family stability. He says he would trade all the education he received for a stabile family upbringing, and you can understand why when you read his heartbreaking story.
Henderson’s memoir is a great example of Wilcox’s book and is actually one of the stories featured by Wilcox. He has become known for coining the term “luxury beliefs,” which is the idea that elites preach and believe ideas they would never do themselves. They might praise having a non-traditional family and not going to college, but they would never actually practice those beliefs in their own families.
It was in a similar genre of J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy and Tara Westover’s Educated, which I love. However, Henderson does not make claims about what the government should do or the powers of education (apart of reading) but focuses on family structures. I especially appreciated his outlook because he went into the field of psychology and knows his stuff.
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
I had never read or watched To Kill a Mockingbird and really loved it. It was so gripping and was just a good story. I can see why it has become controversial because of the “white savior” main character, which is sad.
Atticus Finch is one of the last great heroic characters in American novels who is the best shot in town but doesn’t defend himself when attacked by a mob. He is a great father and ordinary person who shows courage to fight against the tide and live by his beliefs. There is a lot of depth to the characters that would make it a good book to come back to and discuss with others.
The Good
The OCD Healing Journey: Getting to the Heart of Our Obsessive and Compulsive Struggles by Mark DeJesus
Mark DeJesus is a pastor who writes about his OCD struggles, particularly his religious scrupulosity in a very helpful way. It especially plagued him as he went into ministry and had to deal with writing sermons, dealing with relationships, and high-stakes issues. He describes OCD well and also gets to the spiritual issues underlying the desire for control and certainty in all areas.
It is also very readable and could be understood by a teenager which is helpful! I appreciated John Andrew Bryant’s A Quiet Mind to Suffer With which is a similar memoir by a pastor, but that one is much more artistic and less straightforward (which might be good for someone with OCD). However, DeJesus is a clear communicator and wrote a great introduction to the spiritual aspects of OCD.
The Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin
I enjoyed Martin’s historical fiction about the bookshops in England during World War II. I did not realize that a whole street of bookshops were blown up in bombings and appreciated the insights into life in London during the war.
However, I think WWII fiction is overdone and rarely works in the end. It always starts out detailing the beginning of the war, fasts forward five years to the end, where the hero somehow doesn’t get killed and comes home to marry the main character. These stories start to run together.
The Given Up On
The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene
I got Rob Henderson’s psychology reading list which I can’t wait to work through (you can request it from him if you purchase his book), and this was one of the first I picked. Robert Greene is a very popular author of The 48 Laws of Power and is insightful on human nature.
I loved the introduction and the promises of the book to help you understand human nature so you don’t get so emotionally disregulated or surprised when you come against evil and suffering. At first I thought he was profound, but the more I read, the more I came to feel he was on the pseudo-scientific side and saying common sense ideas.
I also might have just gotten irritable reading it because it is long at 600 pages. He writes historical examples for each of his 18 laws that go on for pages and pages, and I did not have the patience to keep going.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
I realized after reading Steinbeck and Harper Lee that I hardly ever read American literature, so I thought I would keep going. However, I really don’t enjoy the modern realism of The Great Gatsby and wasn’t in the mood for the weird darkness and characters.
Cloud of Witnesses: A Treasury of Prayers and Petitions through the Ages edited by Jonathan W. Arnold and Zachariah M. Carter
I love when Crossway does a well-edited compilation of a classic works or selections from church history (especially in a beautiful edition). I received this book as part of a Crossway book review program, and I’m not sure who I would recommend this book to.
I felt it had a confused purpose because at 300 pages, only the first 100 were actual prayers to use from church history, the next 100 were historical introductions to the church history periods, and the last 100 were the prayers in their original languages. Who is the audience for this book?? If someone is going to read Clement of Rome’s prayer in Greek, he will not be reading your introduction to ancient church history. I would have suggested the focus to stay devotional.
I have been loving the non-fiction new releases coming out and am eager to read Coleman Hughes’ End of Race Politics next. However, I want to balance it out with some fiction, so please recommend your favorite fiction you’ve read recently!
My area of study is 20th century American poetry and fiction so I've read all that stuff but avoid it now - I enjoyed darker literature more before I went through actual suffering in life :) -- however I love To Kill a Mockingbird. I have mostly read nonfiction lately because I'm still reading War and Peace and growing more in love with Tolstoy every day - so I recommend Tolstoy haha!