9 Books Our Editors Loved This Year

Reading was the safest way to travel this year — sometimes to another decade and another brand of violence, sometimes to a different continent or a different galaxy altogether. Below are nine books the editors of Sojourners loved reading this year. Most of these books came out years ago, but by reading them through the lens of 2020, we found new wisdom, escape, and resonance. Read along with us:

Dying City by Christopher Shinn
I’ve never been more affected by a play than the production I saw of this one in New York City in 2019. I knew I had to buy and read the script, and in 2020 I finally did. A year after the questionable death of her soldier husband, which occurred during his deployment in the Iraq War, a psychotherapist receives an unannounced visit from her husband’s gay twin brother, whom she dislikes. An examination of violence, war, sex, politics, and more, Dying City is one of the most unnerving and powerful stories I’ll ever read.
—Da’Shawn Mosley, associate editor and culture editor

Something Bright, Then Holes by Maggie Nelson
“Something bright, then holes / is how a girl, newly sighted, / once described a hand,” Maggie Nelson begins this collection of poetry, handing me a new way to summarize living. She goes on to write dozens of gritty stanzas about looking for healing and beauty every night at Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal, a superfund site that etches through west Brooklyn. And hasn’t that been much of 2020? Trying, and occasionally finding, something bright in a largely contaminated year?
–Jenna Barnett, associate web editor

The Power by Naomi Alderman
Thanks to a freak genetic mutation — caused by industrial pollution – the women of the world suddenly develop the ability to send spine-tingling (or deadly) jolts of electricity through their fingertips. But as the women grapple with questions about gender, violence, religion, and, yes, power, from a new vantage point, what might initially seem like rah-rah novel about “girl-power” quickly unleashes something more dystopian — and fascinating.
–Betsy Shirley, managing editor, sojo.net

Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
This book is both a love story and a commentary on race, class, and gender across the span of two continents. We follow the journey of a Nigerian woman from childhood to adulthood as she navigates young adult life, love, and racial dynamics when she moves to the United States for university. As 2020 has been the year of opening some white people's eyes to the concept of race for the first time, it was an interesting departure to see Black people in the U.S. through the experience of someone from the African diaspora.
—Candace Sanders, assistant art director

The Binti series by Nnedi Okorafor
Her name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But accepting the offer will mean giving up her place in her family to travel between the stars among strangers who do not share her ways or respect her customs. The world she seeks to enter has long warred with an alien race that has become the stuff of nightmares. Oomza University has wronged them, and Binti’s stellar travel will bring her within their deadly reach. If Binti hopes to survive the legacy of a war not of her making, she will need both the gifts of her people and the wisdom enshrined within the university itself — but first she has to survive.
–Rose Marie Berger, senior editor and poetry editor

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, which I’m halfway through, offers intimate, personal views of WWII through the eyes of two children: a blind French girl and an orphaned German boy. Their stories are gripping and accessible — and I’m pretty sure their paths will entwine by the time I reach the end.
—Jim Rice, editor

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
The timeless tale of Elizabeth and Darcy had me literally laughing out loud and offered a delightful respite from the gloom of 2020. Having only ever read the Illustrated Classics version as a child, it was a thrill to enter the world of the Bennets with all the richness of Austen's original and unabridged writing.
—Rebecca Riley, multimedia/online assistant

Pillar of Fire by Joyce Hollyday
Former Sojourners editor Joyce Hollyday has written a spellbinding novel that's great for teenagers. As the book's publisher explains: “In an age of intolerance, compassion can be dangerous. Pillar of Fire captures the stunning witness of the medieval mystics known as Beguines. Amid the intrigues of kings and knights, against a panorama of church corruption, Crusader campaigns, and Inquisition trials, these bold women broke all the rules. They offer a model of courageous hope in an era much like our own.”
–Rose Marie Berger, senior editor and poetry editor

Reincarnation Blues by Michael Poore
In this bizarre but wise book of speculative fiction, the reader follows the many lives and deaths of Milo, the oldest human in the world, who is spiraling toward his 10,000th life. During a year when the days indoors began to blend together, I loved transporting to different lives and centuries with Milo and his true love, Death — a charming, sensitive woman named Suzie.
—Jenna Barnett, associate web editor

All books featured on this list were independently selected by Sojourners’ editors. We have partnered with Bookshop.org and when you order books through the links on sojo.net, Sojourners earns a small commission and Bookshop.org sends a matching commission to independent bookstores.