1. Bossypants, by Tina Fey, Reagan Arthur Books
2. Unlikely Friendships, by Jennifer S. Holland, Workman
3. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot, Broadway
4. Heaven Is for Real, by Todd Burpo, Thomas Nelson
5. Blood, Bones & Butter, by Gabrielle Hamilton, Random House
6. The Social Animal, by David Brooks, Random House
7. The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin, Harper
8. The Hare With Amber Eyes, by Edmund de Waal, Picador
9. Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey, by The Countess of Carnarvon, Broadway
10. Empire of the Summer Moon, by S.C. Gwynne, Scribner
11. Cleopatra, by Stacy Schiff, Back Bay
12. Just Kids, by Patti Smith, Ecco
13. The Warmth of Other Suns, by Isabel Wilkerson, Vintage
14. The Call of Sedona: Journey of the Heart, by Ilchi Lee, Best Life Media
15. Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell, Back Bay
Mark Sappenfield
Dear Reader,
About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:
“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”
If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.
But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.
The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.
We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”
If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.
