What Books Should I Add to This Year's Jólabókaflód Box?
Taking title and list suggestions for our annual Christmas book flood!
If you have never heard of Jólabókaflód or your Icelandic is a little rusty, this is an Icelandic tradition. Translated as “book flood,” it represents the flood of books released before Christmas and has become a tradition to exchange books on Christmas Eve1.
While I am well down the list of readers in our family and refuse to participate in the weaponization annual reading goals, we have always encouraged our kids to read, read, read, read. We use the library and have eReaders, but we also love buying books and supporting authors.
Over the past four years, we have adopted the Icelandic Christmas tradition by creating a Jólabókaflód box each year. Most of the books are family suggestions, but I also scour lists because I try to include a mix of topics and titles: heady, academic stuff; fun, brain-candy; moving novels, political and cultural analysis, etc.
What titles should be in our Jólabókaflód box this year?
If you want to suggest a title, the more diverse, the better; drop titles, links, or lists in the comments.
Having just seen Hank Green's video, "The Internet is a Machine that Devours Trust," I'll share the titles of a couple of his highly recommended books: "High Conflict" by Amanda Ripley and "Wrong: How Media, Politics, and Identity Drive Our Appetite for Misinformation" by Dannegal Goldthwaite Young. My favorite novel this year, OTOH, was "People of the Book" by Geraldine Brooks. Also loved "Abuelita Faith" by Kat Armas, "Freeing Jesus" by Diana Bulter Bass, and "The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store" by James McBride. I imagine you have probably already read all of these. But you asked!
The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer and Somewhere Beyond the Sea by T.J. Klune