Gerri Bauer's 3 favorite reads in 2023

I love character-driven stories. I found that, and more, in the Christian historical novel For A Noble Purpose.

The story revolves around a group crossing the American frontier by wagon train in the 1850s. They hope to build a utopian community in the Pacific Northwest.

The story evolves into a metaphor for life’s journey. Prepare to be surprised, and I was. At first, I was skeptical about allusions to the Book of Tobit and about the “gifts” of some characters. I’m glad I kept reading. Good writing/storytelling/characters, and unexpected twists combine into a delightful whole. Also, I appreciate novels that include romantic elements, and this one delivers.

It’s easy to see why this book won 1st place in the Catholic Novels Category at the 2023 Catholic Media Awards.

Characters leap off the page in this novel based on a true crime that occurred in 1920s Prohibition-era New York City. I don’t often read true-crime novels, but this one is exceptional.

The story is a fictional telling of the aftermath of a scandalous crime: the murder of a Broadway party girl. The story’s point of view rotates among several people drawn into the crime’s orbit. The viewpoints offer a lens on how people of various social classes, occupations, races, and ethnicities maneuvered through—and were affected by—the era’s rules, restrictions, prejudices, and biases.

The leading voice is based on a real-life female trailblazing journalist. As a retired journalist, I appreciated the spotlight on her in this page-turner.

Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life adds new growth to familiar portraits of the iconic poet. Eccentric she surely was. But a more complete picture of her emerges from this book than from any Dickinson biography I’ve paged through.

McDowell allows Dickinson’s life story, actions, words, and writing to provide biographical insights through a lens of gardening activities and household chores. Dickinson’s love of gardens and plants is well known. She engaged in the hobby year-round. Like plants need sunlight and air to survive, so did the woman who emerges from these pages. She becomes less the housebound recluse hiding in her bedroom, and more a real person engaging with the world on her own terms.