December
As the year draws to a close, it feels like the perfect time to reach for a book that either fills us with good vibes or lets us sink into a delicious guilty pleasure read. For me, “good vibes” means those uplifting, heartwarming stories that leave you smiling when you turn the last page. “Guilty pleasures,” on the other hand, are the books you tear through because you just have to know what happens next: addictive plots, entertaining characters, and plenty of escapist fun.
Good Vibes Fiction
The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai (2024)
Have you ever tasted a dish that instantly transported you back to another time or place? Maybe you wished you could taste something one more time. I would love to taste Granny’s sourdough rolls and be in her kitchen again.
Hidden away on a side street in Kyoto, Koishi and her dad, Nagare, a retired policeman turned chef, run a restaurant with no sign—just a one-line ad in a foodie magazine. They attract interesting visitors, each with their own stories, all searching for lost recipes that help restore memories and relationships. The food descriptions are mouth-watering, and the characters will definitely bring you good vibes. Oh, and did I mention there’s a charming cat hanging around too?
Good Vibes Nonfiction
The Book of Hope : a survival guide for trying times by Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams (2021)
Who better to bring some good vibes than Jane Goodall? With everything going on in the world, a little hope feels like just what we need right now.
In these heartfelt conversations with Douglas Abrams (the same author who gave us The Book of Joy with the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu), Jane shares her reasons for hope—rooted in real stories of animals saved from extinction, communities coming together, and nature’s amazing resilience. Photos are sprinkled throughout, adding depth to the stories, and while you won’t find pictures of her beloved cat and all her dogs, their presence is part of Jane’s inspiring connection to the animal world. Be warned–Jane’s hope might just inspire you to take action.
Guilty Pleasures Fiction
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman (2024)
What is LitRPG you might ask? Short for literary role-playing game, it is a literary genre combining the conventions of computer role-playing games with science fiction and fantasy novels. Maybe you have heard of Dungeons and Dragons?
In this particular LitRPG, Carl follows his ex-girlfriend’s cat out into the night only to find himself strategizing to stay alive as he descends dungeon levels on an intergalactic game show for survival of the fittest. Along the way, he battles goblins, fairies, talking animals, aliens, and maybe the scariest of them all – humans. Success depends not only on combat skills but also on gaining views and being a fan favorite. The story combines dark humor and intense action with a backdrop of corporate greed and politics. There is definitely more than meets the eye with this exciting series of at least seven to check out now if you are ready to lose yourself in the labyrinth. Plus, there’s a cat named Princess Donut to add a quirky twist.
Guilty Pleasures Nonfiction
Cultish : the language of fanaticism by Amanda Montell (2021)
What exactly is a cult—and why are humans so fascinated by them?
Amanda Montell explores this question in her thought-provoking book, arguing that the power of language plays a key role in what draws people in. As a linguist, she redefines how we use the word “cult,” suggesting the term “cultish” to describe the ways we become deeply devoted to things like pop stars, fitness trends, diets, CATS, or other passions that can border on obsession.
From infamous American cults to modern-day fandoms, Montell unpacks how language fuels belonging, conviction, and sometimes fanaticism. Why do certain words hold such sway? What makes someone susceptible to “cultish” influence? And perhaps most intriguingly—do we follow these stories not because we’re different from cult members, but because we see a little of ourselves in them?
November
The last to hold, oak and maple leaves, are whipping around as the gales of November come blowing. As the landscape is stripped down to the essentials, it becomes a reflective time, a time to gather good books and good conversations to feed our minds as we prepare for the hunkering time. November is Native American Heritage Month. There is a wealth of storytelling, spirituality, environmentalism, and humor to be found among native writers. Enjoy!
Food! Cookbooks
Original Local: Indigenous Foods, Stories, and Recipes from the Upper Midwest by Heid E Erdrich (2013)
Erdrich writes with humor and warmth as she pairs local family gathering stories with recipes using pre-colonial ingredients. If you celebrate Thanksgiving, there are delicious ways to incorporate manoomin (wild rice) into just about anything. While focusing on traditional native foods; corn, squash, sunflowers, trout, and manoomin, Erdrich allows room for “regular” pantry items so one does not feel too stressed about drifting a bit from pre-colonial food.
The Sioux Chef’s Indigenous Kitchen by Sean Sherman (2017)
Turtle Island: Foods and Traditions of the Indigenous Peoples of North America by Sean Sherman (Nov 11, 2025)
Sherman is a James Beard awarded chef, an indigenous foodways advocate and founder of the Indigenous Food Lab in Minneapolis. There’s no better way to understanding a culture than reading and cooking through its traditions. Sherman celebrates a variety of indigenous nations with stories behind eating with the seasons and focusing on plant-forward dishes. Once you’ve cooked, consumed, and shared some of Sherman’s plates, take a trip to Minneapolis and treat your family to dinner at his restaurant!
Classic Novels
House Made of Dawn: A Novel by N. Scott Momaday (1968)
Winner of the 1969 Pulitzer Prize and referred to as a break through novel for American Indian writers, Momaday’s story includes many of the tragic themes current native writers are addressing. Returning from World War II to his home in New Mexico, Abel is plagued by walking in two worlds, the seasonal rhythm of his ancestry and the modern, industrial American norms. Seeking to find home, both spiritually and physically, defines Abel’s struggles and resolutions.
Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko (1977)
Silko began writing in the 1970s and was quickly recognized as brilliant with a genius award by the MacArthur Foundation. Ceremony follows Tayo after his return to his reservation after surviving the horrors of captivity as a prisoner of the Japanese during World War II. Drawn to his Indian past and its traditions, his search for comfort and resolution becomes a ritual–a curative ceremony that defeats his despair.
Philosophy & World View
Becoming Kin: An Indigenous Call to Unforgetting the Past and Reimagining Our Future by Patty Krawec (2025)
Krawec writes to dismantle and connect the histories written by settlers and those stories told by native people in North America. She asks, “What would it look like to remember that we are all related? How might we become better relatives to the land, to one another, and to indigenous movements of solidarity?”
Thunder Song: Essays by Sasha taqseblu La Pointe (2024)
An unapologetically punk dive into indigenous identity, stereotypes, cultural displacement, and environmental degradation, La Pointe’s collection is a voice for the next generation of native people claiming a bigger role in the United States as professionals, artists, activists, policy makers, and leaders.
Memoir
Whiskey Tender: A Memoir by Deborah Jackson Taffa (2024)
Taffa tells the story of her family as she comes of age in the 1970s and 1980s, moved off the reservation to a community divided by natives trying to be model minorities and those stubbornly holding onto traditional ways. While her story itself is compelling, it is Taffa’s writing that draws you in so close, it is hard to stop reading. Again, the existential crisis of belonging in two worlds is forefront as a theme.
The Lost Journals of Sacajewea: A Novel by Debra Magpie Earling
Earling was asked by the Lewis and Clark Museum to write about their journey. Considering this task, the voice of Sacajewea kept whispering to Earling. So, not a true memoir, but an imagined one, The Lost Journals is a powerful telling of a young woman’s survival during a historically transformative time for her people. Earling intertwines streaming consciousness, dreams remembered, poetry, song to create a unique language for Sacajewea that truly communicates an experience we can only imagine.
October
Night comes a little earlier and a shade darker. Mushrooms and spiderwebs magically multiply. The morning chill creeps a little deeper into your bones. There’s a persistent longing for creamy potato soup. It is spooky time! If you don’t generally read in the horror genre, fall is the best time to drift that way. Here are a few titles worth reading while you slurp up something hot and fattening.
Paranormal Investigations
The Haunting of Room 904 by Erika T. Wurth (2025)
Wurth is new to the horror game and mixes a fast-paced noir with paranormal tendrils prying open worlds better kept shut. In her second novel, set in Denver, the Brown Hotel hires investigator Olivia Becente to help them understand why every few years a woman is found dead in room 904, no matter what room she checked into the night before. Ever since her sister’s unexpected & strange death, Becente can’t stop seeing and hearing from the dead which gives her some added insight into what is happening at the Brown Hotel. As she goes deeper into the investigation, the past begins to collide with the present and Becente learns more about her sister’s death than she cares to know. There are pagan cults, corrupt journalists, friend betrayals and ghostly visitations that will keep you reading into the night.
Psychological Thriller
Fox: A Novel by Joyce Carol Oats (2025)
Who doesn’t like a book set at an east coast elite boarding school with a little murder thrown into the halls. Everyone loves Mr. Fox, the charming new English teacher. But when his car is found submerged in the swamp with unidentified body parts scattered in the woods, people begin to question his character, especially Detective Horace Zwender. Disturbing relationship patterns begin to emerge. A classic victim verses predator, psychological thriller where the limits of revenge against evil is called into question. Oats illustrates the spiraling path of innocence to criminal like no other.
Literary Horror or Native American Gothic
The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones (2025)
Jones’ collection of novels and short stories dates back to 2000, but in the last five years his “final-girl” slasher works have gained wide appeal. A member of the Blackfeet tribe, he uses mythology, magical realism and native symbolism to create an atmosphere within his writing that is transformative, as in while reading you may forget you’re sitting in your comfortable home as a sense of foreboding permeates the air. This historical novel follows the life of Good Stab, a Blackfeet Indian as he seeks justice on the Montana plains in 1912 following a massacre of 217 Blackfeet. Jones also uses irony and dark humor to acknowledge and bring to light uncomfortable themes of racism and cultural blindness.
Graphic Horror
From Hell : Being a Melodrama in Six Parts by Alan Moore (1999)
Set in Whitechaple, the poor neighborhood in London where serial killer Jack the Ripper took the lives of at least five women in the fall of 1888, From Hell follows the theory the murders were part of a conspiracy to cover up the birth of an illegitimate royal child fathered by Prince Albert Victor. There is a high level of Victorian creepiness in the text and especially in the illustrations. The black and white drawings evoke desperation and evil born from privilege and the occult (there’s a touch of Freemason weirdness). While the Queen wields power, most women are rendered oppressively without agency, giving the reader a disquieting feeling of witnessing misogyny at its most brutal expression. There’s a lot in this story, including ideas about all time being concurrent and societal responsibility for individual crime. If you pick this one up, give yourself time to digest it in its entirety.