Book News & Reviews

Remembering Wendell Berry

8/31/2026

It's admittedly odd to have a mid-life crisis at 19, but there I was, living alone on my grandparent's farm having left college midway through my sophomore year. I didn't have much of a plan beyond working and reading, but I knew I wanted something more than what it felt like school offered at the time. Before leaving Georgetown, I went to some of my professors and asked for a reading list, and Georgetown being a small, liberal arts college in Central Kentucky, the works of Wendell Berry were highly represented. Reading his books there on the back porch is still one of my favorite memories.

I loved that house. My grandfather died when I was young, and my grandmother moved to town a few years before my return. She graciously agreed to let me live in the farmhouse rent free during my "sabbatical" as I pretentiously called it. There was no air-conditioning, which was absolutely miserable, but I was too stubborn and proud to get a window unit. Did Thoreau have window unit at Walden Pond, damnit!? Sure he lived in the upper, northeast instead of the sweltering armpit that is the Ohio River Valley, but still. While it made the home uninhabitable during the day, the evenings were magical. As the sun set, I'd open all the windows to cool the house and go on the screened-in back porch to read, while the crickets and the frogs did their best to keep me awake.

I have come to the age now where I can see how short a time we have to be here. And when I think about it, it can seem strange beyond telling that this particular bunch of us should be here on this little patch of ground in this little patch of time, and I can think of other times and places I might have lived, other kinds of man I might have been. But there is something else. There are moments when the heart is generous, and then it knows that for better or worse our lives are woven together here, with one another and with the place and all the living things.

So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.
Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.

Outside the Bible, the words of Wendell Berry generally, and the quote above from Jayber Crow specifically, are probably the writings that had the biggest impact on my life. You won't find any better descriptions of true community than Berry's novels, essays, and poetry. His ideas on vocation and membership have been a guiding light and call home for me on more than one occasion, persisting despite my worldly resistance at times.

Even though I have never harnessed a mule team, and I wouldn't know a donkey from a hole in the ground, I always felt like his books just made sense naturally. They are like driving on the back roads where you grew up...you don't need any help navigating. I loved the authentic descriptions of small communities that could have just as easily been the Cecilia or Sonora of my youth. I loved how he could weave between his earnest belief in the value of agrarian life while recognizing the fallibilities and absurdities of the characters found in Port William. I loved the contrariness of the Mad Farmer poems which rest in the tension between cheap labels, where someone can be fiercely independent while at the same time completely submit themselves to the ones around them. And I love that in a world determined to strip everything down to mere transactionalism, he showed what true economy actually looks like.

Sitting on that back, porch I'd read his books and listen to music well into the night, worrying, as many teenagers do, about what I would do and who I would become. I'd like to say I've completely outgrown the immature, selfish thinking of my youth, but I'd be lying if I said I did. However, twenty-some-odd years later, like Jayber, I have now gotten to the age where I know for better or worse my life is woven together here with these people in this place. I hope our little store makes it for the better, and that it might be a place where a new generation can find the timeless words of Wendell Berry for themselves.

The way we are, we are members of each other. All of us. Everything. The difference ain't in who is a member and who is not, but in who knows it and who don't."

Album Highlight: Saxophone Colossus by Sonny Rollins

5/26/2026

Sonny Rollins, one of the true jazz greats, passed away yesterday. I'm not nearly knowledgeable enough to write a retrospective of his career, but the nytimes has you covered with both an obituary and an overview of his essential recordings. His 1957 album Saxophone Colossus is one of the best jazz albums ever recorded, and is often a go to of mine when I'm reading or working.

For a Kentucky connection with Rollins, check out the book The Narcotic Farm. Just outside Lexington, Kentucky there is a prison that used to be known as the United States Narcotic Farm. Opened in 1935, it was a strange hybrid institution: part federal prison, part hospital, part psychiatric facility, part working farm, and part research laboratory. The federal government created it during the New Deal era as an attempt to treat addiction medically rather than purely as criminal behavior. Unfortunately, the "Narco Farm" was also one of the places used for government experiments with LSD and other mind-altering drugs on patients and inmates.

Long before drug rehabilitation facilities were common, "The Farm" was a place where many musicians, artists, and other cultural icons voluntarily went to treat their drug addictions, including Rollins who was a patient in 1955. Some of the best jazz performances in Kentucky took place at the facility while musicians like Rollins were rehabbing. The book is a truly fascinating look at life in mid-century America.

52 Book Challenge: MAy Update

5/1/2026

This year we're doing a 52 book challenge! We hope you follow along, and join us by taking the challenge yourself. You can borrow from our list or create your own!

I made it a goal to broaden my reading horizons, and I want to continue that resolution into the next year! Therefore, I'm challenging myself to read 52 books in 2026 (I'm counting books read in December of 2025....it's not cheating...okay, maybe it is a little, but we all have lives so get off my back!). To spice up the challenge even more, we'll pull books from all the different genres Birdwhistell Books has to offer.

Here is the list that we will update every month throughout the year. The good thing about this challenge is that once the book is finished, it goes right onto our shelves ready for the next reader! I hope you create your own list to share with us so we can see what we should read next!

General / Literary Fiction: 5/10

Audition by Katie Kitamura - Slow-burn look at the roles people play and the narratives we construct. It's not a mystery but you begin the book thinking the story is one thing and then it completely flips.
The Dog Master by W. Bruce Cameron - Historical fiction surrounding the domestication of wolves 30,000 years ago. The ancient history nerd in me couldn't pass it up. The imagining of how the first wolves were tamed was interesting, but the characters lacked depth and there was a little too much soap-opera drama for me.
A Burning by Megha Majumdar - I picked up this book without any idea about the story. It is an interesting look at how the incentives of modern society can influence the marginalized. Very good read for a first novel.
The Hustler by Walter Tevis - I worked my way through the works of KY author Walter Tevis, who had a remarkable number of novels turned into films. The Hustler is a really well done 50’s/60’s teenage anti-establishment, angst book that I would put right up there with the other classics of that genre.
The Color of Money - by Walter Tevis - I didn't really enjoy this is the sequel to The Hustler. I thought Tevis left the main character in an interesting place at the end of his first book. However, in this story he completely changed the narrative, and then proceeded to meander around the rest of the book.
Queen's Gambit by Walter Tevis - By far the best of his books that I've read. He makes the chess scenes action packed without getting lost in the weeds. The characters are complex and evolve in interesting ways (with the glaring exception of Jolene which disappointed me). I highly recommend this one.

Mystery/Thriller: _/5
Si-Fi / Fantasy: 2/5

The Man Who Fell To Earth by Walter Tevis - It was good and I kept thinking that he had to have written it with Bowie in mind, who ends up playing the lead in the movie. But knowing Tevis’s own struggles after early brilliance, it’s kinda sad.
The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin - I'm new to science fiction so I figured I should read one of the classics. I especially enjoyed the tie in to mid-century Chinese history and society.

Kentucky: 3/5

Pauline's by Pauline Tabor - The memoir of the Madam of Clay Street in Bowling Green, KY! If you like the Bluegrass Conspiracy and The Cornbread Mafia then you need to read this one as well, and it's actually really well written too.
Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story by Wendell Berry - Wendell Berry's newest edition to the Port William novels. Ostensibly, it's a story about the impact of the tobacco co-op on the Port William Membership, but reads much more like his essays.
Lark Ascending by Silas House - Really enjoyed this one from Silas House. It is a dystopian novel, yet it is still rooted in timeless values and place.

Romance: _/3
Poetry & Plays: 2/3

The Mad Farmer Poems by Wendell Berry - I'm coming back to The Mad Farmer Poems more and more these days. I have found myself having a harder and harder time just going along to get along with the inane and the insane, and when that happens I know I can find some solace in the poems of the Mad Farmer.
Prometheus Bound & Other Plays by Aeschylus - I'm doing a Prometheus trilogy (Aeschylus' Bound, Shelley's Unbound, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein) inspired by something I read about AI earlier this year. Prometheus Bound is one of my favorite Greek plays and has some of the best lines.

Classics: 1/3

Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse - Can't believe it has taken me this long to read this one. One of those books that took me like five tries to start reading it, but once I got into it I was hooked. See my highlight post for some of my favorite quotes.

Memoir & Biography: _/3
Religion & Philosophy: 2/3

On the Nature of Things by Lucretius - I read this so I could read The Swerve: How the World Became Modern which is about the rediscovery of this classic work of Epicurean philosophy. Absolutely beautiful poem.
A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness by Michael Pollan - Pollan is one of my favorite public intellectual writers. In this book he not only dives into what consciousness is, but also delves into whether it is a human specific trait. A World Appears reads like a sequel or a continuation of the themes developed in his previous book, How To Change Your Mind.

History: 2/3

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern - Stephen Greenblatt - Had a hard time trying to figure out how to categorize this book. It is a fantastic piece of literature that transcends any one genre, but at its core, it is a story tracing of the foundations of our modern world through the history of Western Civilization by telling the story of the rediscovery of Lucretius' On the Nature of Things.
1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--and How It Shattered a Nation by Andrew Ross Sorkin - Sorkin wrote Too Big To Fail, the definitive account of the 2008 financial crisis. In this account of the beginnings of the Great Depression, he takes a less wonky approach and instead tries to do for the stock market crash what Walter Lord did for the Titanic in A Night to Remember.

Society & Culture: 3/3

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad - Writes about crisis in Gaza, but connects it into a much larger and deeper story about who we are and the stories we tell ourselves. Part memoir, part war correspondence, part societal critique...it reads much like Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me.
The Anti-Nuclear Handbook by Stephen Croall - I found this graphic novel from the 1970's, and I had to read it. I love artifacts from societal debates in the past (not that the debate between renewable vs. non-renewable energy ever stopped). I enjoy them even more than history books because you're not just reading about a different time, it's a portal that will take you there for a firsthand look around.
Your Data Will Be Used Against You by Andrew Guthrie Ferguson - Important look at the rise of surveillance and data policing and its impact on our ideas of privacy in America. It looks at how we leave a digital footprint literally everywhere we go, and how AI is making it easier and easier to search and analyze mountains of data.

Science & Nature: _/3
Arts, Culture, and Sports: _/3

Book Highlight: Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

4/19/2026

I've learned that I'm a fan of the sub-genre "hard science fiction" known for technical, scientific story-lines that mostly adhere to the fundamental laws of nature, with a few variations. I'm reading The Three-Body Problem now, which I would also put in that category, and it is really interesting too.

Go see the movie. It's excellent. You'll get to see an alien that looks like a rock dance. Then come by the store and pick up a copy of Weir's books if you haven't already.

So I'll be the first to admit that I've never been the biggest science fiction reader. However, I have been branching out into the sci-fi world of late, and that started with Andy Weir's books, The Martian and Project Hail Mary. I took my friend Travis to a book sale in Cincinnati to pick up some inventory for the store, and he became really disappointed when I tried to put back the beat-up copy of The Martian that he picked out. He said it was his favorite book, so I figured I would give reading Weir's books a shot.

I loved both books (I haven't read Artemis yet). They are quick, funny, and full of nerdy science explanations, that you would think would become tedious and overwhelming after a while but they really work. Now, I have no clue whether any of the science makes sense or not (I'm more of a humanities person myself), but once you just accept what he's saying as plausible, then it becomes a really enjoyable read.

Book Highlight: A World Appears by Michael Pollan

4/11/2026

Michael Pollan is one of my favorite public intellectual writers. His writing deals less with telling you answers to problems and instead takes you with him on a path of discovery. Pollan makes difficult theories and concepts very accessible, and I have really enjoyed his last two works exploring the mind and self. His latest book, A World Appears reads like a sequel or a continuation of the themes developed in his previous book, How To Change Your Mind (here is his interview with Klein for that book). Both are fascinating.

Nearing the end of this journey, I find myself not at all sure what to believe, if anything. I'm abashed to say I know less now than I did when, naively, I set out to unravel the mystery of consciousness...The more I strove to penetrate the mystery, focusing the increasingly narrow beam of my attention on what consciousness is and what it does and how it came to be, the less of it I was actually experiencing - whatever it was...[but] sometimes not-knowing opens us up to possibilities that knowing, or trying to know, or thinking we already know, closes off...

Consciousness is a miracle, truly, and remains the deepest of mysteries, yes, but it is also so very simple it can fit into a sentence. I open my eyes and a world appears.

Album Highlight - The Legend of Lead Belly

4/4/2026

I was over at our neighbor, New Style Records, flipping through their vinyl the other day during a shift change and came across this Lead Belly album. I asked Jill if we could put it on, and of course it ended up coming home with me.

Lead Belly was a foundational American folks/blues/roots artist, influencing the likes of Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, and countless others. You should really check out not only his music but also his life story, from being born on a plantation, going in and out of prison, to eventually being discovered by John and Alan Lomax.

My favorite song on the album is the haunting classic, "Where did you Sleep Last Night?" or otherwise known as "In the Pines." It's one of those songs that captivates you immediately, making you stop whatever else you were doing at the moment and simply listen. Many artists have covered this song but here are some of my favorites.

Lead Belly might not have been the first to record the song, but his version is the one everyone is drafting off of since its release. I'm not sure what artists are doing when they try to do a straight cover. You're not going to do it better than Lead Belly so you might as well take a chance and find a way to make the song your own.

Nirvana did just that, making this hundred years old blues/folk song into their own grunge cult classic. I don't want to get into the mythologizing that happens with this song, the unplugged set, and Cobain's death. Instead, I just appreciate his talent to be able to play a song already rich in authenticity and feeling, and then take it to a whole other level.

The power of this song usually comes from the heavy blues chords and the pain in the artist's voice, but Bill Monroe's bluegrass version almost makes the song sound chipper. That's until you hear the whistling and yodeling that mimick a cold, lonely wind blowing through the pines. If Lead Belly and Cobain's versions make you feel alone in the dark, Monroe's version puts you there on edge in the middle of the day with a hard, unsettling wind cutting right through.

Now I will grant you that the Grateful Dead's version doesn't belong anywhere close to these other three, but I do appreciate it as an example of how the Dead can turn any song into a jam session. Again, if you're not going to top the original then you have to make it your own.

Author Spotlight: Walter Tevis

3/28/2026

I’ve been working my way through the works of Kentucky author Walter Tevis, who had a remarkable number of novels turned into films. I like to think that I'm pretty well versed in Kentucky literature, but I will admit that I didn't know about Tevis until coming across a KET documentary about his life. I would encourage you to watch the documentary because it helps you understand his books a lot better.

The Hustler

The Hustler is a really well done 50’s/60’s teenage anti-establishment, angst book that I would put right up there with the other classics of that genre. I especially liked how the story deals with self-sabotage and the ways people try to build mental frameworks to deal with potential defeats instead of doing what is necessary to win. Paul Newman is great in the movie, and Jackie Gleason is a perfect fit for Minnesota Fats.

The Color of Money

I didn't really enjoy this sequel to The Hustler. I thought Tevis left the main character in an interesting place at the end of his first book. However, in this story he completely changed the narrative and then proceeded to meander around the rest of the book. I also think its funny that the movie is completely different than the book, but since the book wasn't that great, I was more than okay with the changes.

The Man who Fell to Earth

The Man Who Fell to Earth was good, and I kept thinking that he had to have written it with Bowie in mind, who ends up playing the lead in the movie, but it was written well before Bowie became a star. Knowing Tevis’s own struggles after early brilliance, it’s kind of sad to see his own descent and struggles in the story. This novel was written in the early 60's after the The Hustler, but it wouldn't be until the 1980's that Tevis is able to return to form, after struggling with alcoholism, producing most of this other books.

The Queen's Gambit

By far the best of his books that I've read. He makes the chess scenes action packed without getting lost in the weeds. The characters are complex and evolve in interesting ways (with the glaring exception of Jolene which disappointed me). I especially thought Tevis wrote the perspective of a woman operating in a traditionally male dominated game in ways that were really ahead of its time in the 1980's. I highly recommend this one.

Book Highlight: 1929 ~ by Andrew Ross Sorkin

3/21/2026

Ultimately, the story of 1929 is not about rates or regulation, nor about the cleverness of short sellers or the failures of bankers. It is about something far more enduring: human nature. No matter how many warnings are issued or how many laws are written, people will find new ways to believe that the good times can last forever. They will dress up hope as certainty. And in that collective fever, humanity will again and again lose its head.

52 Book Challenge: March Update

3/1/2026

General / Literary Fiction: 5/10

Audition by Katie Kitamura - Slow-burn look at the roles people play and the narratives we construct. It's not a mystery but you begin the book thinking the story is one thing and then it completely flips.
The Dog Master by W. Bruce Cameron - Historical fiction surrounding the domestication of wolves 30,000 years ago. The ancient history nerd in me couldn't pass it up. The imagining of how the first wolves were tamed was interesting, but the characters lacked depth and there was a little too much soap-opera drama for me.
A Burning by Megha Majumdar - I picked up this book without any idea about the story. It is an interesting look at how the incentives of modern society can influence the marginalized. Very good read for a first novel.
The Hustler by Walter Tevis - I worked my way through the works of KY author Walter Tevis, who had a remarkable number of novels turned into films. The Hustler is a really well done 50’s/60’s teenage anti-establishment, angst book that I would put right up there with the other classics of that genre.
The Color of Money - by Walter Tevis - I didn't really enjoy this is the sequel to The Hustler. I thought Tevis left the main character in an interesting place at the end of his first book. However, in this story he completely changed the narrative, and then proceeded to meander around the rest of the book.
Queen's Gambit by Walter Tevis - By far the best of his books that I've read. He makes the chess scenes action packed without getting lost in the weeds. The characters are complex and evolve in interesting ways (with the glaring exception of Jolene which disappointed me). I highly recommend this one.

Mystery/Thriller: _/5
Si-Fi / Fantasy: 1/5

The Man Who Fell To Earth by Walter Tevis - It was good and I kept thinking that he had to have written it with Bowie in mind, who ends up playing the lead in the movie. But knowing Tevis’s own struggles after early brilliance, it’s kinda sad.

Kentucky: 3/5

Pauline's by Pauline Tabor - The memoir of the Madam of Clay Street in Bowling Green, KY! If you like the Bluegrass Conspiracy and The Cornbread Mafia then you need to read this one as well, and it's actually really well written too.
Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story by Wendell Berry - Wendell Berry's newest edition to the Port William novels. Ostensibly, it's a story about the impact of the tobacco co-op on the Port William Membership, but reads much more like his essays.
Lark Ascending by Silas House - Really enjoyed this one from Silas House. It is a dystopian novel, yet it is still rooted in timeless values and place.

Romance: _/3
Poetry & Plays: 1/3

The Mad Farmer Poems by Wendell Berry - I'm coming back to The Mad Farmer Poems more and more these days. I have found myself having a harder and harder time just going along to get along with the inane and the insane, and when that happens I know I can find some solace in the poems of the Mad Farmer.

Classics: 1/3

Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse - Can't believe it has taken me this long to read this one. One of those books that took me like five tries to start reading it, but once I got into it I was hooked. See my highlight post for some of my favorite quotes.

Memoir & Biography: _/3
Religion & Philosophy: 1/3

On the Nature of Things by Lucretius - I read this so I could read The Swerve: How the World Became Modern which is about the rediscovery of this classic work of Epicurean philosophy. Absolutely beautiful poem.

History: 2/3

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern - Stephen Greenblatt - Had a hard time trying to figure out how to categorize this book. It is a fantastic piece of literature that transcends any one genre, but at its core, it is a story tracing of the foundations of our modern world through the history of Western Civilization by telling the story of the rediscovery of Lucretius' On the Nature of Things.
1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--and How It Shattered a Nation by Andrew Ross Sorkin - Sorkin wrote Too Big To Fail, the definitive account of the 2008 financial crisis. In this account of the beginnings of the Great Depression, he takes a less wonky approach and instead tries to do for the stock market crash what Walter Lord did for the Titanic in A Night to Remember.

Society & Culture: 2/3

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad - Writes about crisis in Gaza, but connects it into a much larger and deeper story about who we are and the stories we tell ourselves. Part memoir, part war correspondence, part societal critique...it reads much like Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me.
The Anti-Nuclear Handbook by Stephen Croall - I found this graphic novel from the 1970's, and I had to read it. I love artifacts from societal debates in the past (not that the debate between renewable vs. non-renewable energy ever stopped). I enjoy them even more than history books because you're not just reading about a different time, it's a portal that will take you there for a firsthand look around.

Science & Nature: _/3
Arts, Culture, and Sports: _/3

52 Book Challenge: February Update

2/1/2026

General / Literary Fiction: 3/10

Audition by Katie Kitamura - Slow-burn look at the roles people play and the narratives we construct. It's not a mystery but you begin the book thinking the story is one thing and then it completely flips.
The Dog Master by W. Bruce Cameron - Historical fiction surrounding the domestication of wolves 30,000 years ago. The ancient history nerd in me couldn't pass it up. The imagining of how the first wolves were tamed was interesting, but the characters lacked depth and there was a little too much soap-opera drama for me.
A Burning by Megha Majumdar - I picked up this book without any idea about the story. It is an interesting look at how the incentives of modern society can influence the marginalized. Very good read for a first novel.

Mystery/Thriller: _/5
Si-Fi / Fantasy: _/5
Kentucky: 2/5

Pauline's by Pauline Tabor - The memoir of the Madam of Clay Street in Bowling Green, KY! If you like the Bluegrass Conspiracy and The Cornbread Mafia then you need to read this one as well, and it's actually really well written too.
Marce Catlett: The Force of a Story by Wendell Berry - Wendell Berry's newest edition to the Port William novels. Ostensibly, it's a story about the impact of the tobacco co-op on the Port William Membership, but reads much more like his essays.

Romance: _/3
Poetry & Plays: 1/3

The Mad Farmer Poems by Wendell Berry - I'm coming back to The Mad Farmer Poems more and more these days. I have found myself having a harder and harder time just going along to get along with the inane and the insane, and when that happens I know I can find some solace in the poems of the Mad Farmer.

Classics: 1/3

Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse - Can't believe it has taken me this long to read this one. One of those books that took me like five tries to start reading it, but once I got into it I was hooked. See my highlight post for some of my favorite quotes.

Memoir & Biography: _/3
Religion & Philosophy: 1/3

On the Nature of Things by Lucretius - I read this so I could read The Swerve: How the World Became Modern which is about the rediscovery of this classic work of Epicurean philosophy. Absolutely beautiful poem.

History: 1/3

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern - Stephen Greenblatt - Had a hard time trying to figure out how to categorize this book. It is a fantastic piece of literature that transcends any one genre, but at its core, it is a story tracing of the foundations of our modern world through the history of Western Civilization by telling the story of the rediscovery of Lucretius' On the Nature of Things.

Society & Culture: 2/3

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad - Writes about crisis in Gaza, but connects it into a much larger and deeper story about who we are and the stories we tell ourselves. Part memoir, part war correspondence, part societal critique...it reads much like Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me.
The Anti-Nuclear Handbook by Stephen Croall - I found this graphic novel from the 1970's, and I had to read it. I love artifacts from societal debates in the past (not that the debate between renewable vs. non-renewable energy ever stopped). I enjoy them even more than history books because you're not just reading about a different time, it's a portal that will take you there for a firsthand look around.

Science & Nature: _/3
Arts, Culture, and Sports: _/3

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The Hustler​

The Color of Money

The Man who Fell to Earth

The Queen's Gambit

The Hustler