Looking for great books to read in 2017? Today as I was organizing my home I found a pile of books I have finished reading during the last few months. The number of books I have finished impressed me, as I haven’t been reading as much since becoming a mom. This year, however; I decided to spend more time reading, and I have accumulated a nice selection of books.

Great Books to Read in 2017

I used to give excuses as to why I didn’t have the time to sit and read, but in all honesty, if you truly want to do something, you can always find the time. Below you’ll find my top picks from all the books I’ve had the pleasure to read lately.

Great Books to Read in 2017


When Breath Becomes Air – Non-Fiction (US/CAN)

At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.

What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.

Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer, who became both.

A Dog’s Purpose – Novel (US/CAN)

Heartwarming, insightful, and often laugh-out-loud funny, A Dog’s Purpose is not only the emotional and hilarious story of a dog’s many lives but also a dog’s eye commentary on human relationships and the unbreakable bonds between man and man’s best friend. This moving and beautifully crafted story teaches us that love never dies, that our true friends are always with us, and that every creature on earth is born with a purpose.

The Woman in Cabin 10 – Mystery, Thriller & Suspense (US/CAN)

In this tightly wound, enthralling story reminiscent of Agatha Christie’s works, Lo Blacklock, a journalist who writes for a travel magazine, has just been given the assignment of a lifetime: a week on a luxury cruise with only a handful of cabins. The sky is clear, the waters calm, and the veneered, select guests jovial as the exclusive cruise ship, the Aurora, begins her voyage in the picturesque North Sea.

At first, Lo’s stay is nothing but pleasant, but as the week wears on, frigid winds whip the desk, gray skies fall, and Lo witnesses what she can only describe as a dark and terrifying nightmare: a woman being thrown overboard. The problem? All passengers remain accounted for—and so, the ship sails on as if nothing has happened, despite Lo’s desperate attempts to convey that something (or someone) has gone terribly, terribly wrong…

With surprising twists, spine-tingling turns, and a setting that proves as uncomfortably claustrophobic as it is eerily beautiful, Ruth Ware offers up another taut and intense read in The Woman in Cabin 10—one that will leave even the most sure-footed reader restlessly uneasy long after the last page is turned.

Never Let You Go – Novel (US/CAN)

Eleven years ago, Lindsey Nash escaped into the night with her young daughter and left an abusive relationship. Her ex-husband, Andrew, was sent to jail and Lindsey started over with a new life.

Now, Lindsey is older and wiser, with her own business and a teenage daughter who needs her more than ever. When Andrew is finally released from prison, Lindsey believes she has cut all ties and left the past behind her. But she gets the sense that someone is watching her, tracking her every move. Her new boyfriend is threatened. Her home is invaded, and her daughter is shadowed. Lindsey is convinced it’s her ex-husband, even though he claims he’s a different person. But has he really changed? Is the one who wants her dead closer to home than she thought?

With Never Let You Go, Chevy Stevens delivers a chilling, twisting thriller that crackles with suspense as it explores the darkest heart of love and obsession.

A Mother’s Reckoning – Memoirs, True Crime (US/CAN)

On April 20, 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold walked into Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. Over the course of minutes, they would kill twelve students and a teacher and wound twenty-four others before taking their own lives.
 
For the last sixteen years, Sue Klebold, Dylan’s mother, has lived with the indescribable grief and shame of that day. How could her child, the promising young man she had loved and raised, be responsible for such horror? And how, as his mother, had she not known something was wrong? Were there subtle signs she had missed? What, if anything, could she have done differently?
 
These are questions that Klebold has grappled with every day since the Columbine tragedy. In A Mother’s Reckoning, she chronicles with unflinching honesty her journey as a mother trying to come to terms with the incomprehensible. In the hope that the insights and understanding she has gained may help other families recognize when a child is in distress, she tells her story in full, drawing upon her personal journals, the videos and writings that Dylan left behind, and on countless interviews with mental health experts.
 
Filled with hard-won wisdom and compassion, A Mother’s Reckoning is a powerful and haunting book that sheds light on one of the most pressing issues of our time. And with fresh wounds from the recent Newtown and Charleston shootings, never has the need for understanding been more urgent.
 
*All author profits from the book will be donated to research and to charitable organizations focusing on mental health issues.

Miracles from Heaven – Non-Fiction (US/CAN)

Annabel Beam spent most of her childhood in and out of hospitals with a rare and incurable digestive disorder that prevented her from living a normal, healthy life. One sunny day when she was able to go outside and play with her sisters, she fell three stories headfirst into an old, hollowed-out tree. Implausibly, she survived without a scratch. While unconscious inside the tree, with rescue workers struggling to get to her, she visited heaven. After being released from the hospital, she defied science and had inexplicably recovered from her chronic ailment.

A remarkable family drama and uplifting, hope-filled memoir, Miracles from Heaven will change how we look at the world around us. Includes a photo insert and discussion guide.

PREbiotics, not Probiotics – Health (US/CAN)

The dramatic discovery that the lower gut is home to an enormous collection of bacteria has revolutionized the science of the digestive system, indeed, the entire body. This gut ecosystem is known as the microbiome. Good bacteria live here as well as bad bacteria that we would rather not have. Probiotics are live bacteria that we ingest in the hope that they take up residence in the lower gut and provide health benefits. Prebiotics, on the other hand, are the plant fibers that are the fuel for the whole system and are the ones that make it work maximally for our benefit.

Frank Jackson M.D., a clinical gastroenterologist, provides a physician’s look at this whole system. He does it with a clinician’s approach by talking in Frank Jackson M.D., a clinical gastroenterologist provides a physician’s look at this whole system. He does it with a clinician’s approach by talking in plain language that is understandable by everyone.

Enjoy!

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