(And other highlights)
My lyric for the year comes from Elyssa Figueroa (Smith)’s I Won’t Break. She writes, “‘Cause to live by faith and not by sight is like wеaring a blindfold and running.” This line inspired her 2021 album title and it has been a good companion to me over the last several years. This year, I graduated with my doctorate, started a new job, and moved across the country. The whole year felt like running at full speed with a blindfold on, hoping and praying that the LORD’s gentle voice would lead me to safety and not towards stumbling. It did, but I’m honest enough to admit I was scared the whole time. This year, I read 64 books, 5 of which rose to the very top. And, for the first time this year, I’m including my top 5 films I watched this year and top 5 albums released this year as well. Let’s dig in:
Top Five Albums
#5: Automatic by The Lumineers
One of the best bands to come out of Denver, The Lumineers, returned with their folksy signature in their February 14th album. The songs Asshole and Keys on the Table stand out as perfect elevations of the band’s sound.
#4: Breach by Twenty One Pilots
There’s something both nostalgic and futuristic about listening to Twenty One Pilots in 2025. Their new album has no-skips but my favorite tracks are Robot Voices (particularly in an age of AI) and Garbage (a song about feeling terrible but trying to survive and thrive anyway).
#3: Luckyman by Wingtip
Wingtip is a longtime producer and DJ whose first full album is perfectly mastered from start to finish. He focuses on the failures, dangers, and intoxications of love in an age of insecurity and half-said sentences. This is truly a perfect album that has been on repeat since its release in October.
#2: I Don’t Know How But They Found Me! by Jensen McRae
Another album on consistent repeat, Jensen’s sophomore attempt proves she’s a force to be reckoned with that will be on the scene for a long time. This album focuses on the devastation of lost love and the dangers of thinking love alone can save you.
#1: Learning to Trust by Tenth Avenue North
Thinking that as a lifelong Tenth fan, their new album wouldn’t make the top of my list is a mistake. But, bias aside, Tenth’s comeback album backed by the three new members truly delivers. From the opening note of the Overture (which itself made it into my most played songs of the year) to the last note of All Shall Be Well, Tenth Avenue North continues to push the Church in a better direction. Legendary collaborations with Rend Collective, Leanna Crawford, and opener Natalie Layne prove that Tenth Avenue North is not only back – they’re better than ever.
Top Five Movies
#5: One of Them Days
Keke Palmer is never going to disappoint you, and it turns out SZA was born to be an actress. The buddy comedy of two women trying to pay their rent turns into an epic adventure of action and friendship that I guarantee will make you laugh in spite of all our present darkness.
#4: Sinners
The only thing better than two Michael B. Jordans is two Michael B. Jordans backed by an epic soundtrack. Sinners is a movie for horror fans, music lovers, Americans willing to confront an honest past, and everyone with a heart.
#3: I Saw The TV Glow
This is a searing and memorable exploration of queerness in a cisheteronormative world will leave you discomforted and touched. Justice Smith is one of the best gifts to come out of Hollywood in recent years and his performance in the 2024 metahorror flick deserves all of the awards.
#2: Sorry, Baby
Eva Victor pulls triple duty (as actor/writer/director) in the most heartbreaking and genuinely hilarious indie film to debut in recent years. Tackling the tragically commonplace phenomenon of sexual violence and its aftermath, while somehow finding the light and humanness in the gift of being alive, Sorry, Baby is a must-see for everyone living through trauma.
#1: Daniela Forever
Henry Golding’s latest indie film is a searing hallucination trip through grief in an age where virtual reality is considered as real as oxygen. A haunting forewarning of the emotional consequences of living in an AI age Daniela Forever asks us to experience something real.
Top Five Books
Before we get to the list everyone’s been waiting for, I have to list some honorable mentions. The sci-fi classic Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky manages to still feel fresh and inventive over fifty years later, Hiromi Goto’s Shadow Life confronts the omnipresent fear of death with genuine heart, and Caleb E. Campbell’s Disarming Leviathan proves that not all pastors have fallen prey to Christian Nationalism while also providing genuine tips and strategies for how to thoughtfully navigate our current ecclesial times. Additionally, I personally think my latest book, Weak Eyes, is worth checking out.
#5: Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins
I love you like all-fire.
The Hunger Games’ latest installment is a horrifying glimpse into our current times. This book had me sobbing like you wouldn’t believe, while also reminding me that hope is a tangible thing, even (and maybe especially) when it feels unreachable. Sunrise on the Reaping focuses on beloved curmudgeon Haymitch Abernathy’s gauntlet through the Quarter Quell. The original prequel, Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, left a lot to be desired but Sunrise on the Reaping soars above and beyond all expectations to deliver a genuinely heartwarming and horrifying return to Panem.
(Purchase Sunrise on the Reaping from Off the Beaten Path, an independent bookstore in Steamboat Springs, Colorado)
#4: Long Bright River by Liz Moore
They’re bad and good both, all the pieces.
You’ve undoubtedly heard the praises sung of Moore’s latest God of the Woods (also worth your time), but her 2020 thriller about two sisters caught on opposite ends of the opioid epidemic is even better in my opinion. I devoured this in three days like it was the only source of oxygen left on earth. Moore’s candor and heart is the only thing more powerful than her ability to write brokenness and twists.
(Purchase Long Bright River from Island Books, an independent bookstore in Mercer Island, Washington)
#3: Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
The world is dangerous and we will not survive it. But there is this. Impermanent as it may be.
Keeping up with the two-adjective-followed-by-water titular theme, McConaghy’s latest novel continues to prove her unique prowess for building climate ravaged edge-of-the-earth settings as she documents a remote family encountering a stranger deep in the Antarctic. In each of her novels, the characters find original ways to shrink into themselves, scared of the wounding of the world. Her third international novel is her most popular and I don’t think that comes as a surprise. The book club elements of this book are compelling. I think Migrations (my 2021 #1 best book) is still my favorite, but this is a great novel with broad appeal to introduce others to the wonder and heartbreaking talent of Charlotte McConaghy.
(Purchase Wild Dark Shore from Elliott Bay Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Seattle, Washington)
#2: Dissolution by Nicholas Binge
I can bear anything, I think to myself, anything at all, so long as my life has these moments in it.
Binge’s follow-up to his bestselling Ascension stars Maggie Webb, an older woman who cares for her husband with dementia when a stranger arrives and reveals her husband isn’t losing his memory at all. As Maggie dives into his memories, a dark and twisted web emerges. Nicholas Binge, if you haven’t read him, is a genius. This book is a profound story of loss, love, beauty, and the science and humanity of our memories. Smart and human, this is a perfect read for thriller or sci-fi fans. It takes a little while to get into, but once you’re there, it’ll suck you in and never let you go. I’ll be thinking about this ending for a long, long time.
(Purchase Dissolution from Powell’s, an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon)
#1: The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
They were not demons, they were just men who had too much power and not enough sense.
Brandon Sanderson launches a new series fantasy series about a war on a desolate landscape known as the Shattered Plains. Prisoners, scholars, and soldiers occupy a brilliantly imagined world. At over 1,100 pages, it should be boring or have passages that lose your interest, but Sanderson effortlessly keeps your attention throughout the novel, even as he makes a world horrifyingly vivid. The Way of Kings is a powerful and emotional epic that asks us to evaluate the morality of war, the role of religion, the limits of human resilience, and what is ultimately worth pursuing. Sanderson’s stunning accomplishment easily takes this year’s top spot.
(Purchase The Way of Kings from Fountain Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Richmond, Virginia)
What was your best book of the year? Let us know in the comments below or on our social media posts!
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Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He sells poetry art here and published a collection of poems titled Weak Eyes, and masquerades as the spoken word artist Liihey. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page).
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