All Things Shining: Reading the Western Classics to Find Meaning in a Secular Age by Hubert Dreyfus and Sean Dorrance Kelly

This book begins by positing that we have lost meaning in our secular age. It goes through the highlights of Western history (including Homer, Hegel, Kant, Aristotle, Plato, Dante, and Melville) to establish what we've lost. Finally the authors suggest that if we can reinvest our everyday actions with purpose, we can approach a secular form of meaning. Their argument isn't totally convincing to me, but I found the process of reading the book quite enjoyable, and the readings they offer thought provoking.

The Black Book of Buried Secrets by Rick Riordan

This book is a compendium of information about the 39 Clues that ties up some loose ends from the previous book and is meant to keep readers ready for the next part of the series, which will continue in April and then re-launch in August. If you're obsessive about learning the whole story, you'll enjoy this book, but I wouldn't read it just for its own value.

The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien

This book concludes the story of Nine-Fingered Frodo and the Ring of Doom. I noticed this time around, in addition to Sam and Frodo's awareness of their role in the story, how the story matches neatly: Frodo loses a finger to end the story just as Sauron lost one to start the story. The loss of the finger also echoes the way Beren lost his hand on his quest to recover a Silmaril. The appendices are much easier to read when you're familiar with Tolkien's work in The Silmarillion. I found the story of Aragorn and Arwen (in Appendix A) particularly moving this time.

The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien

This book divides its energies evenly between the events that begin to stir Rohan and Gondor as the remaining members of the Fellowship come into their bounds and Frodo and Sam's journey to Mordor, with the help of Gollum. This time through, I was particularly struck by the foreshadowing with regard to Gollum's role in the adventures. I was also much more aware of the logic of Frodo and Sam's journey (sometimes I hesitate to start Book IV, but not this time!).

My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass's second autobiography is much longer than Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass despite the fact that only ten years elapsed between the two books. This book, while it treats Douglass's life through 1855, still focuses mainly on his life as a slave. There's much more description of his life in slavery, though, and in some senses it's less personal--there are several chapters devoted to various aspects of how the slave system works, on the plantation level.

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

When I reread this book I was particularly attentive to the scenes of foreshadowing and the revelation through dreams. There were several moments that I had not paid a lot of attention to in previous readings that revealed a lot about what was going on at the time, if you know where to look. I also noticed the meter of Tolkien's songs--there's a lot of tetrameter. I'm excited to press on into Rohan and Mordor.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass

In this book, the first of three autobiographies that Douglass would write, Douglass writes about his experiences as a slave. He spends a lot of time dealing with how he learned to read and write and his decisions to stand up for himself (against Mr. Covey) and to escape to freedom. He doesn't detail the escape itself so that other enslaved persons could still use that route. The book is brief, but moving.