This has been a light reading year, for various reasons of circumstance and laziness, but here are the standouts in my mind: * Thomas Merton -- The Wisdom of t

This has been a light reading year, for various reasons of circumstance and laziness, but here are the standouts in my mind: * Thomas Merton -- The Wisdom of the Desert A collection of quotes by and about the Desert Fathers of the early Christian church. I especially liked the ones that showed extreme mercy and selflessness, such as the monks who turned in a band of robbers, felt bad about it, and broke them out of prison, or the monk who would not count payments he received, as that might cause someone who cheated him to add lying about it to their sins. * Alfred Lansing -- Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage This is just an exciting adventure log, following Shackleton's expedition as they spent over a year stranded on an Antarctic ice floe. "The adaptability of the human creature is such that they actually had to remind themselves on occasion of their desperate circumstances." -- Alfred Lansing * Seneca -- Letters from a Stoic "I am not, mind you, against your possessing [riches], but I want to ensure that you possess them without tremors; and this you will only achieve in one way, by convincing yourself that you can live a happy life even without them, and by always regarding them as being on the point of vanishing." Letter XVIII