For fiction, I don't restrict myself by genre, though lean towards horror, thrillers, science fiction, and historical fiction. Recently Glenn Arbery's novel Boundaries of Eden blew my mind: it's a heritage mystery, southern Gothic, and drug-cartel thriller all rolled into one. It begins like a Faulkner classic and then slow-burns into something much more deep and disturbing.

For nonfiction, I like history, religion, and philosophy, especially books that challenge well-established ideas. In the list below, for example, Ivan Eland ranks the U.S. presidents based on their adherence to constitutional principles, rather than their management style and popular appeal. Free Speech on Campus urges that colleges must support liberal diversity without restricting the free expression of ideas in the process. Cynical Theories explores the tension between classical liberalism and woke postmodernism, and the differences between their approaches to social justice. And finally, Veritas is an absolute page turner, the true story of a pornographer who conned Harvard into believing that a forged gospel of "Jesus's wife" was genuine; this book was nominated for the Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime.