Summertime reads for seeing the good in others

Step into the light with these book recommendations

The Michigan eLibrary system makes it easy to read books stocked at any library in the state.

Alice McGuire | Deputy Editor

If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably spent the winter semester brute forcing yourself through a state of frozen horror, clinging to the promise of sunlight and survival, straining against the limitations of your corporeal form in order to complete your everyday tasks as your calf muscles withered alongside your New Year’s resolutions. I don’t much like cold weather or grey skies.

As far as I’m concerned, summer is the season of self-improvement. And there is nothing I want to strengthen more than my own faith in love and humanity. So, if you’re in need of a book to take on the nature trail this summer semester, here are my top picks for seeing the good in literally anyone:

Borderline, Narcissistic, and Schizoid Adaptations: The Pursuit of Love, Admiration, and Safety by Elinor Greenberg, Ph.D.

Are you tired of memes that claim every person who has ever caused harm is a narcissist and must be exiled from society? Using accessible language, Psychology Today writer and Gestalt therapy trainer Elinor Greenberg challenges the notion that a personality can be a disorder, leaving in its place a compassionate framework that renders it easy to name the patterns of strengths and weaknesses humans come to embody as a result of our nervous systems’ ability to adapt to survive our early environments. Unfortunately, the book is weirdly expensive, but it provides an opportunity to get acquainted with interlibrary loans through the Michigan eLibrary system at our beloved public libraries, just in time for summer reading challenges!

Unfollow: A Journey from Hatred to Hope by Meagan Phelps-Roper

When I took SOC 100, I wrote a letter to the Westboro Baptist Church, urging them to reconsider their ways. I didn’t anticipate finding myself, years later, transformed by the writing of someone who grew up within it. Phelps-Roper’s love for her family makes this memoir shine, while her belief in the human capacity for change and growth is contagious. I’ve found myself more inclined than ever to believe in the power of being kind on the internet since encountering her story, and I’m forever grateful that she made the decision to share it.

Into That Darkness: An Examination of Conscience by Gitta Sereny

This book details the worst sins humankind is capable of as well as how one goes about rationalizing away their own part in enabling them. Maybe that’s not a summer read to some, but I need sunlight to push through the darkness. I don’t think I’ve encountered an example of the banality of evil that affected me more than Sereny’s long-form interview with Franz Stangl, who was commandant of the extermination camp, Treblinka. At this point, you might be confused as to why this book gives me hope, but let me spoil the ending: He admitted to his guilt. I didn’t used to think such a thing was possible–at least not for someone quite so guilty.