1. How the Grinch Stole Christmas, by Dr. Seuss, Random House
2. The Polar Express, by Chris Van Allsburg, Harcourt
3. Goodnight Moon, by Margaret Wise Brown, Clement Hurd (Illus.), Harper
4. Gingerbread Christmas, by Jan Brett, Putnam
5. Ada Twist, Scientist, by Andrea Beaty, David Roberts (Illus.), Abrams Books for Young Readers
6. We Found a Hat, by Jon Klassen, Candlewick Press
7. Give Please a Chance, by Bill O'Reilly, James Patterson, Jimmy Patterson
8. Little Blue Truck's Christmas, by Alice Schertle, Jill McElmurry (Illus.), Harcourt
9. Penguin Problems, by Jory John, Lane Smith (Illus.), Random House Books for Young Readers
10. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, by Eric Carle, Putnam
11. Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, by Robert Frost, Susan Jeffers (Illus.), Dutton
12. Mother Bruce, by Ryan T. Higgins, Disney/Hyperion
13. Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak, Harper
14. The Night Before Christmas, by Clement C. Moore, Corinne Malvern (Illus.), Golden Books
15. The Book With No Pictures, by B.J. Novak, Dial
Mark Sappenfield
Dear Reader,
About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:
“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”
If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.
But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.
The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.
We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”
If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.
