Theology: Presence in the Modern World by Jacques Ellul.

It took me a long time to notice technology. Not the fact of it, of course, but its role in shaping humanity from the individual to the historical level. That, of course, is the point. Our tech becomes an extension of ourselves so effortlessly that our brains don’t even know where one ends and the other begins, sometimes for brilliant effect, as in musical instruments and sporting gear, but sometimes for our slow and steady annihilation. Once I noticed tech, I tried to figure out where and how to extract myself from its power over me. It’s impossible. Then what? Then I found Jacques Ellul. Insisting that you cannot extract yourself from humanity’s intrinsic entanglement with the tools we make (or the propaganda we speak), he explores how to be faithful and distinctively Christian in this tech-shaped world and not in any other (imaginary or self-made) world; how to be salt and light. Ellul is the antidote to both utopianism and despair. (For further reflections on Ellul, listen to the episode Dad and I did on his work on Queen of the Sciences.)

Novel: The Ugly by Alexander Boldizar.

In a world gone mad, the only hero is the unlikely hero. In this case, Muzhduk the Ugli the Fourth, one of a tribe of boulder-heaving Slovaks exiled to the worst part of Siberia some generations ago. If that sounds bad, imagine going from there to Harvard Law School. I discovered this novel back when I was trying to find and read every single Slovak novel translated into English. This one slightly violates the rule because it was written in English, not Slovak, but the author is Slovak. His underdog sensibility and hilarious evocation of all kinds of culture clashes is as good a metaphor as any for trying to navigate our way in a world that pretends to be free but is full of restrictions, taboos, and landmines in every direction.

Cookbook: Lateral Cooking by Niki Segnit.

Algorithm is something of a dirty word these days—those manipulable, hackable, and corruptible ways the internet and its programmers control your perception of reality. But in its original meaning, algorithm just meant a set of steps to follow to accomplish a certain goal. In other words, a recipe. A cook generally encounters a recipe as a freestanding thing, but Niki Segnit noticed the family relationships between recipes… and Lateral Cooking was born: from this recipe take one step to the left, and you get that recipe. For example, the opening chapter on bread moves from Flatbread & Crackers —> Soda Bread, Scones, & Cobbler —> Yeast-Risen Bread —> Buns —> Brioche —> Babas & Savarins. The arrangement shows how a little less milk, an extra egg, or a lot more butter changes one kind of thing into another. Each set of recipes is followed by flavor variations, a lateral move of its own in the direction of Segnit’s previous book, The Flavour Thesaurus (which I recommended awhile back, too). I use Lateral Cooking all the time now as a reference and template for developing my own recipes.