Where Ice Meets Fire
Resistance, Resilience, and the Books That Carried Me in 2025
By Randy Kaufman
When the World Turns Cold: Reading Courage in Icy and Uncertain Times
How to Stay Human in an Inhuman Age
Last year, I found myself reading about people standing at the edge—of empires, oceans, ideologies, and even themselves—and choosing courage, and sometimes love, anyway.
My reading drifted across icy landscapes, Cold War shadows, lost ships, and unforgettable women. Along the way, I kept company with memoirists, musicians, journalists, spies, revolutionaries—and even an alien in love.
At the time, my choices felt random. No rhyme. No reason. But looking back, a pattern emerges.
In 2025, I was circling the same essential questions:
What does a human being do when history, nature, or power closes in?
How do we survive in the most hostile climates—environmental and political?
How do we choose between betrayal and resistance, conformity and defiance, quiet survival and bold action?
When brutality and collapse prevail, how do we remain human—compassionate, curious, connected?
Even in stories of wreckage and repression, love persisted—at sea, in spiritual devotion, in friendship, in unexpected tenderness. These were not just books about endurance. They were books about what survives.
Cold War, Spies & Resistance
Checkpoint Charlie: The Cold War, The Berlin Wall, and the Most Dangerous Place On Earth (Compelling Cold War History) - Iain MacGregor
A vivid reminder of how ideology becomes geography—and how ordinary people live inside extraordinary tension.A Shadow in Moscow: A Cold War Novel - Katherine Reay
A story of secrecy and loyalty that asks what love and truth cost under authoritarian rule.The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War - Ben Macintyre
A gripping portrait of moral courage in the world of betrayal, where one person’s conscience can shift history.I Must Betray You - Ruta Sepetys
A haunting look at growing up in a surveillance state where survival demands impossible choices.A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II - Sonia Purnell
An unforgettable story of courage and determination.Address Unknown - Kressmann Taylor
A chilling warning about how quickly friendship and decency erode when fascism takes hold.
Revolution & Power
Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy - Julia Ioffe
How power shapes women’s lives—and how women endured and redefined nations.Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present - Ruth Ben-Ghiat
An urgent study of authoritarianism’s recurring patterns.Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present - Fareed Zakaria
A sweeping look at progress and backlash.1929: Inside the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History--and How It Shattered a Nation - Andrew Ross Sorkin
A sobering exploration of collapse, greed, and fragile systems.
Shipwrecks, Ice & Survival
Shackleton's Epic: Recreating the World's Greatest Journey of Survival - Tim Jarvis
Leadership and endurance at the edge of the world.Realm of Ice and Sky: Triumph, Tragedy, and History's Greatest Arctic Rescue - Deckle Edge
Arctic desperation and rescue.End of the Earth: Voyaging to Antarctica - Peter Matthiessen
Antarctica as spiritual confrontation.The Ship and the Storm: Hurricane Mitch and the Loss of the Fantome - Jim Carrier
Nature’s force and catastrophe at sea.A Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck - Sophie Elmhirst
A love story tested by shipwreck and obsession.
Historical Fiction & Memory
Salt to the Sea - Ruta Sepetys
Honoring lives history almost erased.The Bastard of Istanbul - Elif Shafak
Identity and inheritance across generations.The Forty Rules of Love: A Novel of Rumi - Elif Shafak
Transformation through love beyond ego and fear.There Are Rivers in the Sky - Elif Shafak
Displacement and belonging flowing through time.
Memoir & Reflections
Dirtbag Billionaire: How Yvon Chouinard Built Patagonia, Made a Fortune, and Gave It All Away - David Gelles
Capitalism, conscience, and giving it away.Raising Hare: A Memoir - Chloe Dalton
Attention, care, and gentleness.Chasing Hope: A Reporter's Life - Nicholas D. Kristof
Journalism as compassion.Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story - Bono
Faith, activism, humility, and being alive.The Humans: A Novel Paperback - Matt Haig
Love as our most alien and human trait.History Matters - David McCullough
The past as foundation beneath our feet.
What Survives
This year, I lived through revolutions and ruins. I crossed oceans and ice fields. I cavorted with spies, musicians, mothers, and explorers. These books were not just stories. They were places, provocations, companions. Each one, in its own way, asks the same question: When the world grows colder, harsher, or more divided—what keeps us human?
I’m grateful for the way they widened my world and deepened my perspective.
Here’s to the next adventure.
Wishing you a year filled with grit, grace, growth, and gratitude—and books that leave a lasting mark.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Randy Kaufman, formerly a corporate tax attorney and investment banker, is now a wealth advisor who prides herself on focusing on what matters most: clients’ peace of mind, family dynamics, and getting enough, not more. Randy is a passionate student of impact investing, strategic philanthropy, and behavioral psychology (while not a psychologist, she occasionally plays one in the boardroom). She is dedicated to helping the underprivileged and is a proud member of global venture fund Acumen's advisory board. A thinker, learner, and pursuer of overarching truths, she is always eager to discuss big ideas about money, and its off-and-on associate, happiness.