Knowing (The Masked City by Genevieve Cogman)

Chaos thrives in a world of masks, but knowing one's identity brings power to break through that chaos. The Masked City, book number two in The Invisible Library series has the backbone of an excellent story; however, I struggled to get through the opening chapters -- chapters which fill in much for someone who has not read book number one or has not read it in a long time. I had rushed from book one to reading book two, and my mind was twiddling its synapses impatient to get into the new part of the story.

Sadly one of my favorite characters was not exactly missing in book two but had very little interaction in the book. That knocked my rating down for this book. I did not, however, stop me from bookmarking some favorite pages or stop me from wanting to read the next book in the series.

I continue to enjoy running into allusions to other literary works and authors. I've bookmarked an historical reference (also found in a famous play) as well as a reference to Murasaki, an author whose works I hope to get around to reading. Also, Cogman continues to grow Irene in her sense of identity, but I was disappointed in one particular rescue made in the book. With these disappointments, I want to give the book a middling rating -- a 3. Then, Cogman writes in a discussion between Lady Guantes and Irene. Irene is questioning Lady G on the benefits of Venice (this alternate Venice) for humans. Lady G claims the humans are happy. Irene claims, "The moment one of your kind interacts with them, the humans lose their volition, their freedom. Their life. In your world, the humans are just background characters."

To which Lady G replies, "But such happy background characters..." There's more and all worthy of discussion, and, if you've read my reviews before, you know how much I love discussion worthy books. UP goes the rating to 4 stars.

For now, I'll skip over the family ties and spiritual formation ties...oh, wait. I did think of something that would be intriguing: where would the various characters fit in the Enneagram? 

Reading 2.0 (I'd Rather Be Reading by Anne Bogel)

My reading of this book I'd Rather Be Reading by Anne Bogel came about because of happy coincidental timing of two reading challenges ("a book about reading" on the 2019 Reshelving Alexandria Reading Challenge), (2019 Modern Mrs. Darcy Reading Challenge which led me to her blog), and the book itself offered at half price from two different vendors.

At first glance, I felt the special offer price was the only price I would ever pay for a book this small; however, that was before I actually read the book. It would make a great gift book which was another reason I thought it should be under $10 until I looked at the prices of the gift books on my shelves, and I realized $10 and more is not an unusual price for a gift book.

So, pricing aside, I went from a range of 3 stars (I like this book) to 4 stars (I really like this book).  I'm glad I bought it, and my "Want to Read" list of books grew especially since I discovered via Goodreads' book compatibility analysis that I have a 90% book compatibility with Anne Bogel, so I am likely to enjoy the books she mentions in this book.

The opening chapters were fine. I felt like I could read those same chapters on her blog, but, as I continued reading, her chapters (really, each stand alone pieces in themselves rather than connected chapters -- "charming essays" one reviewer called them) held some deeper thoughts (a quality I like). Interestingly, a reader who gave the book a rating of 3.5 liked the opening chapters and not the last chapters. Differences in enjoyment for various chapters is probably fairly common in a book of essays. My guess is that any voracious reader would enjoy this book as a gift (and at 156 pages, it is little in size, not in number of pages).

💕💕💕 It's definitely a great book for parents who are short of times to read (because the chapters are short and complete within themselves) and who want to raise children who read.

----Those interested in spiritual transformation, I loved the sighting of the influence of Dallas Willard on pages 27-28. 

To Read or Not to Read (Shelf Life ed.Gary Paulsen and Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler)

I don't have to read every book I start. This was an important decision I made last week. See the stack of books below.

These are just a few of the books I intend to read! At the time I took this picture, I forgot there was one in my purse.

(Yes, the purse looks like it could be replaced, but that's a blog piece for another day: not filling our waste or dump sites.) My actual decision not to read a book came while reading these two books:

I finished Shelf Life; I returned Vinegar Girl to the library. Both of these books have something in common. In Shelf Life, editor Gary Paulsen asked prominent authors to write short stories  which included the mention of a book. This was done to promote and benefit ProLiteracy Worldwide. Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler is the third book of Random House's "Hogarth Shakespeare" project where a novelist updates a story from Shakespeare.

I picked up Shelf Life from work and I almost did not finish it as the stories at the beginning did not interest me. Sure, they mention a famous book (or two) in each story, but the stories came across like the results of a writing assignment rather than what would naturally come from the author. However, some of the students at the school where I work had this book as required reading so I pushed on and I liked the stories at the end. Also, the last section "About the Contributors" fascinated me.

Vinegar Girl written by well-known author Anne Tyler was supposed to be my "light-hearted" read after reading through a series of depressing books. It was okay, but I kept thinking the original Shakespearean play The Taming of the Shrew was a lot better. This isn't just me insisting on the original Shakespeare. I like his stories retold in modern language. I just kept thinking: "Wait, she's changing up the actual story." In the middle, I decided that I could stop reading. Just because I had started reading the book did not mean I had to finish it. Not only did I have all those other books I wanted to read (see first picture), but these books came in two days later (and The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley looks like it might be the light-hearted read I have been looking for.)

💕💕💕💕 About 70% of the people who look at my blog do so on a mobile device and I now realize the website post does not always come out well on a mobile so I'm working to fix that. I still have not figured out how to add the translation widget to the mobile format, but I'm playing with how to divide up the sections such as this one that connects the reading to family life and the one below connecting to spiritual transformation.

I don't actually have the answer to the question I'm raising in this section. How do we get our children and students to enjoy some of the best literature of the ages when testing on anything kills most of the joy?

-------------As for spiritual transformation and reading, I have not, I believe, mentioned reading scriptures which surely would be included in any spiritual transformation plan. Again, testing destroys a whole lot of joy. While reading Old Testament scriptures and New Testament scriptures will help any reader because of the vast number of biblical references and allusions made in books, reading of the bible can make a transformative difference. And, while some readers may gasp at the word "can", reading the bible knowing that God loves you, the reader, and delights in you, makes a difference between reading it  and being transformed and thinking that God is out to get you and not being transformed. Also, skillful readers know to picture in their minds what they are reading. See the second book review You Gotta Be the Book in this blog post "Five Books..." to read a discussion of how important it is to picture what we are reading, yet so often that information is not offered to those reading the bible.  

Ratings and Reviewing (aka Why Did You Give It That Number of Stars?)

A befuddled question from a daughter "How exactly do you rate your books?" initiated this post. A standard ratings guide looks a little like the one below (maybe a bit fancier).

This is an opportunity to reveal my complex, not so complex, way of scoring and have a post to which I can refer in other book review posts. Starting from the top:

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 stars still means phenomenally great, well, maybe not always phenomenally, but it definitely means that I have bought the book or will buy the book. It usually means the writing is fabulous; however, it always means I have parts of the book that I want to remember or to refer to.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4 stars still means really good. It might mean that the writing was phenomenal; however, the difference between 4 and 5 involves whether I would buy the book. 5 always means, "I want to own this book" and 4 means "I loved reading this book, but I don't know that I would ever read it again." The Chemist (if you like that genre) was a story that kept me hanging on the edge of my seat. The Help, I stayed up all night to finish that book (hmmm, I may have rated it 5 stars back in the day before I started really fine tuning my ratings). However, with both of these books, the story and writing is amazing, but I'm not buying the books. I'm willing to wait to get them from the library if need be.

Four stars is a tricky little rating for me. If you are my friend and you ask me to rate your book, there is a distinct possibility that I will give it a 4 rather than a 3 because you are my friend. If I hate your book, I will try to never get around to finishing it. Now some books of friends really are 4-5 star ratings. You never know.

⭐⭐⭐ 3 stars is a tough one to explain. It might be a beach read, a book to entertain me. The trouble with three stars is people who love the book want to know why I only gave it three stars, and the people who hate the book, wonder why I even bothered. Three stars very often means that I enjoyed reading the book; I'm glad the author wrote the book, but I'm not going to be referring to it. Maybe there were some flaws in the storyline or in the writing. Maybe they weren't flaws at all -- maybe the book just was not my cup of tea! For those unfamiliar with that phrase, others might like the book, but it was not the usual type of book I read or like.

⭐⭐ 2 stars still means I didn't like the book, but I don't think I give out 2 stars very often. Two star books are blah, and I rarely finish "boring, dull, and without meaningful content" books.

⭐ I think I have only ever given out one 1 star rating to a book. I would not finish reading a book I hated; however, I might have been the library book discussion group leader and had to finish this particular book. You might wonder why I chose a book I hated. In our group, no one person chooses all the books, and, at the time, I would lead the discussion, but everyone had an opportunity to choose a book.

0 rating -- You may wonder at a zero rating. This does not mean that I hated the book beyond belief. It means either I did not get around to rating a book (at my entrance into Goodreads, I added a lot of books at one time without rating each and every book), or it means it's just that type of book which is difficult to rate which truly means that I'm too much of a coward to tell my friends who love the book that it was so-so or to tell my friends who hated the book that I actually loved it. Lol!

And, now I close to go attend our local library book discussion group! 

Surviving (The Legacy Series: Legacy, Prodigy, Champion by Marie Lu)

The first book in this series, Legacy, is not shown here because it was my daughter's book. She thought I stole borrowed it from her when I reviewed it last week. (See that review here.) However, I did not take the book home with me; thus, I only have these last two in the series which I checked out from the library. Notice the books are from the Teen section, and know also that the books have nothing to do with London -- that's just my morning coffee cup. The series takes place in the United States (and I realized this morning that I do not have a US coffee cup -- hint to family and friends).

Why did Lu (or her publishers) title this series the Legacy series? Really, the first book mainly involves the prodigy character(s). But, can you imagine a series titled the Prodigy series? It sounds a bit elitist, which the prodigy character, June, is. We can consider Day as the anti-prodigy character who is a prodigy that didn't make the cut but survives anyway (not a plot spoiler).

This series ranks ahead of the average teen series because of what Lu brings to the table of literature. Sure, it's typical teen fare: parents dead, lots of violence and fighting to survive, love interests (will she go with _______ or with ________ when you know all along that she's meant to be with ____).

However, though it irks me to have dead good adults in teen fiction, I do think the legacy that June and Day have involves parents and siblings who strive for good, in fact, gave their lives up fighting evil. Lu also employs symbolism and allusion, trademarks of good literature. Take the names of the main characters: June and Day -- season and time of the most light, at least in the northern hemisphere where this story takes place. Then, the kiss in Prodigy is so strong of an allusion, if you don't see it, you have some missing pieces in your literary background. I would rate Prodigy  as the strongest of the three books with a 4 star rating.

As for Champion, the last in the series, one can not just stop at Prodigy! I surmise my issue with Champion is that it moves beyond my originally agreeing with a Commonsense review stating that Legacy was for readers 12 and up. I will say, though, that when Lu brings in the theme of who we become, what shapes us, then she leads us into a story much more than the average teen fiction.

"How had he slowly twisted into the Elector who created such a dark nation? What path had he chosen to follow?" (Champion 263).

We know the legacy of three characters and the choices they make along the way which lead them into the people they become. We also see the choices of a few other characters and what led to their rise or fall. In this respect, I like the story. I'm still giving it 3 stars, but who doesn't finish a series?! Three stars won't stop someone from finishing to see what the end holds. And, to Lu's credit, she does go for a more complex ending. I do intend to read more of her novels.

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Writing stories. The deeper aspects of the Legacy series are what elevates this series: the choices that characters make, who they are and who they become. Too often, I saw students from first grade to high school think their normal everyday lives were not as exciting as the latest action movie they happened to watch. I made it my goal to encourage them to see that their daily lives had value in story form. A couple of weeks ago I gave my granddaughters a file of their dad's art work and written work. One of their favorite pieces was a story that he wrote about his dad, their grandpa. The story was loved by Grandpa as well. It's unusual for someone not to want to be a hero (or perhaps "heroic" would be a better word), but heroes don't happen overnight. Small daily actions grow heroes. Daily life, daily choices matter. June and Day, the characters in these books, have flaws, make mistakes. Sometimes our mistakes provide comic relief in our stories and sometimes they provide transparency and reality, but our mistakes need not hold us back from becoming people who in the midst of surviving also grow and thrive in goodness.

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I'm into these practices on listening since a friend sent me nine "DO NOTs of an Active Listener" from a 2014 blog of Janice Taylor's. I wish I could figure out how to turn them into DOs except, basically, the DO part of each one is "Just listen." 😌

4. DO NOT interrupt; do not cut the speaker [your child, your student, your friend, your ___?] off mid-sentence. Allow him/her to finish the thought. Just listen.
5. DO NOT plan your responses as the speaker is speaking. Just listen.
6. DO NOT give advice unless specifically asked for it. Just listen. 

Certainly this book series is an opportunity to think about social justice as well. How one goes about social justice is a good topic of discussion or of listening: to God, to others, before judging, jumping to conclusions and finding oneself more of a hindrance than a help.

Watching (The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn)

I'm not normally a mystery reader (but I think my picture for this book is rather good considering I set up and took the photo). I read this while on vacation because my daughter had it on her bookshelves. All the hype about it is true: Hitchcock feel to it, well-written, keeps you wondering. You can chalk up my three stars as a matter of me not being a mystery reader. The book is entertaining. Some of my friends would not touch it with a ten foot pole (creepiness abounds); others would love the book.

I was impressed with myself that I caught on to a key clue at the beginning. I didn't guess who did it but I was also proud of myself for not cheating and reading the ending first. Easy read -- I took 2-3 days to read it. Short review today.

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My having children and grandchildren section -- what could I come up with to match this book?! Well, since in my last post I regretted buying into the whole "spare the rod and spoil the child" belief, maybe this would be a good time to say that doesn't mean "let the children run amuck and do what they want." There are some obnoxious kids in this book. Raising children and coming alongside grandchildren takes time, lots of it, and consistent love and care. Time that seems difficult to give day in and day out (and let's not forget nighttime as well!) I'm impressed with parents these days. So much good research has come out and parents are learning from it. I'd say that falling into same patterns when we'd rather leave those old patterns behind is a challenge for every generation. A newer challenge for all of us is the lure of technology (a sentence I write using technology 😬). Technology is neither good nor evil, but it definitely can tempt us to skip out on living in the present. Technology is also a part of this book.

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A great spiritual formation practice would be to try and go without technology (or social media if technology is part of your job or too broad a sweep) for 24 hours. There's also a couple of good books I could recommend: The Power of Off (which has even more ideas for learning to avoid the siren call of technology) and The Winter of Our Disconnect. 

Becoming -- a Three Book Review

I grew up thinking I was not creative. My parents didn't put this idea in my head. I simply felt I never came up with any new thoughts. This belief came to full fruition in my junior year of college. Our first activity in my Foundations of Education class was to think of as many ideas as possible using a pair of eyeglasses. Um, look through them; start a fire... When the class as a whole listed the ideas possible, I realized where I had missed the possibilities. The one idea that remains, of the many my classmates had, is to use them for an ant corral*. How effective of an ant corral that would be doesn't matter. What matters is I suddenly saw that I could learn how to be creative! I just needed to see connections beyond my normal parameters for a given object or subject. This is a long introduction to say that I am exercising my creativity by combining these three books for review: Legend by Marie Lu, The Crossroads of Should and Must by Elle Luna, and Becoming Dallas Willard by Gary Moon. They happen to be the first three books I read during my school break.

I give Legend by Marie Lu three stars. I like it. It's a good beach read, library read, vacation read. I liked it enough to seek out the other two books in the series once I returned home. I read somewhere (and, of course, now I can't find it) that Lu was intrigued with the idea of the poor criminal meeting up with the good person such as in Les Misérables. In this story, the criminal has the better morals of the two; however, I think not only Les Misérables but other stories have influenced Lu, all to the good. (Without being too much of a plot spoiler the ending matches the ending of The Tale of Two Cities with a bit of a twist...or maybe not such a twist...since I could also say that it matches a bible story.) Lu comes to the table of the past and updates the stories, freshens them up. Legend is a well-written, easy to read story of a dystopian future. It annoys me that the good adults in YA fiction are always dead or will die (an exception to this standard practice might be The 100; however, since I've only seen the television series and have not read the books, I'll have to check with the granddaughter to confirm that adults do live in that series). A Commonsense review noted that this book could be read at 12+. I agree with that. If you are in the + range as I am but you have enjoyed reading The Hunger Games series or the Divergent series, then you will probably enjoy this series as well.

I give The Crossroads of Should and Must by Elle Luna four stars. I have bought my own copy so that I can write in it. The "shoulds" have driven much of my life. Oldest child, what can I say more? Yet, pairing up "should" and "must" as opposites stretches my thinking about these two words. They are both modals. I used to describe modals as words your mom uses: "You should clean up your room." "You must clean up your room." "Would you please clean up your room!" Modals also express "ability or possibility" but somehow I never caught on to that. I focused on the "permission and obligation" part of the modal definition. Basically, "should" is born out of duty, someone's idea of correctness, our own or someone else's criticism. "Must" as used in this book involves what we love, what drives us, what wakes us up in the morning eager to get on with the day -- with the caveat that what drives us needs to help us thrive, not kill us. Alcoholics must have a drink, but that's not what is going to help them thrive and grow. I did tell my daughter, "Hmmm, I must read, but I don't think I can get paid doing that." She had some ideas of how readers get paid. Previewing books, a reader's dream job, yes? Yet, I get to choose what I read at the moment. I'm not sure how much I would enjoy being forced to read something. The Crossroads of Should and Must is a gift book, an inspirational book, an artsy book. The price is right for me and I want to play around with the questions and thoughts in the book. 

Finally, I arrive at the book I pre-ordered so that it arrived on the first day out in the public and arrived in time for me to read it while flying out of my home state. I easily give Becoming Dallas Willard by Gary Moon five stars, and not just because I've sat under Dallas's teaching (and Gary's, too, come to think of it) or know some of the people that helped Gary make this book be the best it could be. I read the book every page from title page to endnotes in four days, and I will read this book again and again. It won't be sitting on a shelf looking pretty. Why would I re-read a biography? I first "met" Dallas in 2003 when he was a keynote speaker at a teacher's convention. About the same time, one of my sisters gave me his Divine Conspiracy  to read (I had a tough time getting past page 80 that first time of reading). Ten years later in 2013, I sat close enough to hear and see his interactions with people as he gave some of the last lectures of his life. In other words, I met him at a time when who he was seemed unachievable to me: incredibly kind and gentle at the same time that he was incredibly brilliant and humorous. This story Becoming Dallas Willard illustrates so well how the Dallas who closed out this life in 2013 was not the same Dallas who entered it in 1935.

He grew up in more challenging circumstances than many American readers; however, like many of us, he was a normal teen capable of activities that indicated his brain was not fully developed (read, foolish, dumb, stupid, thoughtless). There's nothing wrong with being a super good, moral, kind teenager, but I was not, and it's helpful to see that someone I respect and admire became that better person. He also sat under some of the same church teaching that I did and came to realize how it fell short of the fuller trusting real relationship one could have with Jesus, who "will walk right up to you", and that the kingdom of God and invisible things are real (131-132). Dallas failed in some of the same ways I have failed as a parent. To learn from someone who has struggled with my same struggles encourages my soul. Because spiritual practices were so much a part of Dallas's life, the book is a veritable source of spiritual practices in life narratives. Even the section of Dallas's years as a philosophy professor, which some reviewers have not enjoyed, I appreciated. How does the transformed life look during the hours of employment?

What does the transformed life look like when one comes out from under all the "shoulds" we or our culture places upon us? What does the transformed life look like when light and goodness shine forth? That's the connecting thread between these three books. Dallas Willard became who he was/is because his "must" was a vibrant relationship with Jesus, knowing that the kingdom of God is real and living in light of that eternal truth. He practiced in indirect ways actions that enabled the love of Jesus, the goodness, the kindness, the intelligence, the beauty and art of a life with Jesus to naturally flow out when it was directly needed.  Fictional characters June and Day become better characters as the light overcomes the darkness, good overcomes evil. (Granted there's a bit more violence in the Legend series than might be desired, but without characters who practice goodness, there would be no story. Violence would not overcome violence.)

Who are we becoming? People who live stunted lives because the "shoulds" keep us boxed up in fear? Or, people, who because of fear or anger live violent, ruined lives (this will come more into play in the second and third books of the Legend series)? Or people, as today's Sacred Space describes and a person that I saw in Dallas Willard -- a person who "reach(es) the fresh and challenging possibilities that God wish me (us) to realise"?

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This is my section of the blog for "been there, wish I had not done that" or "been there, I'm so glad I did". As mentioned above, I failed in the same way that Dallas did in certain areas of parenting. Believing church instruction of "spare the rod, spoil the child" has to count as one of my failures. Along with believing some teaching about a child being willful when he or she cries. More than likely, it is an overtired, over-stimulated child, a hungry child, a wet or hurting child. I'm thankful there is so much more research out now than there was when I was raising a child. Sure, there are ways to spoil a child, but I have a feeling that it has more to do with giving a child an overabundance of material goods rather than giving a child an abundance of hugs, presence, partnership in doing chores, direction and guidance in learning to live in an overactive world.

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"What most often stops me achieving freedom is my tendency to be caught up in fears and exceptions about what I 'ought' or 'should' be. My usual automatic responses tie me down and inhibit me from exploring new areas of growth. I ask and pray for a greater sense of inner freedom and that I might reach the fresh and challenging possibilities that God wishes me to realise" (Sacred Space, Monday, April 23, 2018).

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* This morning as I sat on my back porch, I noticed that a lead line had corralled an ant. Actually one ant was corralled inside the loop and another ant was corralled outside the loop. I thought ants could crawl up surfaces so I was surprised that neither one tried to crawl over." 

Journeying, Persevering, Surrendering, Embracing (The Sensible Shoes Series by Sharon Garlough Brown)

With -ing words such as those in the title, it's no wonder that I have not had the time to write. I'm actually way ahead of my goal in Read 52 books in 52 weeks ; however, I'm just now sitting down to write. Yesterday I finished this series, so I'm reviewing the books together (although I did already review the first book here Sensible Shoes).

As mentioned in my review of the first book of this series, Sensible Shoes, it helps going into the reading of these books treating them as a new type of genre: one that is a cross between non-fiction spiritual formation practices and literature. This new genre works if you realize that at the beginning. Brown writes skillfully, even eloquently at times, but I didn't observe this during my first time reading because I kept tripping over the spiritual formation practices. The spiritual formation practices were good, but I was not accustomed to seeing them embedded within fiction. My second time around, I enjoyed both (and discovered beauty in Brown's writing).

By the time I read the second book in this series, Two Steps Forward, I had an invested interest in the characters. In this book, Brown begins developing the main male characters as well. Some of the shiny good characters in the first book lose their luster in the second book. Charissa's husband needed to lose some of his because he seemed too good to be true in the first book. He seems real in the second although it took a few chapters for me to accept the new side of John.

As for one of the four original women in the Sensible Shoes group, Meg, some readers won't be disappointed in her at all. Not that I was disappointed in her, as much as I wanted her to be light shining to her daughter's creepy older "boyfriend." I suspect I expect more of my novel characters than I do of myself.

The third book in the series, Barefoot, is at times too real. It's not an escape book, a beach read. If you have much drama going on in your own life at the moment, you might want to save this book for another time. On the other hand, if you have a lot of trials and tribulations, maybe you will want to feel like you're not alone and to know how the situations could be handled. I did find that to be true. I embraced a couple of the practices, and since this is the "surrendering" book, I can say that I learned to surrender situations that I could not control or change. God brought peace into those situations without me micromanaging everything (which tended to make situations worse just as it did in the book). Mini-spoiler alert: tears involved in this book.

I can't say that the last book, An Extra Mile, is any less real. There were times when I would think I wanted to ask the characters, who I thought were least like me, what were they thinking. Then, there were the characters that I felt sorry for because, of course, I resonated with their feelings and actions. I had been there, done that. The parents of the main women continue to be a rather disappointing lot which I did not like. I take that back. Abby's mom is likable (Abby's mom doesn't figure much into the story, however). Also, persevere through the reading if you find yourself like I did thinking, "Wow, their treatment of the bad character is as bad as the character him or herself." Eventually, good comes into the story.

Since my own siblings are my sensible shoes group, I do want to share this series with them. I'll need to buy my own set to keep because I'll want to keep coming back to the spiritual formation practices within the book (easily accessed both as separate pages and at the end of the book).

Because so much of these books are about being real and telling God exactly how we feel (angry, disappointed, heartbroken, and, yes, glad, too) and knowing we are God's beloved, here is the non-social media worthy picture of this set of books. 😏

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This is my section of my blog where I usually list either my regrets in parenting or my kudos in parenting. I could regret not having the type of teaching in these books, but I had no control over that. I grew up in the culture I grew up in, just as the parents did in this series. For parents now, this series would be a great help in parenting...and grandparents in grandparenting...

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This section I use for a spiritual formation practice. I wasn't going to include any because there are so many to choose from in this series, but then I was flipping through the last book in the series An Extra Mile, and I came across the one meditating on John 11:17-44 where Lazarus has died. Brown brings insight into the story that I had never thought of before. Mary is always the good sister, right? Funny how we categorize people as good or bad, not that their actions are good or bad. Mary does everything right. However, Brown has her character Hannah see Martha as the confronter and Mary as the avoider. From Hannah's journal:

"I look at the text again, and I'm reminded of how differently the two sisters grieved. Martha, the confronter. Mary, the avoider. I've been both sisters. I've had my moments of angrily accusing you of not caring, and I've had my moments of keeping my pain to myself and privately nursing my disappointment.

"I watch Mary sitting there in the house, surrounded by people who are probably wondering aloud about Jesus' power -- couldn't the One who had healed the blind man, they ask later, have kept this from happening? -- and none of their words comfort or soothe. They just compound the pain. Then Martha reappears in the doorway, and her countenance is softened, and she speaks gently and says, 'The Teacher is here, and he's calling for you.'

"That's what breaks the stewing. The ruminating. The rehearsing of the confusion and the wound. 'Jesus is here, and he wants to see you. He's calling for you.' Those summoning words shift everything and gently move Mary forward in her grieving. Those are the words I need to keep hearing, Lord, as I move forward with all of the losses and all of the gains. So many joyful gains to celebrate even as there are so many deaths to mourn. You summon me. I summon you. Come and see the things I have buried. Come and see the places where I'm disappointed and the places where I have hope. Meet me here with resurrection life. Not just me. All of us. Please" (29-30). 

Reading (The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George)

I love Instagram pictures of books, particularly the ones on white bedspreads. I love them, but it's not my reality. This is how reading on my bed looks like:

And, heavens, I could never add a cup of coffee to this mix! I'd have coffee everywhere!

I have been tempted to not rate this book, but then folks would think it is worth no stars (and some people would think that it needs to go into the trash for reasons I will explain). However, I decided to take the middle of the road path with 3 stars. Those who love this book are shocked, I'm sure. And, my readers will say, "How could you give your friend's book 4 stars and this book only 3 stars?" Um, she's my friend. More than that, my giving this book 3 stars will not hurt its sales. It's a best seller in a number of countries so let me delve into the whys and wherefores of my rating for The Little Paris Bookshop.

During chapters 1-7, I was in love. Monsieur Perdu, the main character, prescribes books for what ails one. Swoon! Such eloquent language, a mystery, books, what's not to like? Then, I felt like I was in a peep show, mostly an amazingly written, sensual peep show, which is why some readers will go out and immediately get the book, and others will think the book needs to be burned. Few readers sit on the fence with such scenes in books. Here's my take on it: I prefer my authors to read the Old Testament "Song of Solomon" twenty times and then write their sensual scene. I like discretion and in the elegance, don't allow common coarse words to pop in.

It's hard to tell with translations. Is the translator the elegant writer or the author? I was surprised to find out the author was German (I blame that bias on a stoic German neighbor). I was sure that she was French. Is the translator or the author to blame for putting one or two common coarse words in the midst of the elegance? Just as there are grades of coarse for sandpaper, so too, there are grades for words. These were not the coarsest of the lot but just enough to jar the flow of reading.

I did continue reading and two main characters left Paris! Perdu left someone I thought was a person of interest! I didn't mind traveling with Perdu and Max through the French countryside on Perdu's Literary Apothecary bookshop barge, but as another friend who read this book mentioned, the story begins to meander. This novel reminds me of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce (fictional pilgrimage through English countryside) and two other international books A Man Called Ove by Frederick Backman and The Restoration of Otto Laird by Nigel Packer.

The novel is also reminiscent of another river story, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Mark Twain, however, does a better job of piecing his adventures together. That is perhaps unfair to compare George with Twain (Samuel Clemens) since this is George's second book; still, I think it will give the reader a clearer picture of the story.

Another peeve of mine is the interruption of the story line with chapters from other characters. For the first time, I noticed that the "voice" of the writing did not change with the character change. Perdu's beautiful thinking continued when the novel switched to Manon! I've never noticed that before in a novel. Perhaps I've never noticed because the writing was so-so whereas the style is noticeable from the beginning of The Little Paris Bookshop. So to have Manon's voice sound the same as Perdu's voice unsettled the flow of my reading. Later in the book, Manon's journal does not sound so flawless. Then, again, Perdu's voice becomes more plain as well. Again, is that the author or the translator or the fact of what Perdu and Manon are going through?

Parts of this book shine out for me, the mystery, the heartbreak, the books, the relationships: definitely worth between a 3 and a 4 rating.

💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕

One of the things I do NOT regret is reading to my children. Just this past week, a friend in a poetry group passed out bookmarks printed with the following poem:

"The Reading Mother"

I had a mother who read to me
Sagas of pirates who scoured the sea
Cutlasses clenched in their yellow teeth,
"Blackbirds" stowed in the hold beneath.

I had a mother who read me lays
Of ancient and gallant and golden days;
Stories of Marmion and Ivanhoe,
Which every boy has a right to know.

I had a mother who read me tales
Of Gelet the hound of the hills of Wales,
True to his trust till his tragic death,
Faithfulness blent with his final breath.

I had a mother who read me the things
That wholesome life to the boy heart brings --
Stories that stir with an upward touch,
Oh, that each mother of boys were such!

You may have tangible wealth untold;
Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.
Richer than I, you can never be --
I had a mother who read to me.

Strickland Gillilan
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Almost every spiritual formation plan includes reading scriptures every day. Here is a practice that may be new to the reader. Decide on one of the gospels of Jesus and read it straight through (or as close as possible for new parents). Mark is the shortest in case that helps! Something a young parent has now that I did not: the bible on a phone app. It is possible to get one of the gospels on the phone app (in anyone of the many versions) and read in those moments when you are holding the baby and can't set him or her down because then the child will wake up. Sneak in an uninterrupted few moments of just enjoying the Jesus story without studying it, without making notes, just letting being around Jesus sink in. Read with the eyes of love that Jesus has for you.

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NOTE: I finally added a partial list of the gift books shown in the post "Gift Books on the Top Middle Shelf..." See the comment section on that same post linked here.