Adam Shields

Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver

July 15, 2026January 11, 2013 by Adam Shields

Summary: Three intertwining story lines in a rural Kentucky community

After reading Poisonwood Bible and Flight Behavior at the end of last year I still wanted more Barbara Kingsolver. I really do think she is one of the best living novelist and I wanted more. So I picked up Prodigal Summer because it was on sale for $2.99 on kindle. (Back down to that price)

My wife and I read it together around the time it originally came out. Of the books I have read by Kingsolver it is the lightest. Kingsolver likes to deal with heavy subjects.

The main themes of this book are still heavy, the evolutionary process, what it means to survive when it requires others to die to support us, finding a new place as the world changes around you, etc. But it also is the most traditional romantic story of the Kingsolver books I have read.

Offsite Review of the Holy Bible

January 10, 2013 by Adam Shields

Most of the time I really look for good reviews of good books. I tend to not post negative offsite reviews because I am trying to help people find good books to read. But this is just funny. Andy Darnell tweeted the link to this yesterday and I had to pass it on. This of … Read more

Kindle Touch Gets New Software Upgrade

January 9, 2013 by Adam Shields

Today Amazon released a new major update to the Kindle Touch software. (You know the kindle that they stopped supporting when Amazon released the Paperwhite.) It has many of the best software features of the kindle paperwhite, just without the light and crisper screen. If you have Touch you can wait for it to automatically … Read more

Challies on the Ethics of Book Reviews

January 9, 2013 by Adam Shields

Challies posted an article about how and why he gives good and bad reviews on his blog and more importantly how he evaluates a work on context of the larger ministry. He is directly responding to criticism of his two recent reviews of books by James McDonald and Mark Driscoll. I often disagree with the … Read more

Offsite Review: Was America Founded As a Christian Nation by John Fea

July 15, 2026January 9, 2013 by Adam Shields

There are far too many good books to read them all. That is the main point for reviews. It is also important to pay attention to experts in a field when reading specialized books, like sciences or history. Too often popular authors cherry pick data to prove a point, and while more academic scholars may … Read more

Offsite Review: The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity

January 8, 2013 by Adam Shields

The Oxford Handbook of The Trinity is not available for kindle and the hardcover version is $131 used ($145 new, $150 suggested retail). So I probably will not pick it up any time soon. But the review is very positive and I will pay attention to used book stores and look around at my library … Read more

Another Best Books of 2012 List

January 8, 2013 by Adam Shields

I have one more Best Books of 2012 list that I forgot to share. EmilyReads is a great blog. All of her reviews (usually 3 a week) are in haiku. She used to work in the children’s book publishing world and so many of the reviewed books are children’s or young adult. But since she … Read more

Offsite Review: A Killer in the Wind by Andrew Klavan

July 15, 2026January 8, 2013 by Adam Shields

John Wilson, the editor of Books and Culture Magazine is the one that originally introduced me to Andrew Klavan. Klavan has written a number of thriller and mystery books but has concentrated on the Christian book world, especially young adult over the past few years. Bookwi.se has reviewed his Homelanders Series, and two of his … Read more

Old Man’s War is the January Sword and Laser Book Club Pick

January 7, 2013 by Adam Shields

In a previous iteration of my life I spend a lot of time listening to podcasts and one of my favorite was the CNet’s Buzz Out Loud. When I was listening to it Tom, Molly and Veronica were the main hosts. Since then Tom Merritt has spun off his own show on the TWiT network, Tech News Today and Veronica Belmont is the co-host of Tekzilla on Revision3 network.

For the past several years Tom and Veronica have co-hosted a Science Fiction and Fantasy book club podcast, Sword and Laser.

This month they are discussing The Old Man’s War by John Scalzi. Bookwi.se reviewed the Old Man’s War last fall and I know a few people have read it since then. You might find the book club discussion interesting.