Book Reviews

Is Dark Places Another Cinematic Hit for Gillian Flynn?

August 7, 2015 by All Old Users

Dark Places author Gillian Flynn is no stranger to exploring the shadowy side of human nature. After the success of Gone Girl in theaters, many people are anticipating this sophomore outing in films for the rising star author. While it is unlikely to match the almost perfect madness of Gone Girl, there is more than enough to indicate that Dark Places will be a wild ride for psychological thriller fans.

The new film starring Charlize Theron as Libby Day, sole survivor of the gruesome murder of her family 25 years prior, is presented with an opportunity to help a group of true crime obsessives, aptly named “œThe Kill Club,” uncover the truth of what really happened that fateful night. This triggers a series of flashbacks and an investigation that leads Libby to believe that her brother, whom she had testified against under pressure from lawyers and the media, was actually innocent and the true murderer walked away that day.

The premise is interesting and in the hands of a director more accustomed to risk than Gilles Paquet-Brenner it could really shine on the screen. Unfortunately while Paquet-Brenner is a fine director, he doesn’t have the willingness to try new things with narrative that Fincher did which helped make Gone Girl so good.

How to Read Literature Like a Professor

August 6, 2015 by Adam Shields

Summary: Every story has ideas or meaning that is more than the words on the page. If you know me, you know I love to read. But reading words on the page, and enjoying stories is not all there is to reading. What I most want, is to engage in ideas, to help sharpen my … Read more

Coffee With Jesus by David Wilkie

August 5, 2015 by Adam Shields

I am reposting this 2014 review because the Kindle Edition is on sale for $2.99 this week. Summary: Comics with Jesus, usually over coffee Coffee With Jesus is a simple looking 4 or 5 panel comic strip that started a year or two ago as a web comic. The basic images are actually old clip … Read more

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

August 4, 2015 by Adam Shields

Summary: An impassioned letter from an African American father to his 15 year old son.

Between the World and Me deserves all of its praise. It will be on virtually every ‘Best of 2015′ book list. I need some space, but I would like to read it again before the end of the year.

This is not an easy book to read. I listened to the audiobook, which is narrated by Coates. All of the passion and pain of the book carries through. However, this book of passion and pain and not easy to take.

Coates formats the book as a letter to his 15 year old son on the occasion of his disappointment that Darren Wilson would not be indited or face trial for the shooting of Michael Brown. The book recounts Coates’ life and place in the world as an African American man.

Overwhelmingly it is about his concern for how his son will live, how Coates will not be able to protect him from the pain of life that is unfairly biased against him.

The book is roughly divided into three sections. The first is about the “˜plunder’. The systemic loss of safety and autonomy that Coates, and all African Americans, face because of results of racist institutions. This section also tells the story of Coates own growing up years where he learned to navigate his way through his isolating urban streets.

The second section is about his coming of age at Howard University and how he was “˜made for the library and not the classroom’. His eyes were widened as he learned about others and their different backgrounds and world. He met his wife and they married and had their son and moved to New York. But also how he was frustrated with what his learning revealed.

The third section was about the killing of his friend from Howard University, Prince Carmen Jones, by a cop in 2000. Jones was an engineering student, the son of a highly respected doctor. The cop, who was black, was undercover, and pursuing a 5 ft 4, 250 lb suspect. He mistakenly identified Jones, a 6 ft 3, 210 lbs, as the suspect. He and his partner, in separate unmarked cars followed Jones across two state lines for 16 miles without pulling him over.

The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert by Rosaria Champagne Butterfield

July 15, 2026August 1, 2015 by All Old Users

I am reposting this 2013 review because christianaudio.com is giving away this book as an MP3 (or M4B) audiobook for the month of August 2015. Rosaria Champagne was a hard-core liberal activist, a devoted lesbian and a tenured professor of feminism and post-modern thought at Syracuse University. Then she met Jesus over a summer break–an … Read more

The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity by Philip Jenkins

July 31, 2015 by Adam Shields

Summary: A data heavy look at the state of Christianity around the world.

Earlier this year I read Philip Jenkins’ Lost History of Christianity. Jenkins was writing about the strength of the early church in Asia and Africa. That early church was stronger than in Europe and while it is only a remnant now, it survived under significant persecution for generations.

The Lost History of Christianity is actually a follow up to the original Next Christendom. Originally written in 2002 and then updated in 2006 and again in 2011, Jenkins is trying to help the western church understand the vast shift in Christianity to the Global South.

Jenkins is a helpful reminder to a US Evangelical Christianity that often is ignorant of the global church. But Jenkins is also a researcher that primarily uses demographic statistics, so that number heavy research can be a bit dull. There is also a bit of overlap in content, especially early in this book, with the Lost History of Christianity, as Jenkins is trying to set the stage for presenting the church in Asia and Africa as not new, but revitalized.

Paper Towns by John Green

July 15, 2026July 24, 2015 by Adam Shields

I am reposting this review because the Kindle Edition sale for $0.99 and the movie released today.

Summary: A troubled girl goes missing. And no one seems to care all that much except for Quentin, her long time friend and next door neighbor.

This is my third straight coming of age novel. And it is still somewhat surprising how different a single sub-genre can be. An Abundance of Katherines was about finding purpose and meaning in life (and ended up finding that living life was its own purpose.) Wizard of Earthsea was about humility and realizing your own weakness is part of your strength; and facing yourself can be the hardest battle. Paper Towns is about what it means to be human amidst community.

Quentin (so glad I have another Quentin to associate with the name other than the one from the Magician and the Magician King), is about to graduate from High School. He is a good student, loved by his two psychologist parents, has a good set of friends and is looking forward to college. He may not be exciting, but he is reliable and normal.

His next door neighbor Margo is not. She is popular, the center of attention, but prone to wild pranks and occasionally running away. Margo and Quentin have been friends from early childhood. When they were 10 they found a man that had committed suicide in the park. That single event, while not really all that important, creates ripples that really drive the rest of the story.

Go Set a Watchman: A Novel by Harper Lee

July 22, 2015 by All Old Users

As with millions of readers, I’ve long loved To Kill a Mockingbird and waited with great excitement for the release of Go Set a Watchman. As the release date of Watchman drew near, my anticipation became tainted with dread as social media posts panned the book and blog posts advised readers to avoid this new book.

Go Set a Watchman takes place several years after Mockingbird. A now 26-year-old Scout returns to Maycomb from New York for her annual visit home. Atticus is still practicing law despite his crippling pain from rheumatoid arthritis. Junior lawyer, Hank, is Atticus’s right hand man and longs to marry Scout. Calpurnia is present in this tale but Jem and Dill are not.

Over the course of two days, Scout learns an ugly truth about her beloved father, her intended beau and her dear Calpurnia, hence the firestorm of complaints and dissatisfaction expressed online. Many readers and reviewers are distressed the noble hero is revealed to be a racist. This is a hard pill for a reader to swallow given our previous experience with Atticus Finch in Mockingbird. It doesn’t seem to fit the character we loved; which is exactly how Scout feels upon this heartbreaking discovery. I believe Watchman, at its core, is about a young woman realizing (rather late) her loved ones, especially her father, are fallible human beings. A realization of this nature, no matter when it occurs in life, can be a devastating discovery.

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach

July 15, 2026July 21, 2015 by Adam Shields

I am reposting this 2013 review because Audible.com is having a sale on all of Mary Roach’s books. Each of the books is on sale for $4.95. Bookwi.se has also reviewed Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers and has read (but not reviewed here) Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Sex and Science. Sale runs until July 23, 2015.

Summary: The cool, gross and the ugly of our digestive system.

Mary Roach is a unique writer. I think her closest comparison is Sarah Vowell. Where Sarah Vowell writes in a unique way about random historical matters, Mary Roach writes in a unique way about science issues. This is my third book by Mary Roach. The first book I read was the best, Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex, because well, who isn’t interested in sex?

The second book, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers was also interesting, but frankly cadavers are a bit disconcerting. It veered wildly between gross and fascinating.

In a slightly less disgusting way, Gulp covers pretty much everything you wanted to know, and a number of things you may not wanted to know about the Alimentary Canal (or digestive system).

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

July 16, 2026July 15, 2015 by Adam Shields

Neil Gaiman has credibly been accused of sexual assault and abuse.

Takeaway: All of life is about growing up.

I am a big fan of Neil Gaiman. I think he is one of the most innovative writers around. And I love that he concentrates mostly on fairy tale stories, whether for adults or kids. Many of them are a bit creepy and a little twisted, but at heart they are fairy tales.

The Graveyard Book is the only one of Gaiman’s full length books that I have not previously read. It is intended as a young adult book. Not as young as Coraline, but still appropriate for middle grade and up, if the kids enjoy and can handle creepy and dark stories. (I say this as a person that in general hates creepy stories.)

The book opens with murder. A family is murdered, mother, father, sister. But the baby, about 18 months old, crawls out of the crib and walks away before the killer finds him. The family lives near a graveyard and the baby walks there. The ghosts see he is in trouble, hide him from the killer and agree to raise him there in the graveyard. He is given the freedom of the graveyard. So he can talk to and learn from the ghosts. He can move through the walls and into the crypts. He is taught to Fade and produce fear. And he learns about some of the darker and older things that are in the graveyard.