Absolute Truths by Susan Howatch

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Summary: Spiritual leaders are human, full of sin as all of us, but willing to have their sin redeemed by God for greater glory.

Over the last couple months I have re-read all of the Starbridge (or Church of England) series by Susan Howatch and the first of the off-shoot trilogy. This second reading of each of the main series has confirmed to me that this is one of the greatest series of “˜Christian Fiction’ written in the 20th century.

I use scare quotes because no US Evangelical Christian publishing house would actually publish this. It is full of sin. But also full of grace and redemption and more theologically rich than any other fiction series that I am aware of.

Absolute Truths is the last, and I think best, of the series. It returns to Charles Ashworth, the main character of the first book of the series (Glittering Images.) Instead of a young priest and professor, Ashworth is now a Bishop. And in the course of the book his third life crisis comes to pass.

What was so transformative for me with this series is that all of the conflict and story is based on clergy in the Church of England. All are real and devout Christians. All take their faith seriously (although in different streams of the Anglican way).

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Paper Towns by John Green

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

Paper TownsSummary: 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.

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Go Set a Watchman: A Novel by Harper Lee

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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.

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Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach

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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.

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary CanalSummary: 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).

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The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

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I am reposting this 2013 review because the Kindle Edition is on sale for $1.99.
The Graveyard Book by Neil GaimanTakeaway: 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.

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The Adventures of the Brothers Brave and Noble by Cynthia Hampton

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What if our childhood imaginary friends are real? Noble Hewlett encounters this very situation when he finds himself magically transported from his home to a realm called The Existence. Here in this fantastical land, Noble learns his imaginary friend is real. The Existence is populated with creatures from the imaginations of children like Noble and … Read more

The Radical Disciple: Some Neglected Aspects of Our Calling by John Stott

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The Radical Disciple: Some Neglected Aspects of Our Calling by John StottTakeaway: Discipleship is about following Christ in non-conformity.  Hearing from an elder who has lived the life is a great encouragement to continue on.

This is John Stott‘s last book.  He decided to retire several years ago and now has said he will no longer write (update: he passed away in 2011 at the age of 90).  So I think it is interesting that he is intentionally writing a book about discipleship and concentrating on areas that he thinks are often left unaddressed.

The book ends with a poignant chapter on death, similar to the last album by Johnny Cash.  Both Cash and Stott knew they were not long for this world.  The afterward says goodbye to the reader and discusses his will and legacy. In many ways, I wish he opened with this.  Because it gives more weight to the rest of the book.

However, if he started with death it might overwhelm the general theme of the book, Non-Conformity.  The title of the first chapter, he is calling us to be different as Christians.  Not just different from the world, but different because we were created to be like Christ. There is a good quote about the fact that we cannot live like Christ, unless we have Christ live in us. And I think that the living with Christ in us as the only way to achieve Christlikeness may be more counter cultural to the church than anything else in the book. We all know that we have transformed, but to really be transformed we not only have to strive after living like Christ, we have to submit to the Spirit that guides us.

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Dust by Hugh Howey

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Reposting this 2014 review because this book, and the two earlier collections that made up the trilogy are all on sale for $2.99 each on kindle (Wool Omnibus and Shift). Links to my reviews of the earlier books are at the bottom of the page. Summary: The story comes to an end. Hugh Howey broke into … Read more

The Allure of Gentleness: Defending the Faith in the Manner of Jesus by Dallas Willard

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the allure of gentleness cover imageSummary: The method of apologetics is intrinsically linked to the work of apologetics.

I like Dallas Willard. He has been very helpful, if not always directly, through the mentoring of various other authors and teachers I have been directly impacted by.

Dallas Willard passed away just over two years ago. This book was underway before he passed as a joint project between Willard and his daughter. She organized it based on a series of lectures he gave in 1990 and supplemented it in areas he thought needed further development using other lectures and writings. Despite that, this feels like a cohesive book.

Willard is trying to remind the apologist that the method (and life of the apologist) is important to the work of apologetics. In 1990, I think that was probably a much more needed message than today. We always need to be reminded of that, but I do not think that many apologists today would disagree with that basic summary.

Even so, the part that I most resonated with was that simple reminder. (Although I kept thinking that Unapologetic did a better job communicating the point and at least parts of Vanishing Grace did a better job reminding the reader of the importance of grace toward the non-Christian. )

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