Takeaway: Loneliness is often a spiritual disease, which is a profound insight for a country that has more people living by themselves than ever before.
I have been sitting on this book for over a week. Normally I write my reviews almost immediately after I finish the book, read through them a couple of times and publish them. But I am not sure how to review this book (and officially the book did not release until today). It is not because I didn’t like it. I really did like it.
It is more because I am not sure how to describe the book. This is not a straight forward memoir, or standard prose Christian Living book. Parts of it are more like diary entries. There are chapters that are just a single quote. It is a book intended to take a while to work your way through. It is the taking the reader through the arc of pain and spiritual loneliness that the author went through.
Takeaway: One of the best examples of how fiction is important to give form to important ideas.
Summary: God is God of all of us, not just the extraordinary that get the world’s attention.
The most read review of the month was not of a book but of the Scribd ebook/audiobook subscription service.
Summary: A readable, recent introduction for those new to Anglicanism.
Summary: We need to be able to see God in the Dark as well as the light.
Inferno is the fourth book in the Robert Langdon series by Dan Brown. The first two books in the series were made into successful movies starring Tom Hanks. In this book, Robert Langdon is once again called on for his vast knowledge of symbols and iconography so that he might once again follow the clues and solve a dark mystery. Never knowing whom to trust, Langdon relies heavily on what he knows about specifically Dante and his masterpiece, Inferno, in order to hurry and beat a mastermind at his own game. While the first two books (Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code) in the series take place in Europe, the third book, The Lost Symbol, occurs mainly in Washington D.C. and New England. The third book was supposed to be made into a movie also but was supposedly passed over because its story resembled too closely that of National Treasure. In this book, Inferno, Langdon spends all of his time once again in Europe. Just like in his other books, there are many twists and turns and Langdon’s quest take him to a number of different famous and historic locations in Italy and a few other countries in Europe. Whereas The Da Vinci Code fed on our interest in conspiracies, this book addresses our ever growing population problem and our fears about epidemics becoming more widespread as our world has become more and more globally connected. The movie for this book is set to come out in the fall of 2016 and will once again star Tom Hanks as Robert Langdon.
Donald Miller has always been unlike any Christian author I have read before. He rocked my world in Blue Like Jazz. He inspired me to get off my rear end and start living my life in A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. I’ve always been a big fan of Miller being an open and authentic writer plus an avid student of life. His latest book, Scary Close was released this month and it’s unlike anything he’s written before.
Summary: 45 Reflections on how the bible pushes us toward disquiet.
Many of us struggle to find our identity in our work. We struggle with the gap between what really interests us ““ where our passions lie, and how we earn a paycheck. In many instances, we work to pay the bills so that we can pursue our true interest. Others know their current career path is not their passion, but cannot pinpoint where their true passion lies. Are we living to work or working to live? Are we spending our work hours doing something that fulfills us? Are working at a career that is exactly what we were created to do, or have we pushed our dreams aside to face the reality of a 9 to 5?