Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince by JK Rowling (#6)

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Harry Potter and the Half Blood PrinceTakeaway: Even after I have read most of these books multiple times, Harry Potter is still engaging.

I picked up Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince on a whim.  To the best of my memory, I do not think I have read this since it first came out in 2005.

Inspite of the single reading, this has been my favorite of the series.  And while I have liked all the books, 1-3 are very much middle grade books (I know technically this is still middle grade too, but it clearly is an older middle grade).  I like the older books better.  The Goblet of Fire felt too much like a quest, then wait, then quest then wait formula.  In the Order of the Phoenix, Harry was too whiney.  The Half Blood Prince is just right in tone and Harry Potter.  He is old enough that he starts maturing in many ways (although he is still Snape/Malfoy obsessed.)

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John Knox for Armchair Theologians by Suzanne McDonald

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John Knox for Armchair TheologiansTakeaway: Ways of reading scripture that we take for granted as today were revolutionary in the past.

Short histories, like the Armchair Theologian series or the Very Short Introduction series are hit or miss. Because the author usually has wide latitude to emphasize what they want and organize the books on their own, reading one book is not a good introduction to series.

Aquinas for Armchair Theologians gave a decent biography of Aquinas but focused on how Aquinas changed the nature of philosophy for the modern world.  It as very focused on explaining how to read Aquinas as a modern reader.

John Calvin for Armchair Theologians was very sparse on biography and mostly focused on walking through the structure of Calvin’s Institutes as an organizational structure for Calvin’s theology and thought process. In the process, it seems to not do a very good job introducing Calvin or his theology.

John Knox for Armchair Theologians is mostly a history of the Scottish Reformation and John Knox’s role in that.  While there are several interludes discussing Knox’s writing, there are only a handful of short quotations.  So if you are looking for an introduction to Knox’s theology, this is not it.

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Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

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Eleanor and Park

Summary: A coming of age high school romance between two unlikely teens set in 1986.

In the last year I read almost everything that John Green has written.  And I loved all of it.

So when John Green tweeted how much he loved Eleanor and Park, I added it to my wishlist.  Now my wish list is LONG, but I do track the prices of those books and when it went on sale I picked it up.

Saturday afternoon I was looking for something to read.  I just finished the last few pages of two different non-fiction books and wanted something light and fun.

I started reading and was hooked almost instantly.  In fact I read the entire book before I want to sleep (it was after midnight and was reading in bed, but I didn’t go to sleep before I finished.)

I am a romantic at heart and I love young adult books, so this might not be for everyone.  When I was describing it to my wife, I said it was just like Pretty in Pink, just if the Molly Ringwald character was overweight, and instead of just having an nice alcoholic Dad she had an abused mom and a sadistic drug addicted step-dad, and Andrew McCarthy‘s character were half Korean.  And instead of Duckie… (then my wife said, “so it isn’t really like Pretty in Pink at all.”)

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Physics of the Impossible by Michio Kaku

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Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration into the World of Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation, and Time Travel

Takeaway: My brain is not designed for complex physics. But I keep reading anyway.

The premise of the book is fascinating.  Physicist Michio Kaku takes science fiction ideas and objects and evaluates how they might work and how far away we are from being able to actually do what is now impossible.

Light Sabers, Warp Drives, faster than light travel, time travel, replicators are all in here.  The closer Kaku is to the actual science fiction the more interesting the book is.  The longer the description, the more side discussions the more I lost interest.

Kaku is a fairly good author.  Much of the book was very well written and understandable.  (I say this as someone that wants to understand science and frequently reads science but really does not understand it.)  But it gets too detailed too often, especially about half way through the book.

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Activist Faith: From Him and For Him by Burroughs, Darling and King

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Activist FaithTakeaway: The particular work of the church and the individual Christian is less important than the fact that we are working in an area where we feel a calling.

The Evangelical Church has long had a healthy tension between social activism/ministry and evangelism.  I think there should be a tension.  We are called to do more than evangelism.  But included in our ministry must be some form of evangelism.

But as with any tension (healthy or not) there tends to be a pendulum swing one way or another to counter previous excesses.  Right now I think we are in a social activism swing.  I am all for this.  I have worked with homeless ministries, community development, education, etc.  And I think they are important part of a church’s work if for no other reason than to get the church outside of their own four walls.

Dillon Burroughs, Daniel Darling and Dan King have written a first steps book.  It has first steps for why the church should be involved in a number of issues from Slavery, Abortion, Homeless, Orphan Care/Adoption, Community/Business Development and much more.

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The Scorch Trials by James Dashner (Maze Runner #2)

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The Scorch Trials by James Dashner (Maze Runner #2)Takeaway: Would you consent if you knew that your death (or the deaths of your friends) might save millions? What if you had already consented, but you don’t remember?

Genre books are a wonderful thing.  They give markers for the type of book you are reading.  They follow standards and allow you to dig deeper into an idea than if the author started from scratch.  Some genre books allow you to relax into them or mindlessly wander away for a few hours knowing you will not have to think too hard.

The struggle of genre books is that they can become too repetitive and too predictable.  Dystopian young adult fiction is getting to the too predictable point.  The Selection was an example of a book that had lost some of its purpose and social commentary.

So I am glad to report that the Maze Runner series (at least so far) has stayed within the genre, but broken outside the standard mold.  This is not a repeat of the Hunger Games or Divergent.  But you can see some of the family markers.  If anything, this book feels more like Orson Scott Card’s classic, Ender’s Game, than most other modern dystopian novels.

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Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas

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Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric MetaxesTakeaway: The first popular biography of Bonhoeffer. Not perfect, but well worth reading. (Read Charles Marsh’s biography instead)

Like many Evangelicals I have been a fan of Bonhoeffer’s writing for many years.  I have read Cost of Discipleship, Life Together and the two collections Letters and Papers from Prison and Love Letters from Cell 92.  More than the rest the Love Letters book really made him a real person, and not just writer.  A couple years ago I also saw Bonhoeffer, a great film documentary (streamable on netflix) that did a great job introducing Bonhoeffer, but none of these comes anywhere close to the depth that Eric Metaxas’ new biography has.

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The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

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The Handmaid's TaleSummary: A dystopian novel where women have become chattel and a theocratic government has taken over the US.

The Handmaid’s Tale was written in 1985 and I never would have read it if Audible had not commissioned Claire Danes to read it.

I know that it should not matter that famous authors are reading famous books, but this series has excellent quality narrations.  (Others in the series that I have listened to are The End of the Affair and The Wizard of Oz).

Claire Danes give a very flat narration, which is perfect for the book.  The narrator, OfFred, is the first generation after the US has been taken over by a theocratic government.  The coup d’état was started when a small group of highly placed officials were behind a mass assassination of the President and the entire Congress.  The assassination was blamed on Islamic terrorists and a state of emergency was called.

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New Sony Ereader Comes Out Sept 19

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Sony had always made solid, but relatively unimpressive ereaders.  Back in 2007-2008 when ereaders were just taking off, Sony was a major player.  But their lighted ereader, the PRS-700 was horrible.  And they do not seem to have recovered since then. Goodereader has a review (appears to be reviewing the specs and not the device) … Read more