Nonfiction mini-reviews: Bored and Brilliant and A Forever Family

Manoush Zomorodi is the host of popular radio show and podcast about technology and its effects. When she had time to think about her plans for the future and really look at her surroundings when she was home with her baby, she found herself inundated with ideas. Conversely, when she was back at work and filling every possible second, the ideas seemed to disappear. Wondering if there was a correlation between empty moments and productivity, she challenged her listeners and herself to take on a week of challenges. Readers are asked to delete an app they love, relearn how to observe their surroundings, and ensure that there is quiet time in each day.

The issues examined in this book will be all too familiar to most of us. We wonder about the effects of video games on our kids and find ourselves scrolling through social media whenever we have a spare five seconds. The information that Zamorodi compiles is fascinating, and she has plenty of statistics and interviews throughout the book. Ultimately though, the result of reading this book is about the same as the results of her challenge: people didn't see a huge change, but they were more aware of their habits. After reading Bored and Brilliant, I do find myself considering before picking up my phone and instead asking my kids about their day, reading a few pages of my book, or even enjoying a moment or two of boredom.

Bored and Brilliant
How Spacing Out Can Unlock
Your Most Productive and Creative Self
By Manoush Zomorodi
St. Martin's Press September 2017
208 pages
From the library

Rob Scheer grew up moving from one terrible situation to the next, from his abusive father to living in his car after a foster family kicked him out of their home. As an adult, he felt moved to help children in similar circumstances and he and his husband became foster parents. Scheer doesn't paint a rosy picture; instead, he writes about the difficulties of two white gay men trying to adopt black children and the moments when the ghosts from his own past show up in his parenting. Some of the hardest moments to read about are the small ones--the difficulty of using someone else's soap in a strange new house or Rob and his husband Reece's realization that their foster daughter is hoarding food because she doesn't feel secure yet.

Scheer's story is heartbreaking and I am glad he found the courage to share it. For me, I'm not sure it warranted an entire book; it would have been an excellent article showing how his painful childhood led to his becoming a foster dad, adopting his children, and starting Comfort Cases, an organization that gives backpacks with a book, blanket, and hygiene items to foster kids. But if Scheer's story can make anyone understand the need for foster parents and support for children in need, then it is an important one.

A Forever Family
Fostering Change One Child at a Time
By Rob Scheer with Jon Sternfeld
Gallery/Jeter Publishing November 2018
320 pages
Read via Netgalley

Review: Old in Art School

After decades of teaching history at Chapel Hill and Princeton University, Nell Painter left teaching to become a student again. She pursued and completed a BFA and MFA in painting because she loved art and because her mother had proven to her that you are never too old to start over again. As the oldest student in all of her classes and often the only black student, she faced unique challenges. 

With Old in Art School, Painter attempts to accomplish many things. At its face, this is a memoir about a woman starting an entirely new career at an age when some people think about retirement. It's also a primer on the experience of going to art school, what it means to be an artist today, and an invitation to go down the internet rabbit hole of artists and their work. One of the most interesting facets is Painter's effort to find a middle road between the big picture of her background in history and focusing on the immediacy of a single image. Ultimately, she finds she does not have to choose: a single figure in a piece of art can be indicative of an entire era or the story of an entire people or nation.

The most universal part of this book is Painter's realization that once again, she has to find her own way and her own people. The crits (feedback) from her professors and peers are unhelpful, so she finds people outside of the classroom to comment on her work. The art world seems uninterested in anything happening outside of New York City, but Painter finds her first residency after graduation in her beloved hometown of Newark, New Jersey.

Perhaps Painter is too old to care about such things, but she is not always a likable narrator. She says exactly what she thinks and feels without worrying about how it makes her look or how you will perceive her. She confesses that she wished her depressed father had died before her inspiring mother and she spares no one's feelings when she calls out the racist or ageist behaviors of fellow students or teachers. Whether or not you agree with her on every page, Old in Art School is an interesting look at an older black woman playing a young white man's game and the difficulties and discoveries of starting a new chapter of life. 

Old In Art School
A Memoir of Starting Over
By Nell Painter
Counterpoint June 2018
331 pages
From the library

Review of Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement that Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free

When Linda Kay Klein was in high school, she broke up with her boyfriend, convinced that God had asked this of her. Her church had very strict rules about dating and clothing choices and she was often criticized for "tempting boys" with her curvy figure. She left her church after learning that her youth pastor had been charged with child enticement and he had done this at other churches without consequence. As a grownup with a boyfriend, she found herself paralyzed by shame, fear, and anxiety, so she went back home and tracked down her friends from youth group to find out how purity culture affected their lives and relationships.

This book is very, very in my lane. In fact, I had one of the purity rings that Klein describes. I am the daughter of a pastor and remember sitting in True Love Waits classes with the other teens in the church. Today, my sisters and I often talk about finding another way for churches to talk about sex and relationships that informs without shaming.

I think this is what I missed from Pure. Linda Kay Klein does a thorough job of outlining the experiences that she and her peers had as they grew from young girls who had been told sex would ruin them to women who wanted to have sex with their spouses or partners. She doesn't do a lot of embellishing; she records experiences, often without additional insight. But I wanted more--I wanted to know her thoughts, after talking to all of these people, on ways that parents and leaders in the church can talk about sex with our children. I almost felt like this was part one and we are desperately in need of a second part, that will help us to raise kids within the church who know that they are loved by God and by their community, whether or not they have sex.

Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement
That Shamed a Generation of Young Women
And How I Broke Free
By Linda Kay Klein
Touchstone September 2018
353 pages
Read via Netgalley

Review: A Uterus Is a Feature, Not a Bug

When Sarah Lacy achieved some success in tech journalism, she decided she could take the leap of having a child. She knew the discrimination and setbacks that working mothers could face, but realized that this might be the best moment. So she had a son, and then she had a daughter, and then she built a new company from the ground up. Lacy's book is a rallying cry for women to realize that having children does not make you a less valuable employee and being someone with passion for your career does not make you a bad parent.

The Uterus is a Feature, Not a Bug is several things combined between two covers. It's one woman's story of rising through a mainly male profession; it's a deep dive into the statistics that prove that women and parents in the workforce are a strength, not a weakness; and it's an exploration of what we can do to change workplace culture.

Lacy covers a lot here, but one of the most interesting things is the idea of benevolent sexism. She writes about superiors who would never call themselves sexist, but might have neglected to place you in the running for a promotion because you have a small child or you're too "nice" for management. Lacy also destroys the idea of "distracted mothers." The whole concept is a bit ridiculous--are we actually proposing that non-parents have never been distracted by things going on in their personal lives? And "mommy brain?" Parents can be some of the most focused, productive workers; they know there is no time for chatting at the water cooler or perusing the internet because they want to make it home for that bedtime story.

Some reviewers have pointed out that Lacy can be divisive where she means to be unifying: if you open your book by pointing out that non-mothers can never understand what it's like to birth and raise a child, you are dividing (and perhaps offending) some of your readers right from the start. But I think she is right to point out that, whether or not you intend to have children, women are often considered a liability because they might have children. Men's possible parenthood, however, is seen as a non-issue.

This is not a perfect book, but I do think it's a great starting point for everyone--working moms and dads, their colleagues without children, and the bosses who are determining who gets a seat at the table with them. There is a clear need for change in our places of work. Some of us will become parents and some won't. But we need to leave the possibility for you to attend your child's play or take your parent to a doctor's appointment or just take a mental health day sometimes. If we could base our promotion and pay decisions on the merits of someone's work instead of sitting at your desk for a certain number of hours, I think we would see a huge shift in people's success and love for their jobs.


The Uterus is a Feature, Not a Bug
The Working Woman's Guide to Overthrowing the Patriarchy
By Sarah Lacy
Harper Business November 2017
320 pages
Received from the publisher for TLC Book Tours

Nonfiction November Mini-Reviews: American Fire and That Crumpled Paper Was Due Yesterday

On November 12, 2012, firefighters were called to a blaze in an abandoned house in Accomack County, Virginia. Little did they know that it would be the first of 86 fires over the next five months. Journalist Monica Hesse traveled to Virginia and met the firefighters who spent night after night fighting fires, the police officers who tried to find the perpetrators, and the people arrested for the crime. American Fire is her examination of what happened and why it happened in this particular place with these particular people.

Monica Hesse really embedded herself into the lives of the people of these Virginian towns and her careful research helps readers to understand how this could happen in an area where most people dangle perilously over the poverty line and abandoned structures are abundant. While she does interview both people arrested for the fires, there is a feeling that law enforcement, the lawyers, and Ms. Hesse herself never quite got the full story. This is probably not unusual and doesn't take away from a fascinating story, as long as you realize that you won't get every answer you seek. Otherwise, this is a well-researched and fascinating look into five months of confusion and terror, the people who set the fires, and the people who brought them to justice.

American Fire
Love, Arson, and Life in a Vanishing Land
By Monica Hesse
Liveright July 2017
255 pages
From the library

Many of us who are parents have a moment when we can't believe our kid forget his math homework again or wonder why our kid's intelligence doesn't seem to be matching his English grade. Ana Homayoun works as an educational consultant and spends her days helping students find methods to improve their grades and become great students. In That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week, she breaks down the organizational tools that will help your child succeed in school.

I picked this book up because my favorite 9 year old was having some trouble with getting his homework from school to home and I wanted to help him organize his academic life. This book is aimed at kids in middle and high school, but parents of younger children can still find some pertinent ideas. It's a fine place to start, but I found myself wishing there were some more concrete tools. It seems like common knowledge that a child might not reach his full potential if he spends hours in his room "doing homework" (aka on his phone) or that a child's GPA can suffer if there has been a huge life change like a divorce or death in the family. That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week is a good book to skim for some introductory ideas, but I'm still on the lookout for techniques I can use with my son.

Note: Yes, I'm sure you could use these techniques for girls too. My daughter is only four, so we are not quite there yet. Parents of boys and girls, do you find that disorganization is more frequent in boys or is it a family trait?

That Crumpled Paper Was Due Last Week
Helping Disorganized and Distracted Boys Succeed in School and Life
By Ana Homayoun
TarcherPerigee January 2010
304 pages
From the library

Nonfiction November: Become An Expert

It's Nonfiction November!

This month, many readers are putting away their novels in favor of learning something new. I try to read a nonfiction title or two each month, but it's nice to focus on them during the month of November. This week, we are talking about becoming experts on a certain topic.

I just finished and loved Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. In this book, she recounts the year when her family attempted to eat only things that were grown locally or by the family themselves. I am slowly working my way to better food for our family, so I am excited to read other books about gardening, healthy eating, and maybe even getting some chickens.

I have a few books on my tbr list already, but I want your suggestions too. What book helped you as a beginning gardener? What changed the way you think about eating locally? What in the world do you cook in winter when all the produce is shipped from halfway around the world? Which cookbooks do you turn to when trying to eat an entire crate of strawberries or broccoli?

Review: Shalom Sistas

Osheta Moore and her husband were deeply involved in urban ministry in their New Orleans community. She taught ballet at the community center and invited teens into their home, while her husband taught literacy skills and trained people to start new jobs. When Hurricane Katrina hit, their home and the community center where they worked were both destroyed. The family decided to move to Boston, but Osheta found herself without a purpose. She believed that she was called to help people and to practice shalom, or peace-making, in her community, but didn't know how to do it with three small children in tow and no title or funding. As Lent approached, she decided to take those 40 days to study what the Scriptures say about bringing peace to our worlds and then put those things into practice.

In Shalom Sistas, Osheta tells readers that making peace is for everyone. It's for the people who work full-time jobs, the moms and dads who are home all day with little ones, and those of us who feel a bit too snarky to be considered a saint. In fact, Osheta becomes convinced that peacemaking is an active and audacious process, and it needs people who are ready to speak with power and a bit of sass. She writes a manifesto to remember what people seeking peace should be doing every day, which includes things like believing we are enough, seeing the beauty around us, choosing subversive joy, and serving before speaking.

Some of the practices Osheta writes about in Shalom Sistas are ones we have heard before, like remembering to rest so we can do good, hard work. But in other chapters, she deeply challenges her readers. When she read about the Steubenville rape case, she was heartbroken as a fellow victim of sexual assault. But she also sees that, if we are truly committed to peacemaking, there has to be a road to redemption for the perpetrators too. When her daughter's school throws a daddy/daughter dance, the family decides to take the more difficult road and throw a free party instead of attending the event that not everyone could afford. Osheta writes in an extremely conversational and encouraging way. If you are looking for a book that will give you ideas to make peace in yourself, your home, and your community, Shalom Sistas is a great place to start.

Shalom Sistas
Living Wholeheartedly in a Broken World
By Osheta Moore
Herald Press October 2017
240 pages
Read via Netgalley

Review: Something Beautiful Happened

Yvette Manessis Corporon knew that her family made a brave choice during WWII when her grandparents and their neighbors hid a Jewish family. She has heard the stories of their time together on the island of Erikousa and knows that Savvas and his family survived the war. But no one seems to know where the family went after the war ended. Yvette sets out to discover what happened to them, in the hopes that her family and their family can be reunited. She is overjoyed when she finally finds them, but her joy quickly turns to grief when her relatives are murdered by a neo-Nazi. Yvette and her relatives struggle to make sense of the knowledge that the bravery and joy of the past do not keep them safe from the evil of the present.

Something Beautiful Happened is one of those books that is both universal and specific. Few of us can claim that our grandparents saved someone's life during World War II, but all of us will learn that there is evil in the world that can hurt those we love. What do we do with that grief and anger?

There are moments when the writing in this book veers a bit to the cliche but ultimately, we have two choices when tragedy strikes: either we fall apart or we find those small, beautiful moments that carry us through. Yvette travels around the world and encounters many people, but she finds that they are bound together by the power of story and the unexpected discovery of hope. As the generations who survived the Holocaust are getting older, we must seize our last opportunities to hear about their lives. Their stories of bravery and kindness in one of humanity's darkest moments can give us the strength to hope that good does come after evil.

Something Beautiful Happened
A Story of Courage and Survival in the Face of Evil
By Yvette Manessis Corporon
Howard Books September 2017
320 pages
Read via Netgalley

Mini-reviews: Lessons in Belonging and Love Warrior

Erin Lane is probably the poster girl for going to church. Her husband is a pastor and she recently graduated from seminary. But she finds it surprisingly difficult to fit in at a church. Her knowledge of theology makes her bristle in the face of ignorance about church practices, and she is decidedly uncomfortable with platitudes and superficial social interactions.  In Lessons In Belonging, Lane tries to find out if there is a place in the church for a smart feminist troublemaker with a penchant for asking lots of questions.

There are an abundance of spiritual memoirs from people in their 20s and 30s who feel that it is difficult to belong in the churches of their childhood. It's so much easier to just leave when someone lets you down or hurts you. But Lane discovers that disillusionment is the first step in belonging. Just like any other relationship, being a part of a church means being vulnerable, truthful, and willing to pick your battles and love in spite of your differences. Lane doesn't pretend to have all of the answers, but her questions will seem very familiar to many people who both love the church and feel like they sometimes don't belong there.

Lessons in Belonging From A Church-Going Commitment Phobe
By Erin Lane
IVP Books December 2014
208 pages
Read via Netgalley

Glennon Doyle Melton was feeling good about her life. She loved her family, and had a much beloved blog and a NYT bestselling book. But then she found out that her husband had been cheating on her for years. Everything she thought she knew about herself, her life, and her family seemed to explode around her and she found herself at rock bottom. But Glennon remembered that she had been here before, as a young woman who was an alcoholic and bulimic and held a positive pregnancy test in her hand. In this memoir, we follow a woman as she starts over again to learn who she is, what she believes, and what she will do to fight for love.

This book has been overshadowed by the reality that writing about your life always means writing about the past. As Love Warrior comes to its end, the author has learned a lot about herself and has hope for the future of her marriage. But this manuscript was completed several years ago. As Glennon currently promotes this book, she has separated from her husband and is currently dating Abby Wombach. In spite of the changes to her life since finishing this book, the story itself holds up as raw and beautiful. She writes about the ways that we compromise who we are to fit into perceptions of who we should be and the truth that we must know and love ourselves before we can truly love and know others. If you are in the midst of heartbreak, this is your book. If you have read and loved Glennon's writing before, this is her best work yet.

Love Warrior
By Glennon Doyle Melton
St. Martin's Press September 2016
272 pages
From my shelves

Review: My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me

Jennifer Teege is perusing the shelves at her local library when she spies a surprisingly familiar image on a book cover. The picture is of her biological mother and the book is about living with the legacy of a Nazi father. Jennifer is shocked to learn that her grandfather was Amon Goeth, the infamous commandant portrayed in Schindler's List. Her life goes into a tailspin as she tries to come to terms with a beloved grandmother who was deeply in love with a war criminal who would have murdered Jennifer because of the color of her skin.

This book very intelligently has two authors. Jennifer Teege tells her own story, while Nikola Sellmair writes the history that surrounds her family. She details the life and atrocities of Goeth and the history of the places that Jennifer visits. The two voices are essential to this story. Jennifer's reactions, are of course, primarily emotional and personal. Sellmair's careful research places her story within the larger lens of history.

Jennifer's discovery spurs her to re-examine her entire life. She connects with her mother for the first time in years, and tries to sort out her feelings about her childhood as a black child in a mostly white neighborhood. She remembers growing up with an adoptive family who adored her, but made the difficult decision to cut ties to her biological family. She wonders how she can ever look her Jewish friends in the eye again and walks through the camp where her grandfather reigned in terror over the prisoners.

One of the most fascinating and disturbing parts of this book is Jennifer's realization that she is not alone in this bizarre situation. While she had no knowledge of the actions of her grandfather, there were thousands of spouses and children who knew exactly what was happening during the Holocaust. Multiple generations downplayed the atrocities committed or insisted that their loved one could not have been a part of such a thing. Even the descendents who were not alive during the war live with extraordinary guilt. How can a person atone for the actions of their ancestors?

My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me
A Black Woman Discovers Her Family's Nazi Past
By Jennifer Teege and Nikola Sellmair
The Experiment April 2015
240 pages
From the library

Review: Truevine

In 1899, two young boys were taken from the field they were working to become part of the circus. They spent decades being heralded as cannibals, aliens, and sheep men as people paid admission to see these two albino black men. But George and Willie Muse rarely saw any of the profits from their international stardom and their family back home in Virginia didn't know where they were or even if they were still alive. Their mother Harriet was determined to find them and to give them some control over their own lives, regardless of the cost.

Truevine is an intriguing read in many ways. Author Beth Macy struggles with being both an accurate reporter of facts and a kind fellow human as her research indicates that the often-repeated Muse Family story may not be quite what transpired. The book opens with Macy meeting Nancy Saunders, George and Willie's great-niece. She is a fierce protector of her elderly Uncle Willie and disinclined to let this white journalist talk to him. Nancy continues to believe that the boys were kidnapped, even as Macy accumulates evidence that their mother may have initially arranged for them to join the circus.

One of the most revealing moments in this book is when Macy questions if the circus might have been the best place for George and Willie after all. While the owners and managers certainly took advantage of the brothers, she examines what life was like for people considered freaks both inside and outside the circus tents. George and Willie were seen as different everywhere they went, whether they were up on stage or just sitting outside their home. It is impossible to escape the shadows that hang over this story: many of the people that the brothers performed alongside at the circus met terrible ends and the town of Truevine itself has a dark history of racism that is not as far in the past as we would like to believe.


Truevine: Two Brothers, A Kidnapping, and A Mother's Quest
A True Story of the Jim Crow South
By Beth Macy
Little, Brown, and Company October 2016
432 pages
From the library

Review: Sing For Your Life

Ryan Green was a young man heading for trouble. He lived in a bad neighborhood, his father was gone, and Ryan and his mother frequently get into physical altercations. When he was twelve years old, he was sent to juvenile detention. But twelve years later, he was singing on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera House and winning a spot in a national program for the most talented young singers. Sing For Your Life follows Ryan from a cell in solitary to a career as a professional opera singer.

As someone who has studied voice and sings frequently, I was intrigued by Ryan's story. I know the years of practice that it takes to become a good singer and that talent is no guarantee of success. I wanted to know how a young man with little training kept winning competitions and rising in the opera world.

It's wonderful to read about teachers and mentors who chose to believe in and champion a boy who had a difficult upbringing and had spent time in juvenile detention. The adults in his life tried to get through to him at his most violent, gave him the extra instruction he needed to catch up to the other musicians, and encouraged him to dream big.

The most fascinating part of the story though, is seeing the ways Ryan encounters prejudice and is able to overcome it. He remembers the wonder he felt the first time he saw a person of color sing a major role in an opera and how her performance convinced him there could be a place for him too. The most heartbreaking moment comes when he is fairly far along in his opera career and is asked to sing the seminal musical theatre song Ol' Man River. He has already performed several opera roles and knows how to sing in multiple languages, but the wealthy patrons of the arts want to hear him sing a song that hearkens back to the days of slavery and racism.

Sing For Your Life sometimes struck me as being better suited as a series of pieces for a magazine or newspaper and even after spending 300 pages with Ryan, I feel that I have only seen the surface of who he is and what he has experienced. In spite of that,  I am glad I know Ryan's story and hope that he has a long and wonderful career.


Sing For Your Life
By Daniel Bergner
Lee Boudreaux Books September 2016
320 pages
From the library

Review: Bonhoeffer

Dietrich Bonhoeffer is a pastor and writer known for important Christian works such as Discipleship and Ethics. He is also one of the people who worked from within Germany to fight the Third Reich and take Hitler out of power, by any means necessary. How did a man of faith reconcile the possibility of murder? What drove this man to risk everything to fight for the Germany he loved?

This book is more than 500 pages long. While it might seem intimidating, the talented Eric Metaxas uses every paragraph to bring Dietrich Bonhoeffer to life and convey the difficult choices that Germans faced during the rise and rule of the Nazis. He starts at the beginning of Bonhoeffer's life and reveals the exact combination that made him into the man he became - a religious mother, a wealthy and educated family, and family members who worked for the government and had inside information.

Bonhoeffer was still coming up through the ranks of seminary and ministry as Hitler rose to power, but he knew from the outset that their new leader could not be trusted and that bad things were on the horizon. He was a man who loved Germany as a nation and was willing to fight for the country he had grown up in. Hitler was aware of the potential for the church to cause trouble, so he tried to control it early on by creating a national church that was controlled by his appointee. Bonhoeffer was appalled by the people who called themselves followers of Christ but would not protest the way that their fellow Germans were being treated by the Third Reich. Along with many other pastors, he split from the national church and formed the Confessing Church.

One of Bonhoeffer's great tasks was making connections with pastors and leaders outside of Germany. There were many Germans who understood the importance of overthrowing Hitler, but they wanted to make sure they would have the support of other nations and that they and their countrymen would not be punished for sins they had not committed. Unfortunately, this met with little success and many men in the government who might have taken great risks didn't, choosing instead to look out for their own safety and security.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing about Bonhoeffer's story is the futility of it all. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was arrested not for plotting against Hitler, but for redirecting some money to help Jewish refugees. He was executed by the Nazis just a few weeks before the end of the war. The fact that he came so close to surviving the war and going on to write new works, marry his fiance, and fight other injustices is heartbreaking.

In Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy, readers receive perhaps the best look at Bonhoeffer they are likely to get outside of his own writing. Mr. Metaxas presents a man who was consistently evolving and learning, but also had the conviction to fight and die for his belief in what was right.

Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy
By Eric Metaxas
Thomas Nelson Publishers August 2011
608 pages
Borrowed from my father

Nonfiction November: Tables in the Wilderness

Preston Yancey knew what he believed. He had grown up going to church. His parents were gracious and supportive, showing him what it meant to have faith even in the midst of his mother's debilitating pain. By the time he went to college at Baylor University, he had already been on a missions trip and was sure that God was going to do awesome things with his life. But then he heard God speak to him - "It's going to be about trust with you." And then God was silent.

Preston Yancey is what is lovingly called a PK (pastor's kid). I also happen to be one. For many of us who grow up in the church, it is very jarring to be out on your own and discover that things you took for granted don't hold up anymore. Then the slow work of rebuilding begins. We pick a new version of the Bible or turn to the prayers of the saints for comfort. We visit a different kind of church until we find one where we feel accepted or read spiritual memoirs to remind us we are not alone in this wilderness.

This book moves back and forth in time. It begins at the moment that God went silent, and takes us through college classes, tearful church services, and whispered confessions to friends. Tables in the Wilderness is about learning to be comfortable in the silence, in not knowing all the answers about faith or God or what you are supposed to be doing with your life.

We all think we know everything when we are 18 and heading off to college. Yancey recognizes his own hubris and handles it with grace. The thing that really sets this apart from other stories of 20-something crisis is the beautiful writing. Yancey writes like a poet who just happened to be writing prose and brings clarity and beauty to phrases that would have been happenstance for a different author. Books and stories are incredibly important to this author, and they are present on every page. In fact, he writes about his father's statement that telling a story in and of itself is an act of worship. If that is the case, I'm glad Preston Yancey chose to worship by telling us his story and reminding us that we will not be in the wilderness of uncertainty forever.


Tables in the Wilderness: A Memoir of God Found, Lost, and Found Again
By Preston Yancey
Zondervan September 2014
236 pages
From my shelves

Nonfiction November: Out of Sorts

Sarah Bessey is a writer of incredible grace and kindness. There are many books about the moment when someone becomes a Christian, but there are very few that deal with the changing journey of faith. It is easy to feel confident in our beliefs - we know exactly what we believe and why...until the day when things aren't so clear anymore. We find something that doesn't make sense or realize that we just don't believe a certain thing in light of our own experiences. Through Bessey's words, we see that our beliefs can change over time and we can be gentle with ourselves as that happens.

Throughout the book, Bessey compares faith to holding a rummage sale. As we sort through the pieces of our faith, we rediscover some things we had forgotten we had, but we also find things that no longer fit into our lives. There are chapters about every person's ability to ask questions and dive into theology, how we can and should keep reading through the portions of Scripture that make us uncomfortable, and finding beauty in the new and ancient practices of the church. In all of these things, she always brings the focus back to Jesus and His love for us. 

Bessey weaves together her thoughts about an evolving faith with her own story of coming to faith as a child, growing up in the church, leaving it for six years, and then finding her way back. She is honest about the pain she experienced and the mistakes she made.

Out of Sorts is a book of loving warning for the person new to faith about the trials they may face. It is also a reassuring message of solace for the person who thought they knew what they believed, only to find themselves in a spiritual wilderness. A faith that looks exactly the same for years is a faith that isn't growing. This is a normal part of our journey, despite its uncertainty. With gentle and kind guidance from people like Sarah Bessey, we are able to walk through it together with the knowledge that all will be well.


Out of Sorts: Making Peace with An Evolving Faith
By Sarah Bessey
Howard Books November 2015
272 pages
Read via Netgalley

Nonfiction November: Book Parings

As a part of Nonfiction November, we are pairing novels and nonfiction books that are perfect to read together. Here are my picks: 

             

I reviewed Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy in September of last year. When I read The Crescent Spy just last week, it immediately reminded me of Karen Abbott's nonfiction book. Michael Wallace's novel focuses on one woman who works as a newspaper reporter in New Orleans while sending information back to the Union. In Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy, readers encounter four women. Two of them worked for the Confederacy and two worked were on the side of the Union during the Civil War. Abbott's book reads as easily as a novel, so it will feel like no work at all to go from one book to the other!


                

Flavia de Luce is one of my favorite literary characters. In the first book of her series, she is a precocious eleven year old living in an English village with her father and sisters. She just happens to also solve murders and be rather skilled with a chemistry set. One of her favorite pastimes is concocting mixtures to take revenge on her big sisters. She hasn't poisoned them yet, but her escapades make me think it would be a great idea to pair Flavia with The Poisoner's Handbook.


                

 The Hours may be one of my all-time favorite novels. I read it just two years after graduating from college with an English degree and I was stunned by the way Cunningham wrapped up literary prowess in phrasing I wanted to read on repeat. The book goes back and forth between writer Virginia Woolf and two women who will later be impacted by her work in big and small ways.  Then this year, I read Vanessa and Her Sister, which explored the relationship between Virgina Woolf, her sister Vanessa, and the people who comprised the Bloomsbury Group. Of course, no Virginia Woolf party would be complete without a good biography. The one written by her nephew is supposed to be quite good!


What fiction/nonfiction pairings do you suggest?

Nonfiction November: Week 1

 

It's Nonfiction November time! You can find all of the information over at Sophisticated Dorkiness. This event is a great way to look back at the nonfiction titles you have read this year, add some new ones to your to-be-read list, and think about the importance of reading nonfiction. 

 

If participating does nothing else for me, I'm realizing that I read more nonfiction than I think I do. At this point, I've reviewed 20 nonfiction titles on my blog this year.

         

         

        

        

        

      

                             

 

What was your favorite nonfiction read of the year? That is a tough question. I'm going to call it a tie between Simply Tuesday and I Am Malala. 

What nonfiction book have you recommended the most? I recommended Quiet a lot around the time I read it. I also talk Erik Larson (Dead Wake) up as a great gateway writer for people who don't think they can be nonfiction readers.

What is one topic or type of nonfiction you haven’t read enough of yet? I could read more history and science. I tend to gravitate towards memoirs/biographies or books that I think are labeled as "lifestyle" books.

What are you hoping to get out of participating in Nonfiction November? I hope to really motivate myself to read more nonfiction and add some great books to my tbr list! 

What do you hope to read during Nonfiction November? Definitely Out of Sorts by Sarah Bessey, Sounds Like Me by Sara Bareilles, Headstrong by Rachel Swaby, and Bonhoeffer by Eric Mataxas. Then we will have to see what jumps into my hands the next time I go to the library...