A.J. Jacob’s The Year of Living Biblically is one of the books I was “saving” for Lent, knowing that I’d enjoy it. In case you haven’t heard of it (and you probably have, because it’s getting a lot of hype), it’s Jacobs’ story of the year he spent trying to follow every [...]
N.T. Wright is one of those writers who has had a major shaping influence on my life and thinking. At a time when I was reading a lot of Biblical criticism and questioning whether it was possible for an intelligent, educated scholar to take the Gospels seriously as history, someone pointed me towards his [...]
Like lots of Westerners, I probably don’t know enough about Islam. I read No god by God (recommended by Catherine) in hopes of correcting that deficiency. It was a good choice.
Reza Aslan is a young, Iranian-born-but-living-in-America, scholar of Islam. I have no idea how other Muslims regard Aslan or this book, but he seems [...]
When was the last time you read a business book that ends with the author’s business going bankrupt and being sold off to the highest bidder? When was the last time you read a book about Christian ministry that ends with the ministry collapsing in disarray and being sold to a non-Christian company? In other [...]
This is a book I’d heard about for awhile and was anxious to read. It’s the story of three women — one Muslim, one Jewish, one Christian — who began meeting together to talk about their three faiths, to explore differences and find common ground. Ranya, Suzanne and Priscilla didn’t know each other [...]
The first book on this year’s Lenten reading list is one I picked up in a store a few weeks ago and saved for Lent. McLaren’s subtitle is: “Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope,” which sounds like everything I want to read about.
However, the book wasn’t nearly as thought-provoking or inspiring [...]
Yes, fellow Compulsive Overreaders, it is time once again for my annual experiment in laying aside fiction and getting through a hefty pile of spiritual, theological or generally religious-ish non-fiction — usually things I’ve wanted to read but haven’t got around to because there are too many good novels to read. I’m starting Lent this [...]
Those last two reviews make it sound like I’m particularly hard to please, don’t they? In both cases I tried a novel by a writers who previous work I had enjoyed, and in both cases I was let down. This was my third shot, as I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve read by Sue Miller in [...]
As with the Kate Atkinson book, I chose Alice Sebold’s latest novel on the basis of having enjoyed her previous work. Maybe “enjoyed” isn’t quite the right word for a powerful novel narrated posthumously by a raped and murdered teenager (The Lovely Bones) and a searing memoir about her own experience of rape (Lucky). [...]
Kate Atkinson’s Behind the Scenes at the Museum is one of the most memorable novels I’ve ever read — funny, insightful, and with a brilliantly twisty plot. I read her second novel, Case Histories, and thought it was really good although not as powerful as Behind the Scenes. So I had fairly high expectations [...]
