Every month we show what is on our reading table.
This month we added six new books.
Nothing because we are still busy with much personal and business activity going on. Birthdays, homecomings, graduations, a commercial property in escrow, stabilizing our most recent purchase…
- “Stand” (114 pages, paperback, 2022) by Pastor Jon Benzinger: From a local church we visited: “You are in the midst of the greatest attack on Christianity in your life. Make no mistake, the war is coming for you. The question is, will you be ready for it and will you fight or fold? This easy-to-understand book clarifies the change you’re sensing in our culture, at your church, your job, or your school, and gives you tools to stand faithfully against this aggressive and heretical attack on the gospel. Jon Benzinger is the Lead Pastor of Redeemer Bible Church in Gilbert, Arizona, contributor to the Redeeming Truth podcast, founder of helpingpastors.org, and President of the Redeemer Center for Church Leadership.”
- “A Year in Provence” (224 pages, paperback, 1991) by Peter Mayle: OUTSTANDING: “In this witty and warm-hearted account, Peter Mayle tells what it is like to realize a long-cherished dream and actually move into a 200-year-old stone farmhouse in the remote country of the Lubéron with his wife and two large dogs.
- “Sea Trials” (277 pages, paperback, 2019) by Alaric Bond: The 12th in our series. Great and getting better even! “HMS Mistral has emerged from a major refit with one vital element missing – her captain. But Tom King is many miles away aboard a different warship and facing an apparently unbeatable enemy force. Will he survive to claim his rightful place, or is Mistral destined to sail under another’s command?
- With graphic naval action, danger from the elements and a major conflict of loyalties, Mistral’s sea trials quickly turn into a testing time for her crew as much as their vessel.”
- “Triumph” (288 pages, paperback, 1964) by Phillip Wylie: Set in 1963, this is science fiction/end-of-th-world genre that also examines racial and gender roles. “In the world’s upper hemisphere, only one small group has survived World War III: fourteen people, sheltered deep within a limestone mountain in Connecticut and with enough supplies and equipment to maintain their subsistence for upwards of two years. The group includes a forward-thinking millionaire and his family, a levelheaded Jewish scientist, a playboy, an aging African American servant and his daughter, a gigolo and the glamorous woman who has been his mistress, a beautiful Chinese girl, a young meter reader, two children, and a Japanese engineer. Fully aware of the outcome of the war that had raged briefly above them, the survivors seethe with hatred, fall into depression over their losses, rise to moments of superhuman bravery, and lapse into behavior that reflects their human weaknesses. Philip Wylie mercilessly predicts the inevitable end of a world that continues to function as selfishly and as barbarously as our own.”
- “The Paris Wife” (331 pages, paperback, 2012) by Paula McLain: Really good. “Chicago, 1920: Hadley Richardson is a quiet twenty-eight-year-old who has all but given up on love and happiness—until she meets Ernest Hemingway. Following a whirlwind courtship and wedding, the pair set sail for Paris, where they become the golden couple in a lively and volatile group—the fabled “Lost Generation”—that includes Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.”
- “The Cosmic Revolutionary’s Handbook: (Or: How to Beat the Big Bang)” (286 pages, hardback, 2020) by Luke A. Barnes and Geraint F. Lewis: Interesting way of looking at cosmology: “Free yourself from cosmological tyranny! Everything started in a Big Bang? Invisible dark matter? Black holes? Why accept such a weird cosmos? For all those who wonder about this bizarre universe, and those who want to overthrow the Big Bang, this handbook gives you ‘just the facts’: the observations that have shaped these ideas and theories. While the Big Bang holds the attention of scientists, it isn’t perfect. The authors pull back the curtains, and show how cosmology really works. With this, you will know your enemy, cosmic revolutionary – arm yourself for the scientific arena where ideas must fight for survival! This uniquely-framed tour of modern cosmology gives a deeper understanding of the inner workings of this fascinating field. The portrait painted is realistic and raw, not idealized and airbrushed – it is science in all its messy detail, which doesn’t pretend to have all the answers.”
- “The Other Half of Church” (240 pages, paperback, 2020) by Jim Wilder and Michel Hendricks: This book was mentioned during Pastor Tim’s (Christ Greenfield Church) The premise of the book is that our brains are wired left half/right half being equivalent to rational/relational or thinking/feeling. Modern church has become mostly left half/rational/thinking as opposed to the opposite. To advance, we need to bring the right half back. I’ve read the first few chapters and am impressed. One of the principal arguments is that we have lost the “joy” of the right half. I agree with that; both personally and for ‘modern’ man.
Not pictured:
- “The One Year Bible” with help from the “Lutheran Study Bible“.