Book Review: Redeeming Love

Title: Redeeming Love

Author: Francine Rivers

Passports: 5

Reviewed by: Binta, a Pendleton patron

Angel is a broken woman. She lived most of her life under the control of ruthless, evil people and experienced horrors that most cannot imagine.  Angel learned early on that no one can be trusted and that love does not exist. Then one day, Michael Hosea walks into her life and things begin to change … or do they? Can even the most selfless and dedicated love be enough to break through the walls that Angel has build around her heart? Based on the biblical story of Hosea, Redeeming Love is a heart-wrenching tale of love, faith, and forgiveness that takes readers on a truly inspirational journey.

Publisher’s Description: California’s gold country, 1850. A time when men sold their souls for a bag of gold and women sold their bodies for a place to sleep.  
   Angel expects nothing from men but betrayal. Sold into prostitution as a child, she survives by keeping her hatred alive. And what she hates most are the men who use her, leaving her empty and dead inside.  
   Then she meets Michael Hosea, a man who seeks his Father’s heart in everything. Michael obeys God’s call to marry Angel and to love her unconditionally. Slowly, day by day, he defies Angel’s every bitter expectation, until despite her resistance, her frozen heart begins to thaw.  
   But with her unexpected softening comes overwhelming feelings of unworthiness and fear. And so Angel runs. Back to the darkness, away from her husband’s pursuing love, terrified of the truth she no longer can deny: Her final healing must come from the One who loves her even more than Michael does … the One who will never let her go.  

Want to read Redeeming Love? Click here. Also available in large print.

Binta has been entered in our November drawing for a signed copy of Jane and Michael Stern’s The Lexicon of Real American Food. Click here to submit your own review by Nov. 30 for your chance to win this book!

One week left before November drawing!

There’s one week left to submit a review and be entered to win a signed copy of The Lexicon of Real American Food, by Jane and Michael Stern. This a final published copy, great for yourself or a foodie on your holiday gift list. Submit a review by midnight on November 30 for your chance to win this book!

Book Review: Life Gets Better

Title: Life Gets Better: The Unexpected Pleasures of Growing Older

Author: Wendy Lustbader

Reviewed by: Susan, a Main Library staff member

This book gave me a big attitude adjustment in how to approach the rest of my life. It’s really a book for all ages: for the teenager who needs to understand why grandpa suddenly wants to build birdhouses; for the daughter who wants to help her elderly mother find more joy out of life; for those who have reached the AARP stage and want to sign up for shag-dancing lessons but are afraid of what others might think.

There are so many encouraging, pithy passages, but my favorite chapter is “Beginner’s mind.” As we grow older, some of us tend to close up and stay stuck in the ways we always did things.  Lustbader says, “Living long softens us and opens us up.”  She reminds us that although “aging is public,” it is our attitude, and the willingness to adjust and adapt ourselves to find new ways to be who we are, that bring us happiness. And even if we don’t learn anything new, we learn to rechannel what we can do and reexamine what we are.  It is a loving, inspirational read for all of us who face growing old reluctantly. I recommend it, wholeheartedly!

Publisher’s Description:

From our earliest lives, we are told that our youth will be the best time of our lives-that the energy and vitality of youth are the most important qualities a person can possess, and that everything that comes after will be a sad decline. But in reality, says Wendy Lustbader, youth is not the golden era it is often made out to be. For many, it is a time riddled with anxiety, angst, confusion, and the torture of uncertainty. Conversely, the media often feeds us a vision of growing older as a journey of defeat and diminishment. They are dead wrong. As Lustbader counters, “Life gets better as we get older, on all levels except the physical.”

Life Gets Better is not a precious or whimsical tome on the quirky wisdom of the elderly. Lustbader-who has worked for several decades as a social worker specializing in aging issues-conducted firsthand research with aging and elderly people in all walks of life, and she found that they overwhelmingly spoke of the mental and emotional richness they have drawn from aging. Lustbader discovered that rather than experiencing a decline from youth, aging people were happier, more courageous, and more interested in being true to their inner selves than were young people.

Life Gets Better examines through first-person stories, as well as Lustbader’s own observations, how a lifetime of lessons learned can yield one of the most personally and emotionally fruitful periods of anyone’s life. As an eighty-six-year-old who contributed her story to the book noted, “For me, being old is the reward for outlasting all the big and little problems that happen to all of us along life’s pathway.”

The collected stories in Life Gets Better provide a hopeful corrective to the fear of aging aggressively instilled in us by the media. Don’t dread the future: The best years of our lives just may be ahead.

Want to read Life Gets Better? Click here.

Write your own review for your chance to win our November drawing for a signed copy of The Lexicon of Real American Food, by Jane and Michael Stern.

Our October winner!

Congratulations to Samantha, the winner of our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice! Samantha reviewed Under a War-Torn Sky.

November’s prize will be a signed copy of The Lexicon of Real American Food, by Jane and Michael Stern. This a final published copy, great for yourself or a foodie on your holiday gift list. Submit a review by midnight on November 30 for your chance to win this book!

Book Review: The Thinking Life

Title: The Thinking Life: How to Thrive in the Age of Distraction

Author: P. M. Forni

Reviewed by: Susan, a Main Library staff member

Why do I spend so much time online googling? Do I need to click and scroll and chat for hours and hours?  Do I need Facebook or MySpace? Do I want to stay trapped in a social network of senseless voices? P.M. Forni’s book, The Thinking Life: How to Thrive in the Age of Distraction suggests that the answer to my technology overload is to learn why I don’t allow myself to think. Shallow thinking, he warns, can cause botched relationships, negatively impact effectiveness at work, leave a person at the mercy of adversity, and limit happiness.

He urges us to be more aware of our surroundings and to develop healthy introspection. He spells out why self-control requires real thinking, what proactive and creative thinking will do for successful decision making and problem solving, and how to think before speaking. This easily readable, short, small book is loaded with stimulating questions and snippets of good advice, and examples of well-known people who have struggled to be successful. Skip to the last chapter and his conclusion, “We are what we think,” to understand why effective thinking will improve all our lives. I am now starting to rethink technology and how I will spend my time.

Publisher’s Description:

Professor Forni, founder of The Civility Initiative at Johns Hopkins, is America’s civility expert. Now, in The Thinking Life, he looks at the importance of thinking in our lives: how we do it, why we don’t do enough of it and why we need to do more of it.

In twelve short chapters, he gives readers a remedy for the Age of Distraction, an age fuelled by the internet, Blackberries and cellphones, all of which make constant demands on our attention, diverting it from one thing to another. After suggesting ways we can find time to think more, Forni shows readers how we can improve our abilities of:

—Attention
—Reflection
—Introspection
—Self-control
—Positive thinking
—Proactive thinking
—Effective decision-making strategies
—Creative thinking
—Problem-solving strategies

Just as he did with civility, he puts the importance of good thinking front and center in a book as simple and as profound as his earlier works.

Want to read The Thinking Life? Click here.

Write your own review for your chance to win our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice.

Book Review: Unfamiliar Fishes

Title: Unfamiliar Fishes

Author: Sarah Vowell

Passports: 4

Reviewed by: Janet, a Main Library staff member

I have not listened to Sarah Vowell on public radio, but I heard her speak at PLA in 2010.  She had a very dry sense of humor which I enjoyed, so when I saw she had written a book about Hawaii and how it became a U.S. state, I thought I’d try reading it.  I’m glad I did!  She brings a new perspective to the historical figures and the dramatic events of this period in history.  She certainly isn’t afraid to point out both the good motives of real people, as well as their foibles and downright self-serving actions and attitudes. Yet you can still empathize with nearly everyone discussed, and considering the vastly different attitudes and upbringings between New England missionaries and traditional Hawaiian royalty, that’s remarkable.  If you enjoy history with a dose of wit, I highly recommend this book.

Publisher’s Description:

Many think of 1776 as the defining year of American history, when we became a nation devoted to the pursuit of happiness through self- government. In Unfamiliar Fishes, Sarah Vowell argues that 1898 might be a year just as defining, when, in an orgy of imperialism, the United States annexed Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Guam, and invaded first Cuba, then the Philippines, becoming an international superpower practically overnight.

Among the developments in these outposts of 1898, Vowell considers the Americanization of Hawaii the most intriguing. From the arrival of New England missionaries in 1820, their goal to Christianize the local heathen, to the coup d’état of the missionaries’ sons in 1893, which overthrew the Hawaiian queen, the events leading up to American annexation feature a cast of beguiling, and often appealing or tragic, characters: whalers who fired cannons at the Bible-thumpers denying them their God-given right to whores, an incestuous princess pulled between her new god and her brother-husband, sugar barons, lepers, con men, Theodore Roosevelt, and the last Hawaiian queen, a songwriter whose sentimental ode “Aloha ‘Oe” serenaded the first Hawaiian president of the United States during his 2009 inaugural parade.

With her trademark smart-alecky insights and reporting, Vowell lights out to discover the off, emblematic, and exceptional history of the fiftieth state, and in so doing finds America, warts and all.

Want to read Unfamiliar Fishes? Click here.

Write your own review for your chance to win our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice.

Book Review: Sarah’s Key

Title: Sarah’s Key

Author: Tatiana de Rosnay

Passports: 4

Reviewed by: Becky, a Powdersville staff member

A gripping story of a little-known Holocaust incident in France in 1942. De Rosnay does an excellent job of tying together the story of Sarah, a Holocaust survivor, and Julia, a contemporary American living in France. As journalist Julia delves into Sarah’s story, she becomes obsessed with finding out the truth of what really happened. This page-turner kept me up late to finish! 

Publisher’s Description:

Paris, July 1942: Sarah, a ten-year-old girl, is taken with her parents by the French police as they go door to door arresting Jewish families in the middle of the night. Desperate to protect her younger brother, Sarah locks him in a bedroom cupboard—their secret hiding place—and promises to come back for him as soon as they are released. 

Sixty Years Later: Sarah’s story intertwines with that of Julia Jarmond, an American journalist investigating the roundup. In her research, Julia stumbles onto a trail of secrets that link her to Sarah, and to questions about her own future.

Want to read Sarah’s Key? Click here. Also available in large print, on audio CD and on audio cassette.

Write your own review for your chance to win our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice.

Another review of Under a War-Torn Sky

Title: Under a War-Torn Sky

Author: L. M. Elliott

Passports: 5

Reviewed by: Samantha, a Piedmont patron

I think that Under a War-Torn Sky is an inspirational story. It will capture the minds of all readers, especially if you like dramatic, suspenseful stories.

Publisher’s Description: When Henry Forester is shot down during a bombing run over France, the World War II pilot finds himself trapped behind enemy lines. In constant danger of discovery by German soldiers, Henry begins a remarkable journey to freedom. Relying on the kindness of strangers, Henry moves from town to town–traveling by moonlight, never asking questions, or even the names of the people who help him along the way. Through his journey, Henry gains an understanding of the French and their struggle; and of his own place in a war that will change the face of Europe forever.

Want to read Under a War-Torn Sky? Click here.

Samantha has been entered in our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice. Click here to review a book for your chance to win Kings of Vice!

Book Review: Under a War-Torn Sky

Title: Under a War-Torn Sky

Author: L. M. Elliott

Passports: 4

Reviewed by: Binta, a Pendleton patron

Under a War-Torn Sky, by author L.M. Elliot, takes readers on a sorrowful, yet hopeful journey through the realities and brutalities of a nation at war. The story is made more real by the heart-wrenching emotions that Henry experiences as he desperately attempts to find his way back home to his family.  The book also tackles the intricacies of friendship, and parental expectations. Throughout the book, Henry thoughtfully speaks about his anger and contempt for his father, who Henry felt was harsh and overly critical. People of all ages can appreciate the complex and universal themes explored throughout the pages of this fast-paced, fascinating story.

Publisher’s Description: When Henry Forester is shot down during a bombing run over France, the World War II pilot finds himself trapped behind enemy lines. In constant danger of discovery by German soldiers, Henry begins a remarkable journey to freedom. Relying on the kindness of strangers, Henry moves from town to town–traveling by moonlight, never asking questions, or even the names of the people who help him along the way. Through his journey, Henry gains an understanding of the French and their struggle; and of his own place in a war that will change the face of Europe forever.

Want to read Under a War-Torn Sky? Click here.

Binta has been entered in our October drawing for a signed advance reading copy of Ice-T’s Kings of Vice. Click here to submit your own review for your chance to win this book!

We have a winner!

Congratulations to Cynthia, the winner of our September drawing for a signed advance reading copy of James Patterson’s The Christmas Wedding! Cynthia reviewed Hostile Witness, by Rebecca Forster.

October’s prize will be a signed advance reading copy of Kings of Vice, by Ice-T. Submit a review by midnight on October 31 for your chance to win this book!