4th Quarter Books

Last year about this time, I had set a goal to read 23 books in 2013. I'm happy to say I met my goal! Here's the final list of books I read in the last quarter of 2013:

Into The Wild, by John Krakuer
I've read two other books by Krakuer, one that I liked (Under the Banner of Heaven), and one that I didn't like (Into Thin Air). I picked up this one because I found it for $1 at a garage sale, and my cousin had told me it was good. He was right - I did enjoy it. It's the true story of a young man who sells all his possessions, hitchhikes around the country, and ends up in Alaska in an attempt to "live off the land". He ends up dying in the wilderness, with the actual causes for his death being a bit of a mystery. Krakuer himself is quite an adventurer, and so he also weaved some of his own stories throughout the book. I am pretty much the opposite of an adventurer, which is evident given that I read this book while camped out on my couch with a cup of cocoa. Nevertheless, it was intriguing to try and get into the mind of this young man, try to figure out why he did the crazy things he did, and to see the effects his actions had on his family:

A month later Billie sits at her dining room table, sifting through the pictorial record of Chris's final days. It is all she can do to force herself to examine the fuzzy snapshots. As she studies the pictures, she breaks down from time to time, weeping as only a mother who has outlived a child can weep, betraying a sense of loss so huge and irreparable that the mind balks at taking measure. Such bereavement, witnessed at close range, makes even the most eloquent apologia for high-risk activities ring fatuous and hollow. 

The Snow Child, by Eowyn Ivey
I read about this book, and it sounded good, so I gave it a try. I was not disappointed - it was really good. It's set in the early 1920s, and is about an older, childless couple who live in Alaska (strange Alaska theme going on here). For whatever reason, the couple was never able to have children of their own, and, even though this has caused a strain in their marriage, their love for each other remains strong. Then, one winter a girl comes to them from out of the wilderness, and they have to figure out first if she's even real, if they should "adopt" her, and how she should fit into their lives. What I enjoyed about the book was that you got things from both the wife's perspective - her longing to be a mother - and the husband's perspective - his longing to be a father. I thought it was just really well written, and I particularly liked this quote:

Faster! Go faster! Faina called out, and Jack didn't know who she was cheering on, but he skated as fast as he dared, and prayed that his blades wouldn't catch in a crack or a rough spot. Mabel stayed just out of reach, until she slowed and swung around to face him. Hand in hand they skated back to where Faina stood in her small circle of lantern light. Without a word, Jack and Mabel each took one of the child's hands and skated up the river, following the curves of the bank. Faina squealed in delight. Even through the cushion of their thick coats, Jack could feel her small arm folded in his, and it was as if his very heart were cradled in those joined elbows. 

A Praying Life, by Paul Miller
I read this book at the recommendation of one of my dearest, closest friends. Earlier this year she and I were talking about how we were both struggling in different areas of our lives, and even though our struggles were different, we realized there was a common theme to them. At that time, she was about mid-way in this book, and said that it was an encouragement to her. She described it as "a book about prayer for grown-ups", meaning that many books on prayer sort run along the lines of "it's what every Christian should do, so just do it already", which is not all that helpful. I appreciated that this book addresses some of the nitty-gritty of life and some of the honest struggles Christians have with prayer, like persevering in prayer during times of doubt and cynicism. I also appreciated how the author shared from his own struggles in life and his family - it just made it more real.

Most of us isolate prayer from the rest of what God is doing in our life, but God doesn't work that way. Prayer doesn't exist in some rarified spiritual world; it is part of the warp and woof of our lives. Praying itself becomes a story. 

The Wednesday Wars, by Gary Schmidt
This is the second book by Gary Schmidt I read this year, both at the recommendation of my Mom. Like his other book, I wholly enjoyed this one too. It's set during the late 1960's, and follows the life of a 7th-grade boy throughout one school year. It's sort of a "year-in-the-life-of" type of story, and follows the boy through the ups and downs of being in 7th grade. There's both humor and sadness, and some bittersweet spots. The main character also becomes rather enamored with Shakespeare along the way, which sounds kind of random, but surprisingly made sense to the overall story, especially with this quote:

Maybe the first time that you know you really care about something is when you think about it not being there, and you know - you really know - that the emptiness is as much inside you as outside you. For it so falls out, that what we have we prize not to the worth whiles we enjoy it; but being lacked and lost, why, then we rack the value, then we find the virtue that possession would not us while it was ours. That's when I knew for the first time that I really did love my sister. 

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County, by Tiffany Baker
Blah. This book was no good. I plucked it at random from the library because I needed a book to read over Thanksgiving break. It started out good, and seemed to have promise, which is why I kept reading it. Towards the end, though, it just got...bad. It's like the author had several ideas that she thought would make for a good book, and she just threw them all into this one story, resulting in a bit of a mish-mash storyline that was either not fully developed in some places, or just not plausible in others. I'm not even going to bother giving the plot of the book, because I wouldn't recommend it. In spite of all its flaws, there was one line I liked:

Who says all the lines of love are supposed to match up? I'd never thought about it that way before - that maybe your perfect other wasn't everything you already were, but everything you were never going to be.

Five Points, by John Piper
I picked this short book up at the Sola 13 conference I attended with a friend in December. It was only $5, and I couldn't resist. (I'm rather proud of myself that this is the only book I bought from that conference!) In this book, Piper briefly and succinctly lays out the the doctrines of grace - or "5 points of Calvinism" as they're more commonly called. Piper's point is not to make everyone a Calvinist, but instead to show what the Bible teaches about God's grace when it comes to saving and keeping sinners. It was a quick read, but wonderfully encouraging, as Piper's books often are.

If we want to go deeper in our experience of God's grace this [the doctrine of limited atonement] is an ocean of love for us to enjoy. God does not mean for the bride of his Son to only feel loved with general, world-embracing love. He means for her to feel ravished with the specificity of his affection that he set on her before the world existed. He means for us to feel a focused: "I chose you. And I sent my Son to die to have you."

Overall I feel good about my 2013 reads. I have some specific books that I want to read in 2014, and I've made it a goal to for sure read those. We'll see what other ones I also pick up along the way.