5 comments about The Real James Herriot: A Memoir of My Father.

1. This book is a fun one to pick up on a rainy day or just to get a little uplift



2. I thought this was a well done biography. However, there is a bit of repeating of what was in Herriot's/Wright's books. All in all a good read.



3. The book arrived in a timely manner in excellent condition. I am enjoying reading about the life of this gifted, gentle and compassionate man and his family and the descriptions of the countryside and the people of Yorkshire/Glasgow and that area. A good read to help me appreciate and aim for a slower, gentler pace of life.



4. This is a good peek into the true life of James Herriot as written by his son. His son gives his own views and anecdotes of James Herriot. I have really enjoyed reading it and getting to know the author and his characters better.



5. How often do we find that the man behind the myth isn't all he's cracked up to be? Well, that most definitely is NOT the case in this loving biography of the world's best-known vet, James Herriot, by his son Jim Wight. (If you're wondering about the different last names, it's because James Herriot was actually a pseudonym for James Alfred Wight, known all his life as Alf.) This is a tribute to a cherished father and, as the author notes, best friend who always considered himself "99 parts vet and 1 part author," which must be why he remained the decent and down-to-earth individual he was, unspoiled by fame and fortune that would have turned the head of a lesser man. I was moved to find that the individual was as nice if not nicer than portrayed in his books and as appreciated by his friends and family as he was by his fans. Anyone who loved the other main characters in the series, namely Siegfried and Tristan, will also enjoy discovering more about them as well. This is a wonderful, heartwarming, well-written biography of a remarkable human being by one of those who knew him best.

1 comments about Dont Drop the Coffin.

1. This is a wonderful book by a British Funeral Director. Even though funerals are serious business, even there you can find moments of mirth that even the deceased would appreciate. I loved this book and highly reccomend it!

4 comments about Its All in the Playing.

1. Shirley MacLaine writes about cohesion in our world. What do you believe and how did you truly come to believe in that? She
   doesn't target religions but does inject insight into a notion
   some find upsetting: God is everywhere, God is in you, a power of change for your life is also in you. I enjoy her books and hope
   to see more. But my favorite is OUT ON A LIMB when Shirley shares her unsettling discoveries, discusses Jesus Christ and the missing 18-years from when he was 12-30---a time period deliberately remove from the original bible text. She challenges others to think and test what you believe in a real perspective.
   Terrific!



2. Shirley Maclaine has proved herself not only to be a very good actress, but writer as well. She is very insightful and obviously intelligent. For those exploring the metaphysical realm, I would highly recommend her books.



3. This kind of modern day thinking is mighty scary and I am sad that Shirley MacLaine promotes such foolishness. Ms. MacLaine likens life to a play and believes we ALL pick our parts and others are just characters in our play and besides, they PICKED their part too! Why is it people who have money, fame and relatively good luck fall for this? Why never starving victims of war or horribly abused women in Saudi Arabia? This line of thinking also apparently justifies whatever you choose to do in your life as it is merely for the experience and quite eliminates the need for much of a conscience. After all, if you decide to hurt someone, it was chosen in THEIR life script as well. Psychic types often promote this viewpoint. They claim a person who has been murdered was really a willing participant, as they actually wanted to leave this world. Scary concepts that psychopaths buy right into for their justifications. Does Ms. MacLaine really understand what she is encouraging? Pat Brown/Director/Investigative Criminal Profiler/The Sexual Homicide Exchange, Inc.



4. This kind of modern day thinking is mighty scary and I am sad that Shirley MacLaine promotes such foolishness. Ms. MacLaine likens life to a play and believes we ALL pick our parts and others are just characters in our play and besides, they PICKED their part too! Why is it people who have money, fame and relatively good luck fall for this? Why never starving victims of war or horribly abused women in Saudi Arabia? This line of thinking also apparently justifies whatever you choose to do in your life as it is merely for the experience and quite eliminates the need for much of a conscience. After all, if you decide to hurt someone, it was chosen in THEIR life script as well. Psychic types often promote this viewpoint. They claim a person who has been murdered was really a willing participant, as they actually wanted to leave this world. Scary concepts that psychopaths buy right into for their justifications. Does Ms. MacLaine really understand what she is encouraging? Pat Brown/Director/Investigative Criminal Profiler/The Sexual Homicide Exchange, Inc.

5 comments about Ava's Man (Random House Large Print (Paper)).

1. Rick Bragg is the man. Why is it that when I read his books, I feel like I must have roots in the South, too? Simply put, he captures Southern, hard scrabble, depression-era life from the perspective of his lovable and flawed grandfather so poignantly that readers from anywhere will identify. Truly a gifted writer who captures family history in all of its beauties and pains. A model memoir.



2. Ava's man was Bragg's maternal grandfather who passed away before Rick was born into poverty.
   
   Like William Faulkner, Bragg writes of the poor American South with such vivid descriptions that you feel as though you are walking along a hot, dusty path in a depression era back woods, spiting tobacco and drinking moon shine as your caloused hands and achy back trudge along yet one more soul depleting day.
   
   Like Pat Conroy, Bragg captures the essence of an abusive father who simply won't let go of the booze and the demons.
   
   Life was hard, mean and nasty and wore Bragg's family down to a pulp. Bragg's admiration for his grandfather shone through.
   
   This is the second book of his that I've read and I'll continue to learn of Bragg's saga. It is wonderful to read such clear, crisp images. This guy can write!



3. With his improbable personal background and deft story-telling, Rick Bragg has earned an avid readership. In All Over But the Shoutin' (1997) he introduced his family of origin, and especially his heroic mother, who epitomized the poorest of poor white trash. His newly released The Prince of Frogtown (2008) makes peace with his violently alcoholic father who repeatedly abandoned his family. Bragg spent one semester in college, then started writing, first high school sports, local stories, anything. In 1993 he won a prestigious Nieman fellowship to spend a year at Harvard, and in 1996 he won a Pulitzer for feature writing at the New York Times. Today he teaches writing at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa.
   
   In Ava's Man Bragg re-creates the story of his maternal grandfather, Charlie Bundrum (1901-1958), a man of mythic proportions and colorful character who died the year before Bragg was born. Like his other two memoirs, Bragg's narrative works well at several levels. He illustrates the power of place, honors the traditions of a time and place that have been lost to cultural snobbery, exemplifies the ambiguous shadow that one's extended family casts over successive generations, and is just a remarkable wordsmith with the dialect of rural Alabama and Georgia.
   
   Charlie Bundrum was a roofer who could neither read nor write. His people picked the banjo. At the slightest insult to their "honor" they brawled with pocket knives, ax handles, and shot guns. They worked in the mills and picked other people's cotton. "Chollie" fished his beloved Coosa River on a "boat" made from two car hoods that he welded together, he could make a harmonica scream, and he ruined his liver from too many mason jars of moonshine. He eloped with his beloved Ava when she was sixteen and he was seventeen. Ava dipped snuff, her dresses were made from feed and flour sacks, she knew the meaning of welfare cheese handouts, and somehow nourished her eight children through the Depression and two world wars. Charlie moved his family twenty-one times in a decade between the backwoods of Georgia and Alabama, sometimes looking for work, sometimes outrunning the law, and never more than a hundred miles either way.
   
   When Bragg's own alcoholic father deserted his family for the last time, Ava took in Bragg's mother and three sons and became their stalwart caregiver. Bragg owns the horrific domestic violence, superstitions, cockfights, and alcoholism that characterized so much of those times, places, and people. But he dignifies their hard work, the dirt under their fingernails, music, foods, traditions, poetic dialect, and resilience. When Charlie Bundrum died at the age of fifty-one, a line of cars snaked a mile or more to his funeral at Tredegar Congregational Holiness Church. How many of us today can hope for a similar legacy that is so honored by your community?



4. If chronological order is important to you, Ava's Man should be read as the first in the series of Rick Bragg's three biographical novels. Charlie Bundrum's story is the first of what we will learn is two family's lives in the rural south during turbulent times. Then, as now, when life is hard people find many different ways to survive. Generations later, we have the luxury of looking back with a critical eye. That's easy. When you're cold and hungry, the view is different.
   
   In this book, Bragg shares with us the life to Charlie Bundrum who, along with Ava manages to rear a house full of children who survive with him and sometimes without him. One of those children is Margaret, Bragg's mother. Hard working and hard living, Charlie did all he knew to do to get by.
   
   More than in either of the other two books in Bragg's trilogy of his family, Ava's Man tells us more about the history of region, industry, and the impact of war, all of which contribute to the making of the man, Charlie Bundrum.
   
   While Bragg writes, he always manages to let the characters tell the story...in their own words. That language, and the crafting of the true tale he tells, leaves this "their story." On the other hand, Bragg's own turn of a phrase is "my language," that upon which I was reared. And is that which makes me feel like going home.



5. I have read all of Rick Braggs books and thia was the best. I felt like I just wanted to keep on reading. He is such a powerful writer. I just wish he had more books out there, but the ones he has written are the best. You will not be disappointed reading any of his books. There is no wondering why he is a Pulitzer Prize winner.

1 comments about Can Lily O'shea Come Out to Play? (Reminiscence).

1. This autobiography is a terrific read. Think Frank McCourt without the heartache. There are many moving moments, and moments of great warmth.

5 comments about Three Weeks In October: The Manhunt For The Serial Sniper.

1. It baffles the mind how anyone can read this brilliant literary tome from former police chief Charles A. Moose, and not come away inspired. Charles Moose's story is a "Horatio Alger" tale of our times - with one major difference - Mr. Moose's story is no tale! This book details his humble beginnings: his birth in New York in 1953, his "Oliver Twist like" string of odd jobs in his youth - chimney sweep, coal miner, and tailor's assistant in the Lower East Side. Mr. Moose endured racial taunts and oppression on a daily basis, yet always kept his "eyes on the prize". He perservered, and completed his degree in U.S. History in 1975 at UNC Chapel Hill. Shortly after, his meteoric career in law enforcement commenced - patrol officer in Portland, Oregon, rising to chief of police. He later was police chief of Montgomery County, Maryland, where we learn the details of how he single-handedly solved the "DC Sniper" case using brilliant police work and Sherlock Holmes style "gum shoe" tactics!
   
   Charles Moose is a definite inspiration to all, and I highly recommend this true-life literary masterpiece to all my associates and confreres in academia!



2. It's always irritating when someone in a position of authority uses their involvement in an event of this nature to sell their own story, which is exactly what Charles Moose has done with this book.
   
   It's like calling a movie Titanic, then basing the story around the dramas of just two people when the bigger picture carries so much more gravity than can be expressed through the story of individuals.
   
   It's true that the racial identities of the perps in the case of the Washington Snipers was a key element (profiling would've suggested white men, when in fact the guilty men were of African descent) and that Charles Moose is a black man who has struggled against the prejudice of others, but at least half the book is a very poorly written autobiography which has little relevance to the killings. Without his involvement in the case, it's unlikely his story would've interested anyone enough to be published and whether that's right or wrong, it's most certainly wrong to use the case as a vehicle to sell his own biography.
   
   Also it's a difficult read: the first few chapters are written in a frustratingly concise prose made up of lots of short disconnected sentences with no cohesion to the rules of grammar, making for sloppy story telling. It does improve, but you have to battle with the first few chapters. Far be it from me to postulate, but it's as if two separate minds wrote this book. Ghost writers pay heed - either do it all yourself, or consult with the subject more closely.
   
   Where the story of the Washington Snipers is positioned between the chapters about the author and his experiences, it IS quite well detailed and described objectively (Mr. Gost Writer, take a bow.) This part of the book is riveting and makes for very interesting reading. But there's so much about Moose (it's like trying to watch a film on American TV, you just get fed up with adverts and lose interest in the film) screaming "ME ME MEEEEE." Here lyeth the need for humility and the recognition that this story is not about one man and his struggles. It is, or rather SHOULD be, about - as the title refers - the hunt for the Washington sniper(s).
   
   On the whole this book had a lot of potential but was marred by the self indulgent nature of the biography which is at least half (if not more) of the book when the author's personal story could've been dealt with in one chapter or less. I'm no literary agent, but am sure that had it not been for the position Moose held in this investigation he wouldn't have got away without having at least a third of the book being edited out.
   I've read this book twice now, but on the second go round just skipped each chapter about the author's life and found the book to be much more edifying.



3. I was really looking foward to reading this book. Yet having been glued to the media like everyone else during these three weeks, there was never more I learned about the investigation, profile etc of the snipers. This was more like an autobiography of Chief Moose. At times how he became Chief was interesting but mostly very dry and hard to keep focus jumping back and forth between topics about himself then back to the investigation.



4. Initially this novel will take you into the fear and complexity that surrounded the case of the killing spree caused by the Beltway sniper attacks in 2002. I was intrigued to read about how tough it was for the police to tackle a "serial killer" that ultimately did not leave any kind of pattern in regards to victims' backgrounds or relations for which the police could build a case on. Although some vilified Moose after the case was wrapped up, The book does not portray Charles A. Moose in a poor light in regards to the wild goose chase over leads such as the white box van, because at the time that was really all they had to go on.
   
   The problem with this inexpensive book that is centered on a modern day high profile crime is that it ultimately drowns in an accolade ridden biography of Moose himself. Charles Moose was the Montgomery County, Maryland Police Chief who headed the investigation when the killings first happened. The book lightly touches on the locales and victims, skimming over them in a consecutive and timely manner to constantly go back to what Moose was "going through". The book spends way to much time going back into his history and background, and we ultimately learn more about his own family than the victims, or the eventual backgrounds and cause when the two men who are responsible for the deaths are apprehended and identified.
   
   I just felt that this book was much more of a biography and "pat on the back" of Moose than of the overall case itself. It doesn't do a good job of delving into the other agencies and people involved in researching the case, and does little to show the leads that really led to the capture. If you want to know what was going through Moose's mind during all of this, then by all means get the book. If you would rather learn more about the overall case and the other people who worked around the clock besides Moose to help bring justice to those involved, then I would recommend looking elsewhere. Ultimately a disappointing read about this recent high profile crime in our country.



5. I've been wanting to read this book for a long time, and finally did. I got very interested in this subject because I followed the story very closely in the news at the time. Then, during about a week and half during the time of many of the shootings, my mother and I were on a road trip from Rhode Island to Arkansas. I remember getting into the Maryland/northern Virginia area and thinking I'd better have plenty of gas so we wouldn't have to stop in those areas. We actually stayed at a hotel in the northern Virginia area one night. We decided, because of the snipers on the loose, to just go to the Wendy's drive thru across the street, and bring dinner back to the hotel. At the hotel, I had the news on, and the shooting that had occurred that day was only about 45 minutes from where we were staying that night. The next morning, we repacked the car hurriedly and got back on the highway - without stopping for breakfast. We remember looking suspiciously at every white box van we saw on the drive. Reading this book brought back a lot of those memories for me; but in general, this book was problematic for me. Although it was intersting to learn more about Chief Moose's life and background - it was heavily a story about him, with the story of the sniper ordeal added in. Every other chapter was literally an autobiography about Moose - some details more intersting than others. There's one chapter in the middle of the book that is huge - about 40 pages in the paperback version, and it's all about Chief Moose's life. I thought I would never get through some parts of this book. What annoyed me a lot is that at least in the edition I read, there are typos or other errors. For one, there is a reference to the ill-blamed Richard Jewel from the Atlanta Olympic Park bombings. The Olympics is referred to as the 1998 Olympics, when I know it was the 1996 Olympics. I found at least two sentence strung together with no period in between. There are countless fragmented sentences in this book. Also, I found a sentence that had "at at" in it. Did anyone proofread this text, I wonder? Besides this nitty-gritty stuff, I was a little disappointed that this book really didn't shed too much more light on this crime that the public might have already gotten from news reports. There were a few insights here and there, but they come really late in the book, when I was already decided that this book was 'just ok'. I feel that it is still worthwhile to read, but if you're interested in it, be prepared to learn more about Chief Moose than you intended, and not as much about the crime at hand than you thought you would learn. In the end, I thought maybe this was his way of dealing with this whole ordeal - to talk more about himself and to have some closure in this chapter in his life - I don't know. I guess it's easy for me to say ... I've never walked in his shoes.

5 comments about A Royal Duty.

1. I find it stunning that this book would have so many positive reviews. Before I knew that Paul Burrell had made headline news in England for lying on the witness stand and for the fact that his brother-in-law claims Paul Burrell said he had sex with Princess Diana and last but not least cheating on his wife with many men over the years, I was already forming opinions from his own words that he was a certifiable nutjob. The main part of the books consists of him laying the groundwork for how important he was to Diana. He makes it sound like it was the two of them against the world. This comes at the expense of betraying Diana's loyalties as in even the picture he himself paints of her, you know she would have felt betrayed. The book is littered with incidences of his self-serving choices and he sprinkles it with some pity he has for Diana. How unbelievably aggrogant. The rest of the book is a focus on his trial, where he was accused of stealing hundreds of items of Diana's. Why a non-relative would have that many of her things is beyond me even after reading pages and pages of his literal pleading with the reader to understand why he would. For an innocent man, he was terrified of the court proceedings complete with episodes of crying and a suicide attempt. He is obviously the protagonist in the book yet I could see perfectly why people turned against him even though the book was from his point of view. The worst part is that he benefitted from all the relationships and good will that Diana worked hard to achieve in her life because some people testified in favor of him at the trial. I bet they regret that now. He had most people fooled. This is a man with very low-self esteem who was completely obsessed with Princess Diana and her own issues of trust and insecurity certainly worked against her as he sat like a vulture on the shoulder of her life. If he ever truly cared about her he would have respected her sons' wishes that he not write this book. There is a special place waiting for Paul Burrell in Cocytus in the Ninth Circle of Hell. Read this book if you are intrigued by dark and creepy things like Burrell's mental derangement, but don't read it if you are looking for any sort of truth.



2. Excellent portrayal of Princess Diana. After reading the book I am convinced even more what a truly remarkable person she was. I feel anyone you thinks this book is a betrayal to the Princess has NOT read it in it's entirety. Mr. Burrell shares his experiences of daily life with the princess like no one can, yet does not bash the monarchy. In fact after reading this book I have a deeper respect for the Queen and appreciation of what Princess Diana had to endure as part of the monarchy. It is obvious by this book that Mr. Burrell is a wealth of information and his goal is simply to keep the memory of Princess Diana alive. Thank you Paul!



3. This is a book that lets the reader enter into the intimate world of Princess Diana. And I think that her butler is the right person to do that job becuase he was near the Princess almost 24/7 and he doesn't belong to her real family so, in a way, he's allowed to talk and speak the truth.
   I really liked this book a lot and when i finished reading it I was glad to know that the real Diana was just as I imagined she would be, aside from the headlines and the big pictures, just a simply beautiful human being.



4. I loved the book! I am a huge Princess Diana fan and it was a pleasure finding out more about her; especially her intimate facts. Must read for any Princess Diana fans.



5. I was looking for a book that would give me a little more insight into Diana, Princess of Wales but it is an insider's look at the life of an employee in Royal service. Interesting, but not what I expected or wanted. Towards the end of the book, the author seems to be in the "poor pitiful me" mode which made finishing the book laborious. The photos are excellent, though.

4 comments about Confessions of a Beachcomber (Large Print Edition).

1. Ah the island life...a wonderful memoir of a more nostalgic time. Great read.



2. The Confessions Of A Beachcomber is the fascinating autobiography of a man who left a high-stress, dead-end career to live the simple live of a beachcomber on Dunk Island off the northern coast of Queensland, Australia. An avowed disciple of Thoreau, Banfield sough as simple a life as possible and maintained that life on his tropical island for twenty-five years. He involved himself in observing the flora, fauna, and aborigines of the island, and through the publication of The Confessions Of A Beachcomber became one of Australia's highly regarded literary figures. Now available to an American readership through this Dixon-Price edition, The Confessions Of A Beachcomber is especially recommended reading for any one who has ever felt like chucking so-called "modern life" and return to a simpler, more basic existence in harmony with the environment and all that nature has to offer the contemplative life.



3. Under inauspicious circumstances -- failing health -- Banfield arrives on Dunk island off of Australia's northeast coast. But as island lovers everywhere know, more often than not islands have a way of reintroducing vitality to the soul and regenerating failing health. Consider Robert Louis Stevenson! Such was the situation of Banfield when he arrived on Dunk Island.

   Banfield's greatest skill within this book is his journalistic training and keen powers of observation. His descriptions of island birdlife, in particular, present detailed glimpses of behavior and how individual birds interact with the rest of the island. "With the aid of a good telescope and a compact pair of field glasses, birds may be studied and known far more pleasurably than as stark cabinet specimens," he writes. It's no surprise to find out later that Banfield eventually persuaded -- similar to Thoreau and Muir in America -- the Australian government to set aside Dunk Island as a protected wildlife area.

   Banfield also turns his attentions to other island life, such as the coral reef and fishes surrounding the island, and including Aboriginals living on Dunk Island. While sounding condescending now, nearly a century later, his observations offer interesting insights into times past.

   Banfield's book reminded me of a non-political, "Desert Solitaire"-esque Edward Abbey turning his attention to a tropical island, in that the location is both a background and a source of detailed information. I enjoyed reading about the behavior of all island life and appreciated Banfield's obvious patience and skills as an observor. Being an island aficionado myself, I felt like I was enjoying the sights, sounds, and smells of some of my favorite places revisited.

   Overall, an excellent book to add to your library, whether travel, island, bird, or environmentally related.




4. Under inauspicious circumstances -- failing health -- Banfield arrives on Dunk island off of Australia's northeast coast. But as island lovers everywhere know, more often than not islands have a way of reintroducing vitality to the soul and regenerating failing health. Consider Robert Louis Stevenson! Such was the situation of Banfield when he arrived on Dunk Island.

   Banfield's greatest skill within this book is his journalistic training and keen powers of observation. His descriptions of island birdlife, in particular, present detailed glimpses of behavior and how individual birds interact with the rest of the island. "With the aid of a good telescope and a compact pair of field glasses, birds may be studied and known far more pleasurably than as stark cabinet specimens," he writes. It's no surprise to find out later that Banfield eventually persuaded -- similar to Thoreau and Muir in America -- the Australian government to set aside Dunk Island as a protected wildlife area.

   Banfield also turns his attentions to other island life, such as the coral reef and fishes surrounding the island, and including Aboriginals living on Dunk Island. While sounding condescending now, nearly a century later, his observations offer interesting insights into times past.

   Banfield's book reminded me of a non-political, "Desert Solitaire"-esque Edward Abbey turning his attention to a tropical island, in that the location is both a background and a source of detailed information. I enjoyed reading about the behavior of all island life and appreciated Banfield's obvious patience and skills as an observor. Being an island aficionado myself, I felt like I was enjoying the sights, sounds, and smells of some of my favorite places revisited.

   Overall, an excellent book to add to your library, whether travel, island, bird, or environmentally related.

5 comments about Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil (Readers Circle Series).

1. In 2002, Deborah Rodriguez ventured off to Afghanistan with Care for All Foundation, an emergency and disaster relief organization. She knew nothing really about emergency and disaster relief--she is a hairdresser by trade. But she had a generous and brave spirit. When all the doctors and nurses had gone, she stayed behind to to build a beauty school and salon (something the Taliban had outlawed). She encountered the Taliban, women in arranged marriages, bombings, cultural divides--and all with great humor and grace. This was not only enlightening, but fun to read.



2. I highly recommend this book. Some may say that Rodrigues gave herself too much credit for what others have done. But I have to admit, that I for one would never go to Kabul. So regardless of how much she did, or did not achieve, she was there, and we weren't. To be a woman in a repressive society is beyond difficult, it's torturous. I applaud her courage, and her determination to initiate change in a world where women's voices are meaningless. I wish the best for the women of Kabul, and for the few good men there who help them in their way.



3. TV and news reviews make war feel distant, un-human and entirely male-centered. This book beautifully captures a glimpse of Afghan life. Every page was enlightening and touching in the same way. Written in a refreshingly simple way, this book allowed me to think about complex issues in a digestible (and dare I say, whimsical) manner.



4. I enjoyed this book very much. It gave a look into the lives of Afghan women trying to make a positive step in their lives, sometimes when their husbands couldn't provide. They took it upon them selves to take a step toward financial independance for themselves and their families.
   
   What was a bit contradictory, perhaps, was how Debbie Rodriguez mentions a few times that the Afghan people were the warmest and most endearing people, however, it seems like most of her students and women there in general were being beaten by their husbands. It seemed every time she brought it up, somebody was getting beaten. So what's the deal?? Are the people only nice to women outside their families, or did she miss something in her writing to differenciate the two.



5. Well I really enjoyed this book. The author writes in a way that makes it seem she is talking directly to the reader. She gives many situations that are sad, funny and difficult. She points out how ahrd it is for Afgan women, and all the "rules" they must follow(this is upsetting for us westerners) but also enlightens us about what other women have to endure. Her funny incidents are really light and show a comradary with women as women. All in All I found this a very enjoyable ready and I learned a lot and this is a women who at least tried to do some "good" for women under the worst situations.

5 comments about Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith.

1. I read this for book club and it was an okay read. The author does a nice job and the book is interesting.



2. In an e-mail exchange, a ministry colleague asked, "I have never read Anne Lamott. Do you recommend her?" I responded:
   
   Knowing your heart for broken people and for Jesus, I can recommend "Traveling Mercies" to you without qualification. I have only about 16 feet of easily reachable bookshelf, including my favorite reference books, yet this is one book that I keep avoiding moving to attic storage.
   
   Lamott is blunt about what she has gone through, how she has felt (especially about those of us who make a career of being nice), and her determination to keep Jesus out of her life at all costs. She is a product of multiple dysfunctions, and you can see why she'd have a hard time learning to love herself or to admit that perhaps God could love her. But I love the sentences by which she let Jesus come in; I have never otherwise heard such a simple prayer of conversion, nor one that is so true at the heart level.
   
   My daughter-in-law said that if I enjoyed Lamott, I'd also enjoy Kathleen Norris (The Cloister Walk). I did, but Norris is more cerebral. Lamott is at once pithy, practical, shocking, and profound. "Traveling Mercies" has confirmed in me, probably more than any other source has, an understanding of how varied, unexpected, and original God's work is in any one individual's life.



3. Anne Lamott recounts the stories of her growing faith from disbelief to belief in a God who crouches down and waits patiently for her to open the door and welcome Him in. Anne recounts a harsh life of challenges with addiction, love, family, and herself. She shares her simple yet profound spiritual conversion careful to incorporate the people who have had some of the greatest impact in her life.
   We catch glimpses of her faith story through the people she shares relationships with: her childhood friend, a Jesuit, the people (especially the older women) of her church community, and her son. We see in her life the mundane, the struggles, a person who can be gritty in one breath and sweet in the next. Anne Lamott tells her journey of faith, in a way that is not for the faint of heart. (or the straight and narrow) She packs this memoir with everything that life is made of and allows one to enter into her story and glimpse the God who unwearyingly waits.



4. This book is written differently than just your average book. It's a compilation of several life lessons all molded into one story. The short stories are really interesting and her humor gives it a fun kick. She tells her stories in such detail it feels as though you're experiencing it with her. The stories are so diverse that I guarentee someone finds some story in there that they relate to. No matter what your religion is, this book is a really powerful read. Prayer helps the author out in numerous ways that will prove to the readers that there is power in prayer. This book is touching and it really makes you think about life.



5. Anne Lamott writes with tremendous vulnerability and sincerity. She opens her veins for us and spills the contents of her life onto the page--the good, the bad, and the very very ugly. Her words are raw and evocative.
   
   I must say that while this book resonates with many people, including myself, who have been hurt by life, disillusioned by the church, and a bit angry at things, I did not come away feeling closer to any tangible answers. I didn't think her crass and vulgar language added much to her message. It was kindof distracting, and I felt like taking a shower after wading through it.
   
   My generation is craving something more--something deeper. We want real answers for real problems. While I continue to read Lamott, I would not say this is her best work.
   
   Shameless plug--check out my new book Sex, Sushi, and Salvation: Thoughts on Intimacy, Community, and Eternity