August Book Recap!

Was finally able to pick up the pace with reading again this month! It may have helped that a fair bit was young adult books so the big words and hidden symbols were kept to a minimum.

Last month my book club read The Maze Runner by James Dashner which was remarkable good! I really enjoyed it and looked forward to continuing the series. Well this month I definitely did that by reading both the 2nd and 3rd books in the series, The Scorch Trials and The Death Cure. There is a 4th book to the series which is actually a prequel to Maze Runner. If the library has this easily available I may read it, but I find it sometimes weird to go back and read the beginning when I do know what already happens. Of the entire series, the first book was probably my favorite. But then again, it could be because it was fresh and new and that first spark of something new is often times the most exciting. Scorch Trials is a very obvious second book in that it does keep the pace going and new plot lines emerge, the readers are introduced to more characters, and ultimately more questions are formed than answered. Luckily Death Cure does a good job of answering a number of those questions and you do get a formative ending. You don't get all the details, especially regarding Teresa, and I would have like liked the chancellor to be a bit more present with more details, but such is any good book. It leaves you with a fair amount of answers, with just a few questions left. Definitely a good overall series and one I suggest. I typically don't pick up young adult series, but I'm happy I picked up this one! Who knows, maybe I'll eventually pick up some of the other popular series too!

My book club this month selected to read Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. Going into this book, I had heard it was good, but never really knew what it was about. To be honest, I didn't even read a summary of what the book was about, just merely jumped in and started reading. That was a unique way to read as normally I have at least a general feel for what the basis of a book is. If I had to describe this novel I'd probably say it was predominately about two screwed up people who happen to get married and ultimately end up ruining each others lives. Gone Girl certainly keeps you guessing and going back and forth between the two main characters as to who you like and who you hate. Friends had told me that there's this crazy twist you don't see coming and it's going to be amazing! Well, I got to that point, and I had guessed it already. Or at least hoped for it. So it didn't shock me, but what did shock me was the psychotic things you learn of after that twist. I liked the whole story up until the very end. At that point there was a strong chance I ended the book by saying "seriously?!?!?" out loud. It left me feeling pity for pretty much all characters involved.

Lastly, I read the short story Larger Than Life by Jodi Picoult. This is another precursor to her next novel that comes out next month and introduces you to the mother of the main character in her upcoming book, Alice. She researches and studies animal memory, at times feeling more sympathy toward the animals than she should. I actually found myself hoping that the book would continue and I'd learn more so I guess it did what it's supposed to! Then again, any book that is about humans and animals creating a bond that surpasses the differences of species is pretty much guaranteed to get my seal of approval.  Even more to the goal of Picoult is it got me more excited for her book that comes out in October!


Books Read in 2014:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Fault in Our Stars  by John Green
Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
A Grief Observed by CS Lewis
The Monument Men by Robert Edsel
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Beer
Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass Isak Dinesen
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Looking for Alaska by John Green
When Life Comes Undone by TJ Addington
Number the Stars by Lois Lowery
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Where There's Smoke by Jodi Picoult
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster  

Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen
The Peppered Moth by Margaret Drabble 
The Maze Runner by James Dashner
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver 

The Scorch Trials by James Dashner

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Larger than Life by Jodi Picoult 

The Death Cure by James Dashner 

July Book Recap!

July was a better month than June for book reading! Even with unpacking a new place, and 2 weeks of absolute craziness at work-I still managed to read a couple! Better yet-I enjoyed most of them!!!

First I finished The Peppered Moth which I had previously started in June. As much as I wanted it to, it never fully captured me like I hoped it would. It seemed to jump a bit going from person to person within the same overall family tree. Each person was moderately interesting, but it just never fully meshed well for me. At the end I was just feeling like I just watched a scripted reality TV show. It was that feeling of kindof getting a feel for someone, but never feeling as though they were as open and had as much depth as you had hoped.

On the other hand, I was instantly hooked with The Maze Runner by James Dashner! Looking over the books I've read this year it's obvious I don't really read a lot of science fiction, or dystopian type of books. And yet oddly enough-I do really like that genre! Maze Runner captured the spirit of adventure and the unknown right away. When even your main character and narrator has no idea about his past, where he is, who he is, or even how old he is-it makes for a pretty interesting ride! Add in some survivalist fears, some mystery, and then a big twist at the end and I love it! It's part of a series and I definitely think I will be continuing it!

Lastly was The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. This had been on my list for a while and I'm happy I finally sat down to read it! It follows a family over a number of years, but focuses first and foremost on the family's first year as missionaries in the Congo. One thing I liked about this book is that it is written from the 5 main female characters (the mother and 4 daughters) points of view. But the mother's is always looking back and in past tense while the daughter's are always in the present. You can't help but feel for the family; and the paths the 4 daughters go down are so vastly different! I don't admit to being a great scholar on Africa's politics in the 1960s and 70s so it did kindof open my eyes a bit to what life may have been like at that time there (with a grain of salt however as it was a fiction novel). Great read from start to finish!

Books Read in 2014:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Fault in Our Stars  by John Green
Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
A Grief Observed by CS Lewis
The Monument Men by Robert Edsel
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Beer
Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass Isak Dinesen
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Looking for Alaska by John Green
When Life Comes Undone by TJ Addington
Number the Stars by Lois Lowery
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Where There's Smoke by Jodi Picoult
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster  

Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen
The Peppered Moth by Margaret Drabble 
The Maze Runner by James Dashner
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver 

June Book Recap!

June was not my best showing. In fact I only read 1 1/2 books this month. Part of this is surprising since I traveled this month and normally when I fly I can get quite a bit of reading done. Instead these flights consisted more of dozing or listening to podcasts. Then the two weeks I was gone were full of activity which meant no time for reading, and a week after I returned I moved to a new place. Oh June has certainly has it's distractions from books!

The one full book I read was entitled Black and Blue  by Anna Quindlen and was very good! I was looking for a light easy read and ended up picking a book about a woman who builds up the courage to leave her husband and father of her son after 20 years of physical abuse. Not exactly light hearted, but it was so well written and flowed remarkably well, it was a pretty fast read! I really liked that it showed that developing the courage to leave is just the first step. After that comes the anxiety and paranoia that constantly exists; paranoia that you will slip up and someone will find out who you are and word will get back to him. I would definitely recommend this book!!

I started a book entitled The Peppered Moth, but only managed to make it halfway through. So far it hasn't fully captured me like Black and Blue, but we will see how the second half goes in July! 

Books Read in 2014:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Fault in Our Stars  by John Green
Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
A Grief Observed by CS Lewis
The Monument Men by Robert Edsel
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Beer
Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass Isak Dinesen
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Looking for Alaska by John Green
When Life Comes Undone by TJ Addington
Number the Stars by Lois Lowery
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Where There's Smoke by Jodi Picoult
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster  

Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen

May Book Recap!

May was a pretty strong Month in terms of number of books listed! Although I will admit it was also a month of shorter books so that was pretty helpful in getting through half of them really fast.

First book of May was Looking for Alaska by John Green. I admit I read it because it was selected for my book club. I had read another Green book earlier in the year, but honestly it wasn't my favorite. It didn't capture my attention and interest too much. Looking for Alaska was much more captivating to me though! I really enjoyed it from the first page to the last. I liked the plot, the characters, and the development of the story. It takes place on a boarding school campus and delves into lives of the kids that aren't the jocks or preppy kids you stereotype for boarding schools. Granted the characters talk a little above their age using words and phrases that regular teenagers wouldn't use (reminded me of Dawson's Creek type of dialogue), but I could get past that since I'm also well past being a teenager.

Next up was When Life Comes Undone by TJ Addington. This was a book that was given out at my church after TJ came and gave the sermon on Sunday. I read the entire book in about 6 hours and admit that I skimmed a little more than I normally do. But it was a cool thing to have heard from the author on this very topic and then read the book he wrote on it. Kindof like getting the cliff notes before diving into the real book. I think it's a good book to read when you are dealing with some crazy times in life and it seems like you keep getting knocked down and question why. Was it something I needed that particular day? Not exactly, but it was still something I'll keep in mind for when those times may come.

Apparently it was the month of reading a book in less than a day. Granted this next book is written at about a 4th grade level so it took all of an hour and a half (and that may be with me stopping for a break in the middle). Number the Stars by Lois Lowery is probably one of my FAVORITE books from when I was a kid. I was buying some books for an elementary school my church is associated with and this was one I picked up. I couldn't help but read it again myself! I still think it introduces some pretty serious topics to kids in a way that doesn't scare them to much. I still really enjoyed this book and while saying it was an easy read at this point in my life is an understatement, it still makes the reading list for sure!

On a more age appropriate level, I also read Angels and Demons by Dan Brown. I was pretty captivated by this book although, like The DaVinci Code is does push some of the religious boundaries a bit. Similar to DaVinci Code there is a lot of reference to historically true information as well as a lot of fictional freedom. I was surprised that the entire story takes place within a 24 hour period. You don't see many books like that. I  feel like the tiny bit of romance at the end was completely unnecessary, but if I had stopped before the last 5 pages it would have been absolutely fantastic!

Second to last full "book", and I use quotations because technically it was a short story. Jodi Picoult's Where There's Smoke is a prequel to her new book, Leaving Time, that comes out in October. Picoult is one of my favorite authors and I always really enjoy her writing. This short story was no different. It centers around a psychic named Serenity who will play a part Picoult's new book. It's just a glimpse since it's only about 35 pages, but you really get to know this character in a short amount of time!

Lastly I barely finished A Passage to India by E.M. Forster in May (I'm talking finished it literally at 10:27pm on May 31 barely finished). Not gonna lie-I didn't really enjoy it. I heard it was supposed to be great and tell of racial struggles between the English and Indians in India, but really to me only the middle about 60 pages were really good. Probably not one I'm going to read again.


Books Read in 2014:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Fault in Our Stars  by John Green
Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
A Grief Observed by CS Lewis
The Monument Men by Robert Edsel
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Beer
Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass Isak Dinesen
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Looking for Alaska by John Green
When Life Comes Undone by TJ Addington
Number the Stars by Lois Lowery
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Where There's Smoke by Jodi Picoult
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster

April Book Recap!

Time to get away from some of the serious happenings of the month, and shift gears back to my New Years Resolution of reading at least 1 book a month. Even with all that has been going on, I still managed to read 2 books in April!

I started with And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini. I've really enjoyed Hosseini's other books The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns so I've been looking forward to reading his latest for quite some time. Unfortunately, I don't feel as though it lived up to his other top sellers. The book is still ok, but it jumps quite a bit from various characters, who are only loosely related, as well as jumping between years. Hosseini had me right away with the initial few chapters, but then sadly we don't see these characters again until the very end. The middle is full of other characters each getting a few chapters describing their lives at the time but they are never enough to fully satisfy what I hoped to learn about those people. All in all, I admit I was a little disappointed, but then again I may have had too high of expectations seeing as how I really enjoyed his other books!

Next I went for a classic, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. This is one I've heard people rave about and has been on my list of books I'd like to read for quite a while. I'm so glad I finally got around to it as it really was a good book! It does start off kind of intense and fast so it took me a minute to start sorting things out. My only complaint is that before reading it I had always heard of Heathcliff kind of being this ideal romantic so that's what I went in expecting. Having now read the book, in my opinion he is NOT! Yeah he has strong love for one person in the world. But to literally everyone else in the book he is mean, cruel, and vindictive! That was quite surprising to me! I never got on his side. Really I found myself not liking most of the characters as they all seemed rather petty and selfish. But that didn't take away from the story surprisingly! Highly recommend this one to be read!


Books Read in 2014:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
The Fault in Our Stars  by John Green
Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
A Grief Observed by CS Lewis
The Monument Men by Robert Edsel
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Beer
Out of Africa and Shadows on the Grass Isak Dinesen
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

Still walking with those emotions....

It's now been about 5 days since I heard about my pastor. Which means it's been 5 days of roller coaster emotions. And I don't anticipate suddenly getting off that roller coaster and never getting back on again. In fact, I believe this is something that will have an effect on me for a while. Not necessarily in a horribly negative way-just in some way.

Yesterday afternoon was the memorial service. I went into it preparing to ugly cry like no other! Before then I had pretty much been holding back my emotions and not allowing myself to express the true extent of my feelings. So I figured the service would be my time. And I admit, as soon as his wife and 2 kids walked in there were definitely some tears rolling down my face. But I never had a moment of utter breakdown ugly crying. And I think my tears were exclusively sadness yesterday. Sadness that we lost this man who honestly I very much respected. A man who I really looked to for guidance and enjoyed hearing him speak. A man who had laughter in literally every single one of his sermons. A man who did a lot for our church family.

There were a number of people who spoke yesterday. People who knew him when he first became a Christian, people who knew him when he was in college and starting to date the woman who became his wife, people who worked with him at various churches. And something I took from all their words of wisdom, was that he really was a great guy who loved life and loved God. And that none of us may know why he did what he did. One person said that he led with all of his heart and with all of his passion, and that could lead you to a lonely and dark place. Maybe it was being there for so many others without feeling like he could be selfish and ask for help himself. Now that's just pure speculation on my part-but it does kindof make sense. At least to me it does.

The songs were honestly hard at first. Because like I've said before, when the songs are all about praising God and finding strength, it still made me sad that he couldn't do that himself. But what I found was that by the end of the service I was singing the songs for me and not for him. I was singing them to take comfort in the words and what I've felt from them. A couple different people mentioned how our church, which really has been flourishing over the past few years, may be under some form of spiritual attack. Within the last year 3 of the leaders in our church have been battling cancer and now this happens as well. It's like when things start going really well, something or someone wanted to come along and try and knock us down. A prayer for the church is that we won't be beaten back. That we will mourn the loss of our friend, but that we will feel a revival and people coming closer to God in this loss than a separation.

I'm not over it. As I read back over what I've typed it sounds like I've come to terms with what has happened. And while I admit, today is easier, and today I feel more peace; it's not over. An online quiz I took recently (I'm a sucker for online quizzes) had me pick a quote from a number of options. I picked this one by Willa Cather "There are some things you learn best in calm, and some in storm." Now I don't know who Willa Cather is. I'm honestly not sure if Willa is a man or woman; although I'm leaning woman since Willa ends in an a. But it's a quote that seems to resonate with me in a time like this. This whole experience is a lesson. Something that will alter my outlook and who I am from this point on. And while I will continue to process over the next few days, weeks, months; I will try to stand firm in my own strength. I will continue to learn from this situation and all that happens after it.

A walk with my emotions during a difficult time

I can't believe this happened and that I am writing these words.........my pastor committed suicide. 

This past Friday the 11th, he took his life. I was made aware of it the next day. My first reaction was shock, disbelieve, sadness, and then anger. Anger stayed the longest. I typically react to death with a combo of sadness and anger. Last month when there was a loss I felt anger to God. But with this, it was against my pastor. It was his choice. His actions. His decision to leave behind his family, friends, and congregation. 

Sunday was supposed to be a church service of praise for Palm Sunday. Instead it was a service of prayer. As I sat there and I saw how many people filled the church to ultimate capacity, with many people crying, I still felt angry to be honest. I don't like making people feel bad, or hurting others. So to leave that many people hurt and confused is something I just don't understand. 

I've thought about suicide before, probably more than I want to admit. And I get that sometimes there doesn't seem like a reason to live anymore, but when you have that much of a support system around you that's when I get confused. Being an adult means asking for help when you need it sometimes. It means understanding when you need to be vulnerable. I thought he understood that. But I guess not. 

In church we sang a hymn as well as read a Psalm. Both of which basically mention standing strong in God in times of trouble and in times of need. Building yourself up and getting your strength from The Lord. It was great to hear and something the congregation can really take hold of to lift them during this time. But if he believed that too, then why in the hell did he commit suicide?!? Who was he that he felt he couldn't talk to anyone, admit he needed help and sought help from The Lord and the people around him. Instead he opted to take his own life. To give in to the suffering. To leave behind his wife and 2 children. To leave behind literally hundreds if not thousands of the people he has touched in this world. One of the other pastors even said he wished he had reached out and called. Everyone said it was unforeseen and that even last week he was joking and pranking and getting excited for the upcoming sermon series. So what the hell happened?!?!?!? They said he admitted to be a broken individual but we all are. 

As much as it sounds like I do, I am really trying not to judge him. I'm just confused. And don't like to see people in pain. I think eventually I'll give in to the fact that we may never know why he made that choice. But as I write this less than 24 hours after hearing the news, I'm just filled with a crazy array of emotion. He was a great pastor. I really enjoyed his preaching and his messages. I respected the fact that he would get emotional and real and honest during his messages as well. I appreciated the positive change he made in my friends lives. This is going to be something new for the church to overcome.

It's an interesting time of year for it. We are in Holy Week currently. A week of praise and worship and welcoming. It leads up to a great tragedy tho. It leads up to the loss of our savior. The loss of our greatest spiritual teacher. Holy Week has always been a big deal to me. Good Friday is typically one of my favorite services as it is always so full of emotion. But I think this year it will be even moreso emotional. Because now I know what it feels like to lose your spiritual leader. I'm not saying Robert was Jesus by any means whatsoever. I'm only saying that Good Friday was always a day that was emotional but also exciting because I knew what would happen 3 days later. But now I can more closely relate to what Christians felt when they woke up one Saturday and realized that someone they looked up go for spiritual guidance was taken from them. To lose some sense of hope. To question why he didn't save himself. To feel cheated of guidance and direction. To have so many questions that are left unanswered. And I know that this situation is very different from the one that took place 2000ish years ago. But I guarantee this Friday I'll feel more connected to the believers of that day. I'll understand the story from a different point of view.

I'm still trying to figure out my emotions. Still dealing with confusion and sadness and anger. But I refuse to lose my faith this time like I have before. I refuse to feel further from God. I refuse to let myself slip. And I commit myself to not feeling that same way again. To not feel as hopeless. To find my strength. And to overcome and grow.