What's in the book bag....

Ah.... the word book bag means something so totally different for me than a lot of my friends. I like to hang out with younger people still in school and I have several friends in college and some going back to school, working full time and mothering....God give 'em strength- that's hard!

For whatever reason I have been reading like crazy recently. So here's what's in the bag...

I am also listening to the Bible on my smart phone too, usually during commutes- our small group is reading through the Bible this year together.

This isn't a true "read" it's a Bible Study but there is more reading in this study than her other ones, none the less this one is changing me...if I let it....some days are easier than others but James is packed full of proverb like verses on how to live out your faith.

The beginning of the year found me in this...

Oh my, do I love Ann. I will say it takes a while to get used to her writing style, and there's so much depth to it you have to read slow. It's a cross between a story of her life and the spiritual discipline of giving thanks. I will be referencing it for awhile.

My dearest friend and I finished our book at the end of January (more later) and I decided to read the only other book like ours on the market....

I LOVE a true story. I am glad I didn't read it before we felt the call to write our own story because she does such a good job I wouldn't have thought we should not write. An excellent read even if you've never lost a child. Many of our fellow human beings have and it's just nice to acknowledge their pain even when we can't change their reality.


Then I read this right around Valentines....

The only fiction I've read, Kingsbury is often predictable, but very modern and a quick read. Several years ago I started the REdemption Series. I read all 14 books in 3 months. Since then she's done 2 more series and this is the third book in the Bailey series. I'd love to sit and talk to anyone who's read it, there's one more book due out end of the month and I have so many ideas as to how this epic love story is going to end....

After that I picked up this one night....

One of the ladies that proof read my book suggested it. WOW.  James McBride grew up as the 8th son of Ruth McBride JOrdan. She was a Russian immigrant and grew up Orthodox Jewish in Sulfolk, VA in the 30's. Her story and her son's (growing up with 11 brothers and sisters after losing their dad to cancer with mixed race in the climax of the American civil rights movement) are told simultaneously. What I didn't expect was the faith aspect that was clearly how they survived. 

I LOVE a true story where Jesus gets made to be the hero.

And lastly I finished this just last night ...

From a friend at church. NOT DISAPPOINTING!! So glad I read it before seeing the movie. The book is their story of a God ordained courtship, real tragedy and the real people who God used to help them keep their original vows when she lost every memory of her husband but not her faith. Somehow I doubt all that makes it to the big screen. The reviews of the movie don't look good and Channing Tatum was terribly disappointing in Dear John (Nicolas Sparks book) 2 years ago. But the book!! Read it in one evening, LOVED the fact that they are from the same decade that I fell in love, their 2nd wedding was same summer as my own. When you are falling in love  you are kinda tuned out to everything else going on in the world. It amazes me that I missed this story that year.

 I was also in college at the time carting around the purple high sierra back pack with books I didn't want to read. I have never, not once regretted getting a bachelor's degree.

 For those still adding books to the pile of want-to-reads hang in there. There is a season for everything.