Update on reading

I don't think anyone ever reads this blog. I barely write on it. But there is something fascinating about knowing I am recording something somewhere. In October I said I was reading the following books. If you want to know what kind of a reader I really am, the answer is slow... Here is my update:

_Jayber Crow_ by Wendell Berry: completed, but not completely satisfying to me. Berry *does* give one a sense of longing for place and a sense of what belonging must mean. His writing is simple, but somehow profound. But this book failed to move me on the whole. I may give _Hannah Coulter_ a try and see if Mr. Berry's fiction grows on me...

_Peacemaking Women: Biblical Hope for Resolving Conflict_ by Tara Klena Barthel and Judy Dabler: Almost done studying through this with our Women's Fellowship at church. It is excellent, and I highly recommend it. I think it's weakest sections are the ones on marriage and family, but there is a plethora of good material on those topics, so I will excise that. The rest is challenging and biblical.

_Standing by and Making Do: Women of Wartime Los Alamos_ ed. by Jane S. Wilson and Charlotte Serber: this is not tremendously well written, but it is a fascinating look at my adopted "hometown". It is a little slice of what these women went through as Los Alamos was founded. I loved the descriptions of people waiting outside here in Los Alamos, looking southward, waiting for the first atomic test to be visible. Fascinating.

_The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment_ by Jeremiah Burroughs: I reread about half of this timeless classic, and have laid it aside for a time. Anyone who has not read this, ought to do so.

_A Soldier of the great War_ by Mark Helprin (though I'm only a few pages into this one, and not sure if I'll stick it out or not...): Well, I didn't stick it out, but I am rethinking. I am trying to talk my husband into reading it first, and telling me whether it is worth it or not...

And new on my nightstand:

_Life at the Bottom: The Worldview that Makes the Underclass_ by Theodore Dalrymple: Fascinating, sobering, and I think full of insight. Dr. Dalrymple, a psychoiatrist in England, discusses his discovery that poverty is not so much about lack of wealth, but about poverty of soul and ideas in the West. I can't read it at bedtime, because it gives me nightmares, and makes the people you see on the Jerry Springer Show seem real...

_Lord Peter: The Complete Lord Peter Winsey Short Stories_ by Dorothy L. Sayers: Just for fun :-)