Tagged: book recommendations
If you’re giving up something for Lent that frees up some time (i.e. TV, video games, surfing the web), one great way to use that extra time is by reading spiritually enriching books. Here are a few suggestions: The Bible (of course) especially the gospels, or the books of Jeremiah and Exodus: you could buy a book that contains the daily Mass readings and read along with the Church The Divine Comedy – Dante Alighieri: use this great book to begin your meditations on the afterlife The Confessions...
Some books take no extra skills to read–all of their benefits are on the surface waiting for you. Others hide their treasures below the surface and you have to go after them like a deep sea diver, returning and returning again to appreciate their beauty and discover their meaning. Books like The Brothers Karamazov and City of God require extra literary skills to understand, but the effort is worth it. If you’ve never had a good literature class, or if it’s been a while since your last one,...
If you are a computer troubleshooter, you need to know about St. Vidicon of Cathode. He was martyred in the year 2020 when he was electrocuted in order to keep the Vatican broadcast equipment working so that Pope Clement could send his message to the world. Since his death, people throughout the world have prayed for his intercession to combat those terrors of technology, Murphy’s Law, the Imp of Perversity, and Finagle. His story is recounted in St. Vidicon to the Rescue, a novel by Christopher Stasheff. St....
I hate making decisions. Well, that’s not exactly true. I hate making bad decisions. Why can’t God just reach down from heaven, place a huge index finger on the newspaper and say, “THAT ONE…PICK THE ONE WITH CENTRAL AIR CONDITIONING”? He told Mother Teresa to found an order of nuns to serve the poorest of the poor, why can’t he tell us what he wants us to do with our lives? Well, it turns out he does tell us. It’s just that he uses God-speak, that mysterious language...
Today is the feast of St. Benedict, so I thought I’d mention a few of my favorite Benedictine books. First, a few books about the Rule of St. Benedict: The Rule of St. Benedict – Though it was written to guide behavior at monasteries, anyone who is in a leadership position can also benefit from the wisdom it contains. Try reading it as if it were addressed to parents, or supervisors. Reading St. Benedict: Reflections on the Rule by Adalbert de Vogue – This is probably the definitive...
The wonderful thing about After the Rain is that it feels so true. Like a good writer should, Norma Fox Mazer takes ordinary, everyday life and writes about it in such a way that it becomes interesting and compelling. After the Rain recounts the story of Rachel, a typical middle-class teenager just trying to live her life. Rachel struggles with what it means to be a high school student, what it means to have a boyfriend, and what it means to be a granddaughter–which are all interconnected, as...
There’s nothing in the living world like books on water cures, deaths-of-a-thousand-slices, or pouring white-hot lava off castle walls on drolls and mountebanks. How I just love Ray Bradbury’s writing style. After I read any of his stories or novels, the world becomes a more interesting place. Falling leaves become tears that the trees cry; rain is the cleansing power of the universe; books are portals to new worlds. Ray Bradbury takes the ordinary world and electrifies it until it shimmers with a glow that was always waiting...
“What I hold is not a neuronic whip, nor is it a tickler. It is a blaster and very deadly. I will use it and I will not aim over your heads. I will kill many of you before you seize me, perhaps most of you. I am serious. I look serious, do I not?” The wonderful thing about Isaac Asimov is that he’s just so readable. A person can pick up one of his books and just dive in with little or no preparation, and yet Asimov...
“This is a different kind of army. If you look at history you’ll see men fight for pay, or women, or some other kind of loot. They fight for land, or because a king makes them, or just because they like killing. But we’re here for something new. I don’t…this hasn’t happened much in the history of the world. We’re an army going out to set other men free.” What motivates a nation to go to war with other nations? What motivates a nation to go to war...
“Master, sadness was made for men, not for beasts, but if men let themselves give way too much to it, they turn into beasts.” It has been said that a person should read Don Quixote at least three times in one’s life: in youth, in middle age, and in old age. I whole-heartedly agree, but I would hope that it could be read more often than that. This is my all-time favorite book, the one book I would want with me if I was stuck on a deserted...
Truisms, my young friend, are the useless children of hindsight. There was a time–about five years ago–when only a few of my students had heard of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. Of course, all that has changed with Peter Jackson’s magnificent movies. Now all of my students are familiar with the story, and many of them have read the books. If you haven’t read them yet, buy them immediately–they’re that good (and so much more satisfying than the movies, which I also happen to love). But...
Of all the books that have been read in my classroom over the years, one continually grabs the attention of my students and keeps them interested from page one: Ender’s Game. Maybe it’s the non-stop action; maybe it’s watching Ender try to rise through the ranks of the battle school; maybe it’s the threat of the Buggers returning to make war on humanity. I think it might just be that they like Ender Wiggin so much, they want to see how far he can go. The book takes...
