Books
Reflections on the role of reading in culture, faith, and family
I read and listen to a lot of news. NPR plays in the background as I’m making breakfast and dinner. We subscribe to Time, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker (as well as to Christianity Today, Books and Culture, and Critique). I scroll through The New York Times’ headlines and most-emailed ...
Professor and writer Karen Swallow Prior’s biography of Hannah More—abolitionist, poet, and reformer—came out last fall. March is Women’s History Month, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to ask Karen to reflect upon More’s life and legacy:
Although I hadn't learned ...
I live in New England, and right now we have over a foot of snow on the ground. To the northeast of me, in Boston, they’ve had more snow in a seven day period than ever before in recorded history. The Midwest has been pummeled with snow this season. I’ve even seen images of snow in Texas. ...
Some people talk about kids in a candy store as an image of pure excitement and unadulterated joy. I have never been that kid. But bookstores? Libraries? Lists of books at the end of the year to help me figure out what reading pleasure I might have in the weeks and months ahead? My heart pounds a ...
Released in late October, Disquiet Time: Rants and Reflections on the Good Book by the Skeptical, the Faithful, and a Few Scoundrels is the brainchild of Jennifer Grant (a fellow contributor to her.meneutics) and Cathleen Falsani (an award-winning religion writer and journalist) who co-edited the book. ...
It felt kind of like the Oscars, well, like the Oscars for book nerds. An evening with awards in different categories, a host who made witty remarks, and palpable excitement in the air. Two nights ago, I sat in an auditorium at the New School in Manhattan, for the privilege of listening as the twenty ...
I had the privilege of talking by phone with Philip Yancey about his new book, Vanishing Grace: What Ever Happened to the Good News? A few of the questions we discussed made it into the November issue of CT Magazine (A Church for Outsiders), but today I get to offer you another sliver of our conversation. ...
I mentioned the title of my book to an old friend who is in his 60s last night. He said, "Oh. Small Talk. Help for conversations at cocktail parties?" He wasn't kidding. I then told him the subtitle--Learning from my Children about What Matters Most, and I think he got the idea. Yes, ...
In my limited experience, the day a book launches often proves to be pretty much the same as any other day. Except for feeling kind of silly because it's supposed to be a special day. My newest book, Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most, released on Tuesday, and the best ...
When I was working on Small Talk:Learning From My Children About What Matters Most, my husband asked, "What's the one-minute takeaway from this book?" Without thinking too much about it, I said, "You are not alone." I later elaborated on that thought in the introduction to ...
The following excerpt comes from my new book, Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most (Zondervan):
It snowed yesterday. The view outside the kitchen window is idyllic—trees hand-painted with delicate white strokes, sunshine glinting off the crystal expanse, a landscape ...
I succumb to the same temptations as everyone else. I lie in bed with a novel next to me and my phone in my hand, scrolling through Facebook and Twitter to see what people have shared, clicking various articles and blog posts, flitting from one idea, one news item to the next. According to the Pew ...
A friend once pointed out to me that writing a memoir has three stages. First, you live it. Then you write about it. And then you send it out into the world and respond to it. As a writer, I usually don’t love the first part, the living-it part, because I’m in the midst of all sorts of ...
My husband is the Head of School at The Gunnery, an independent boarding school in western Connecticut, so he keeps himself current on national debates surrounding education and learning. We also, of course, have kids of our own, and because our oldest daughter Penny has Down syndrome, we are particularly ...
I was talking with a friend who teaches high school English about his syllabus this semester. He teaches junior English, which means he covers largely American literature (although they start with Shakespeare's Tempest). This year includes surprises like Upton Sinclair's The Jungle and predictable ...
I've been aware of Christopher Beha's writing for a few years now. I still sometimes find myself thinking about his coming-of-age novel What Happened to Sophie Wilder, and just this summer I raced through his memoir about reading the Harvard Classics, The Whole Five Feet. I also had the privilege ...
Yesterday I wrote about my ongoing search for chapter books for my kids with African American protagonists. I have only just begun to look, so I cannot personally recommend all the books on this list. But from asking other parents, librarians, and teachers, here are a few books for three different young ...
We've been reading chapter books with our two older kids—Penny, now 8, and William, nearly 6—for a few years now. We generally stick to the classics: Winnie the Pooh, Charlotte's Web, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Little House on the Prairie, Pippi Longstocking, Charlie ...
School has finally finished for my kids, and the temperatures are finally reaching the 80s. Summer has arrived, which means I've gotten emails recently from the town library, the school library, from teachers and other parents, all related to summer reading. Our eight-year old daughter Penny ...
If you're looking for an excellent novel to read this summer, pick up Sing For Me, by Karen Halvorsen Schreck. Karen weaves together a compelling story about race, class, music, faith, and the immigrant experience in Chicago in the 1930s. The main character, Rose, and her sister Sophy both come ...
