Luggage and Literature

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page. - St. Augustine

Archives for February 2015

What I Read (February 2015)

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Every month I try to read at least one book from the following categories: nonfiction, devotional, and fiction. Non-fiction ensures that I’m always learning something new. Devotionals ensure that I’m keying into my faith. And fiction books are just so enjoyable to read! This is What I Read in February 2015.

Books Finished:

The Mermaid’s Sister by Carrie Anne Noble


I loved this book! The story follows Clara, a teenage girl delivered to her Auntie by a stork, and whose sister Maren is transforming into a mermaid. Clara has to come to terms with losing her sister as she transforms into a mermaid, and deliver her to the sea before simply losing her altogether. Clara has some help from her life-long friend, O’Neill, whom she is in love with, but who she believes is in love with Maren.

This book has magical elements and creatures, but a completely compelling story. I was captivated, and could hardly put it down. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain


This book was completely fascinating to me. I had heard good things about it from several people, and finally decided to read it for myself. And it was well worth the read. As someone who falls pretty equally divided between introvert and extrovert traits, I could relate to much of what Susan Cain writes about. And for those introverted traits that I don’t possess, I can see them in others. A book like this could easily be dull, but this one is very engaging, probably because of the stories and character studies throughout. I definitely recommend this book to everyone, no matter where they may fall on the spectrum of introvert-extrovert.

Gotta Have It!: Freedom from Wanting Everything Right Here, Right Now by Gregory L. Jantz


I picked this book because I’ve been struggling a bit lately with wants. And I do think that while reading, and since finishing this book, it has helped me to see that the pattern of going to these wants doesn’t bring peace, but rather pain. My key ‘excessities’ as the author calls them are food, money, and control. And really, they probably all boil down to a desire for control. But real control is an illusion, as God is the only being in control. And I need to lay my troubles and concerns at His feet, as I cannot solve them on my own. Truly a good lesson to learn or re-learn.

Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery


The story follows Anne Shirley, an extremely intelligent and high spirited orphan, as well as Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert, the brother and sister with whom Anne is sent to live. It’s set in Canada in the 1800s.

I loved this sweet little book. Of course I had heard about it growing up, but had never read it. This is a great read for children and adults, but is quite sad at one place in particular, so parents may want to red along with younger children.

 

Books Abandoned:

None.

Six Things You Might Miss if You Fly Over ‘Fly Over Country’

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1. The boundless variety of shades of greens, golds, and oranges of the land, as well as how the same stretch of land changes through the seasons.

North Park Holdrege Nebraska2. Seeing red and green train signal lights, which leads you to wonder about what they mean, and then leads you to research it. Learning something new every day!

3. An early morning modern cattle drive. One pickup leads the cattle with a giant round hay bale in the open bed of the truck. Some of the cattle, apparently the most hungry, trot along to try to catch the truck. Other cattle, apparently the lazier and less hungry of the herd, dilly-dally along. Men on four-wheelers, and men in other pickup trucks, bring up the rear and hurry these slow cattle along. So neat to watch!

40318 Cattle Drive4. The feeling of freedom that you get while driving down a wide open road through an empty stretch of prairie.

5. The unmistakable squawk of Canadian geese migrating south in the fall, or north in the winter.

Canadian Geese6. Coal trains stretching as far as the eye can see, and moving along right next to you on the highway.

 

What I Read (January 2015)

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Every month I try to read at least one book from the following categories: nonfiction, devotional, and fiction. Non-fiction ensures that I’m always learning something new. Devotionals ensure that I’m keying into my faith. And fiction books are just so enjoyable to read! This is What I Read in January 2015.

Books Finished:

How to Travel the World on $50 a Day by Matt Kepnes


I read Nomadic Matt’s Travel Site, and very much enjoy his thoughtful, informative, and entertaining posts. So when I heard that Matt had a new book coming out, I preordered it. This book is a great resource for those planning around the world trips, or simply trips to a particular geographic area. My only complaint is that it didn’t have money-saving tips for an area that I frequently travel to, the Caribbean. Perhaps this can be added in the next edition.

I personally enjoy traveling and staying in a slightly higher level of accommodations, and to eat at restaurants and try local foods as opposed to cooking my own meals while traveling. So some of the tips are ones that I would probably ignore. But even if you are unwilling to travel quite so frugally, there are still plenty enough money-saving tips to make the book worth the purchase price. I anticipate that this book will be a great resource for me over time.

The Last Passenger by Manel Loureiro


This book was creepy and fantastic! It is set aboard a Nazi cruise ship that bears a curse that affects its passengers. It takes place in 1939, just before the outbreak of World War 2, as well as in modern-day. I don’t want to say too much more, for fear that I would give away key plot points, and I’m hopeful that others will want to read it.

I had previously read one other book by the same author, Apocalypse Z, which is a zombie horror/dystopian novel. It is a unique take on the genre, in that the entire thing is told through a series of blog posts and journal entries. So when I found another of Loureiro’s books translated into English, I jumped at the chance to read it, and was not disappointed.

Breaking Free by Beth Moore


I have several Beth Moore books on my Kindle, as I was fortunate enough to stumble across an online sale at one point, thanks to my good friend Carrie.

This book is intended to help readers break free from the lies fed to us by the devil, and our negative circumstances, in order to follow the Holy Spirit toward the future that Christ intends for us. It at times is hard-hitting, in that it forces readers to examine what our reasons are for thinking the way we do, and trying to ‘break free’ from those negative cycles.

Probably the biggest take-away for me, was that I can’t always be the person to provide help, support, and guidance to another person. Sometimes the job to help a particular individual is not on my path, and I need to pay attention to whether the Spirit is leading me to help this person or away from helping this person. It was particularly insightful, because it’s a lesson that I wished I had learned before. It applied so clearly to a situation that I was going through while reading the book, and the passages on this topic seemed to crystallize the experience.

Home by Morning (A Powell Springs Novel) by Alexis Harrington


This book is set in World War I and follows a female doctor in the United States, as well as a few other characters. The story is enjoyable, but not particularly compelling. I wanted to love it, because the character and time period seemed like a fresh idea. But the story was a somewhat predictable love story, so although I finished it and liked it, I just didn’t love it.

Getting to No: How to Break a Stubborn Habit by Erwin Lutzer


I picked this book to read in my non-fiction/learning genre for the month of January to help me get motivated to pick and start some New Year’s resolutions. My takeaways from the book are (1) that we need to make sure that we have something to replace our bad habits with, rather than simply trying to stop doing something, and (2) that we need to seek the guidance of God as to why we have bad habits and help to break them. I did not agree with some of the characterizations of the book (particularly dealing with homosexuality and the ability to change this), and this made it a bit difficult to stay invested in the book and give credibility to what the author had to say. This was even more so, since these references seemed to be included in large part, simply to be inflammatory. The book would be more helpful to more readers without them, so that the message didn’t get lost amidst such a politically and emotionally charged topic.

 

Books Abandoned:

None.

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