The folks at 5 Minutes For Books host What’s On Your Nightstand? the fourth Tuesday of each month in which we can share about the books we have been reading and/or plan to read. You can learn more about it by clicking the link or the button.

I only reviewed two of these earlier this month, so I’ll say a little more about the rest here than I usually do. I read more non-fiction than fiction this past month — highly unusual for me!!

I finished reading Thread of Deceit by Catherine Palmer. It’s edgier than most of her books. It’s about a man who runs an inner-city activities center, a reporter sent to the center to do a story on lead paint in old buildings, a young girl who comes to the center every day but who will talk to no one, and the “thread of deceit” the man and woman follow to find out the girl’s story.

I completed Take One and This Side of Heaven by Karen Kingsbury, reviewed here.

I also finished Hannah’s Hope: A Journey of Faith by Hope Houchins about a teen-age girl in our state, Hannah Sobeski, who fought a six-month long battle with cancer. The book is primarily made up of the Caring Bridge daily updates with a little background information here and there provided by Hannah’s aunt. It was heart-breaking to want to pull for Hannah throughout the book while knowing the end of the story, but the journey of faith that Hannah and her family and friends went through was probing and thought-provoking. I don’t remember how the story came to public awareness, but I do remember the signs on businesses requesting prayer for her and the news stories that did not shy away from or dim the faith expressed by the family.

My future daughter-in-law gave me a Bible study book titled A Life Surrendered by June Kimmel for Mother’s Day. It sat on my desk for several weeks until one day I just picked it up and started through it — and it was definitely the right thing at the right time for me. It’s a study of surrender through the life of Christ. Very convicting.

Another finished book is Becoming God’s True Woman edited by Nancy Leigh DeMoss. I agreed to review this book because I wanted to read something by DeMoss — I had heard much about her from people I respected. It turns out she didn’t write this book, but she compiled it from several messages by women from a conference for women. Nevertheless a couple of the messages were hers, and they were excellent: very well-written and meaty, filled with the Word. I will have more to say about this book later: I’m still digesting it. I definitely want to read more from DeMoss.

I read Organizing Your Craft Space and almost finished Where Women Create, both by Jo Packham. I don’t usually read this type of book through — I tend to leave them out and browse through them a few minutes here and there. But I read all of the first one except a couple of chapters of craft organization that don’t pertain to me (beads and mosaics). In the first one Jo deals with just about every consideration that could possibly apply to organizing crafting areas. I don’t agree with the brief mentions of feng shui — I don’t believe in “energy” in a room, and most of the recommendations I’ve read from that viewpoint are common sense (for example. placing a desk so it faces the door helps you not to have to crane your neck every time someone enters.) The second book shows the studios or crafting areas of different artist and designers. I enjoyed the different styles, personalities, and tips.

I’m almost finished rereading To The Golden Shore by Courtney Anderson about America’s first missionary, Adoniram Judson. Tremendous, tremendous book. I’m planning to review it soon.

I’ve also started Sometimes a Light Surprises by Jamie Langston Turner about a man whose wife died twenty years earlier in an unsolved murder who, a few weeks before she died, spoke of a “conversion” experience, which he resented. Now the daughter of the woman instrumental in his wife’s conversion applies for a job at his place of business. Turner’s books tend to be, as Bet put it so succinctly once, more character driven than plot driven. So far most of the story has taken place in four characters’ thoughts with not a lot of conversation or action — but where she takes her characters is always interesting. I like how most of her main characters are “outside looking in” to Christianity — we don’t always think about how we come across to people.

I’ve also been reading the daily excerpts from Daily Light on the Daily Path and Our Daily Walk devotional by F. B. Meyer as well as reading through I Thessalonians several times in my effort to slow down and delve into the epistles rather than speeding through them. I just started II Thessalonians this week.

Plans for the next month are to finish Sometimes a Light Surprises, to read Take Two, the next in the Above the Line series by Karen Kingsbury. I would really like to read How To Read Slowly by James W. Sire. I am thinking (hoping) it will help me retain more of what I read from non-fiction books. After that I’m not sure. I have a whole stack of books to read and a long trip to and from a wedding this month, so I am planning to take several!

(And Ann, thanks to this post of yours, I removed the adjective “amazing” from one of my descriptions. 🙂 )