In Lost Melody by Lori Copeland and Virginia Smith, Jill King is a talented concert pianist on her way to Carnegie Hall when she’s involved in a horrible subway accident which kills most of the passengers. Jill survives, but sustains an injury to her hip, and what’s worse, to her hand, tragically ending any dreams she had for her future as a pianist.

In the year following she slowly recovers physically as much as possible, but she is still seeing a counselor to deal with the emotional trauma. People feel it’s time for her to move on, and things begin to move toward a permanent commitment to her boyfriend Greg, a lawyer with promising political ambitions.

About this time she begins having recurring terrifying dreams, and she feels they are portending a disaster to her oceanside Novia Scotia town and she’s supposed to warn people. But warning people carries the risk of being thought crazy, which would not only damage her reputation but would also affect her fiance’s career.

I’d seen this pop up on other blogs and always thought it sounded interesting until I got to the part about the dreams, then I’d close the screen and move on to something else. But when I was looking for a new audiobook, somehow I missed that part when I ordered.

For me, I can’t help reading/listening and wondering “Where are the authors going with this? Are they trying to promote a view that God speaks to people in this way today?”

Personally, I don’t believe that He does. No, there is no Bible verse where God says, “I will never again speak audibly or through dreams to anyone ever again until they get to heaven.” But my understanding of I Corinthians 13:8b-10 (“But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.”) is that once the Word of God came, the need for the “sign gifts” faded away. I know there are differences of opinion about that, and that’s fine: I don’t mean to start a debate. I’m just relaying my mindset as I listened to the book. The most realistic and seemingly genuine incidents I’ve heard of their use today have occurred among primitive people who don’t have the Scriptures in their languages yet. Plus, I don’t know of a Biblical prophecy that’s just about getting out of town because of a coming disaster: usual it has to do with a call to repentance. There are multitudes of crashes, floods, explosions, earthquakes, and other disasters throughout the world on a daily basis: why would God pick one little town and send a prophecy to them to leave town because something bad is about to happen?

But I decided if I was going to get anything out of the book, I needed to just set that aside mentally, accept it as just a fictional part of a fictional story rather than reality, and just see how it played out.

I felt the authors did handle well the ramifications of such a character with such a message: the disbelief of some, including her fiance, and his wrestling with how to support her while not letting her stance have a negative impact on his career; the support of others, with a tiny few carrying it over into a bit of extreme fanaticism; the media interest and “spin” on it, etc. All of that was very realistic and did make me empathize with the prophets of old, the reluctance some of them may have felt at proclaiming a message that many would not receive. The authors also did a great job with the plot development and the build-up of suspense to the climax at the end.

I enjoyed most the parts about Jill’s recovery and the issues she faced in connection with the loss of her dream. But even regarding the prophecy as fictional, as a plot element, I didn’t really enjoy that part of the book as well.

In the small town of Cold Sassy, GA, in the early 1900s, Rucker Blakeslee shocked and scandalized the town and his family by remarrying Miss Love Simpson just three weeks after his wife died. That was the worst of it, but added to the scandal were the facts that she was “nearly a Yankee” and half his age. Thereafter she was the main subject of gossip (as if the marriage was totally her fault) and could seem to do nothing right in their eyes. That’s the basic plot of Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, but the story is told through the eyes of Rucker’s grandson, Will Tweedy, who is sympathetic with the couple, and whose teen-age perspective causes him to question things and not necessarily go along with the status quo.

I do generally like small-town Southern fiction, but it took me a long while to get into this one. I almost laid it aside many time but persevered because so many people told me they had liked it.  A lot of the town gossip, prejudices, and family competition seemed mean-spirited; Will had a minor obsession with ladies’ bosoms (trying to catch a peek when his sister-in-law nursed her baby, noticing how Miss Love jiggled when she played the piano), there is a smattering of bad language and some faulty theology (I do understand this is not at all meant to be a Christian book, but if a writer is going to get into theology, then, yes, I am going to evaluate that). One example: when Will asks why we don’t get what we ask for in prayer even though Jesus said “Ask and ye shall receive,” his Grandpa says: “Maybe Jesus was talkin’ in His sleep, son, or folks heard Him wrong. Or maybe them disciples tryin’ to start a church thought everybody would join up if’n they said Jesus Christ would give the Garden a-Eden to anybody believed He was the son a-God and like thet” (p. 98). He does decide to “study on this some more” and later decides that Jesus may not give exactly what you ask (healing, a new job, etc.), but He will give you the grace to deal with whatever He allows, which is closer to the truth. But perhaps Rucker’s theological convolutions were meant as just another window into a personality that wants its own way and doesn’t care what anyone else thinks, which is manifested in various ways throughout the book.

I did enjoy Will’s camping trip. I loved the way Will’s innocent but unwise foray into impending doom on the train tracks was told. By the end of the book I grew to like the relationship Will had with his grandfather and the growing relationship between Rucker and Love from a marriage of convenience to a true, deep love. I liked that everything came more or less right in the end though I was sorry for the tragedy that led to it.

One of my favorite lines was when Will was pondering being in mourning (wearing a black armband, not being able to do anything fun) over the death of his grandmother as opposed to what it meant to actually mourn for her: “But to mourn, that’s different. To mourn is to be eaten alive with homesickness for the person” (p. 56). If you’ve ever mourned anyone you loved, I’m sure you can sympathize with that feeling.

My other favorite line was more humorous. When Miss Love models some driving attire in the store window because Rucker won’t buy a mannequin, Will’s Aunt “Loma was jealous. The store window being like a little stage and her having taken elocution, she considered herself the only person in Cold Sassy qualified to act like a dummy” (p. 282).

I went online looking for some more insight into the book, and these SparkNotes helped (warning: they do contain spoilers to the plot since they’re discussing it more in depth). It is a mark of good writing that I’m still thinking about the book days later and discovering angles, connections, and layers that I’d missed at first, but it still won’t go down as one of my favorites.

I finished a couple of books that I just wanted to mention briefly rather than writing a full review.

 Coming Home is Karen Kingsbury’s latest and supposedly last book about the Baxter family. Though the family is the subject of some 22 previous books, I don’t think one would need to read all of them before enjoying this book.

The extended Baxter family is coming home for a surprise party for patriarch John Baxter’s 70th birthday. As each of his children reflect on their lives in order to write him a letter about what he means to them, their stories are summed up for the reader. But a tragedy turns their world upside down and shakes and tests their faith.

I can’t say much more than that without revealing too much. I enjoyed the book very much.

 Walking on Broken Glass by Christa Allan is the story of Leah Thornton, who at 27 confronts the truth of her alcoholism and checks herself into rehab. She comes to realize that there are more problems with her life than just alcohol, and that everything she blames her husband for may not be entirely his fault.

I loved Christa’s witty writing and Leah’s self-discovery, but I thought her admission of her alcoholism came a little too easily. I’ve mentioned before that my father was an alcoholic for most of his adult life, losing his family and his health, I don’t think he ever did admit that he had a problem, at least not that I ever heard. But I suppose it is possible to admit such after one confrontation.

There is also much more about Leah and her husband’s sexual life than I like to read. It is integral to the story and and for the most part it is no more explicit than what you’d find in Song of Solomon or Proverbs 5:19. Still, I’d rather the issues between them were expressed through some other venue.

I also felt the ending was left hanging unresolved. I do appreciate that not every thread of a story needs to be wrapped up in a neat bow at the end, but this ending was so abrupt that at first I thought perhaps not all of it came through on my Kindle download.

I did, however, really enjoy Christa’s writing and will look for more of her books in the future.

In Beyond the Shadows by Robin Lee Hatcher, Deborah Haskins’ husband has just died in a farming accident, leaving her a young widow alone on a 40 acre farm. Unbeknownst to her, her husband Andy had offered his old Korean war buddy, Gideon Clermont, a job on the farm, and Gideon happens to arrive the day of Andy’s funeral. Gideon finds another job but wants to help Deborah out by volunteering his services at the farm on Saturdays.

Both Gideon and Deborah are Christians but not in close fellowship with the Lord. After several months they fall in love and elope. Some time later Deborah experiences a renewal of her faith, but Gideon is aloof spiritually. It takes a long while for Deborah to realize that Gideon has a drinking problem, and then longer to acknowledge that he is a full-blown alcoholic.

As the daughter of an alcoholic myself, I felt the actions and emotions of the characters rang true. Experience with alcoholism with a member of Robin’s family lends an authenticity to the story.

One of the things I most appreciated about this book was the realistic use of Scripture and Scriptural principles. Some Christian authors today seem to think they have to veil, to downplay, or to merely suggest spiritual truth, but it should be a normal part of a Christian’s life to read and be instructed and convicted by God’s Word. The book is not preachy at all, but the characters do grapple realistically with God’s Word and its claims on them.

In one instance, Deborah has come across the verse “‘I hate divorce,’ says the LORD God of Israel” in Malachi 2:16a. At first it seems like a promise that her marriage will be salvaged, but as Gideon’s initial denials that he has a problem turn into multiple relapses despite promises to quit all chisel away at Deborah’s love for him, the verse begins to feel more like a prison sentence. It reminded me of a quote from Jane Eyre: “Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigor.”

And I also thought it was quite realistic that once both Deborah and Gideon came to a place of surrender and decision, it still wasn’t easy and they still had their ups and downs.

For all of that, though, the book is not dreary and gloomy. It’s meant as a story of hope.

The book is mostly told through Deborah’s voice, but there are occasional paragraphs of various other characters’ viewpoints.

I listened to it via audiobook and it was quite well done. It appears to be out of print right now, but used copies are available and it is also available for the Kindle and the Nook as well as audiobook. There is an interesting interview with Robin from a few years back that covers this book as well as other information.

Annette at This Simple Home and Dorie at These Grace Filled Days have teamed up to create Together on Tuesdays as “a casual way to meet and connect with other women” over the summer. They’ve created a schedule of topics to discuss in order to get to know one another better, and the topic for this week is favorite books and films.

I would have a hard time narrowing books down to a couple of favorites, as reading has been a lifelong favorite activity. But I’ll try to suggest a few from favorite genres (links are to my reviews).

Missionary biographies: probably my favorite category or at least the one that has most impacted my life: Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur by Frank Houghton, Evidence Not Seen by Darlene Diebler Rose, Through Gates of Splendor by Elisabeth Elliot, To the Golden Shore about Adoniram Judson, By Searching and In the Arena by Isobel Kuhn, Goforth of China and Climbing by Rosalind Goforth, Mountain Rain by Eileen Crossman, Second-Mile People by Isobel Kuhn (an excerpt here), In the Presence of My Enemies by Gracia Burnham, Green Leaf in Drought by Isobel Kuhn.

Non-fiction books: When God Weeps by Joni Eareckson Tada and Steve Estes, How To Say No to a Stubborn Habit by Erwin Lutzer, Changed Into His Image by Jim Berg, Spiritual Depression by D. Martin Lloyd Jones, Spiritual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders, On Asking God Why by Elisabeth Elliot (just about anything by Elisabeth Elliot!), Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job by Layton Talbert, The Art of Homemaking by Edith Schaeffer.

Classics: The Chronicles of Narnia series by C. S. Lewis, Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. the Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, the Lord of the Rings series by J. R. R. Tolkien.

Christian fiction: the Mitford series by Jan Karon, A Quiet Strength by Janette Oke, The Secret Life of Becky Miller by Sharon Hinck, Francine Rivers’ Mark of the Lion series, The Princess and Sophie’s Heart by Lori Wick.

More are listed at 98 Books that Have Enriched my Life and Favorite Books: Non-Fiction and Favorite Fiction Books and Authors.

Favorite films: That would be a much shorter list. Newer films tend to have explicit scenes or bad words, so most of my favorites films are older. Some of my favorites are the Lord of the Rings series, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Toy Story, the Toby Stephens/Ruth Wilson version of Jane Eyre. both the Gwynneth Paltrow and Romola Garai version of Emma, The Princess Bride, Camelot. Having boys, we’ve watched a lot of action/adventure type movies, and I really did like the Iron Man films, Captain America, and The Avengers even though I wouldn’t normally gravitate to those.

Sorry for such long lists — it is hard to narrow down favorites of these categories!

Carrie at Reading to Know is once again hosting the Chronicles of Narnia Reading Challenge and dovetailing it with her book club choice for July.

During last year’s Narnia challenge I read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, Voyage of the Dawn-Treader, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe Graphic Novel. and The Way Into Narnia (all links to my thoughts) plus I thought through the use of Narnian Magic.

I’m reading the books in publication order, so the next in the series are The Silver Chair and The Horse and His Boy. They do read rather quickly so I might be tempted to go ahead and read the last two books and finish the series, but I’d also like to hold something back for next year. So right now I am just planning on those two, but we’ll see. I also have the Focus on the Family’s dramatizations of the series, so I may listen to some of those.

Someday I’d also like to read The Narnian by Alan Jacobs and What I Learned in Narnia by Douglas Wilson — I heard good things about both books during last year’s challenge — but at this moment I am not planning to work them in this month…unless I change my mind. 🙂

(I’m revising. updating my goals: I just looked back over my review of The Way Into Narnia and realized I had skipped the chapters devoted to the books I hadn’t read yet, to wait until I had read them. So I’ll be reading those chapters pertaining to The Silver Chair and The Horse and His Boy.)

If you’ve never visited Narnia, or if you’ve visited many times, I invite you to make a journey back with us this month!

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.

It’s been a great reading month. A couple of road trips provided more time for reading as did summer nights with not much on TV.  🙂

Here is what I’ve finished since last time:

It Is Not Death to Die: A New Biography of Hudson Taylor by Jim Cromarty, reviewed here. Good.

When Christ Was Here: a Woman’s Bible Study by Claudia Barba. I’ve immensely enjoyed and been blessed and convicted by hearing Claudia speak several times and enjoyed this Bible study, reviewed here. Excellent.

Infinitely More by Alex Krutov, true story about an abandoned orphan in Russia whom God brought to Himself, reviewed here. Wonderful book.

Raising Real Men: Surviving, Teaching, and Appreciating Boys by Hal and Melanie Young, reviewed here. Excellent resource.

Feminine Appeal by Carlyn Mahaney, reviewed here. Excellent.

Mentalpause…and Other Midlife Laughs by Laura Jensen Walker. Not reviewed. Meh.

Chasing Mona Lisa by Tricia Goyer and Mike Yorkey, about Swiss OSS agents trying to keep the famous painting from German hands, reviewed here. Great story though a little too descriptive for me when someone was killed.

Wives and Daughters (audiobook) by Elizabeth Gaskell, reviewed here. Loved this!

When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin. reviewed here. Wonderful writing but a couple of troubling elements.

Freckles by Gene Stratton Porter (audiobook), reviewed here.

A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter (audiobook and book): just finished and will review in the next day or two.

Currently:

I am bouncing around between a few, trying to decide which one to pursue next. I have Freckles Comes Home by Jeannette Stratton-Porter (Gene’s daughter) from the library, but I am a little tired of the Limberlost just now and popular opinion seems to indicate this isn’t as good as the others.

I started Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, but it’s not grabbing me yet. It came highly recommended, but I can’t remember by whom. But I’ll keep with it for a while at least.

I’m also reading Walking on Broken Glass by Christa Allan, about an alcoholic woman checking herself into rehab and trying to salvage her life. I love the writing, but there is a particular area of concern that I’ll reserve judgement on til I read more.

Next up:

Coming Home by Karen Kinsbury

The House at Riverton by Kate Morton. I’m sorry to have listed this here. The story ended up being very sordid with some use of vulgar language and I cannot recommend this book or author.

Beyond the Shadows by Robin Lee Hatcher (audiobook)

The Silver Chair and The Horse and His Boy for Carrie‘s The Chronicles of Narnia Reading Challenge in July. I will probably be tempted to finish the last two as well — we’ll see.

I’m thinking about Not By Chance: Learning to Trust a Soveriegn God by Layton Talbert. I’ve had it on my shelf for years and really enjoyed his book Beyond Suffering about Job.

I had also seen at Joyful Reader a button for a Louisa May Alcott reading challenge over the summer — I may try to participate in that, too. I do like to revisit her books every few years.

That should keep me busy for a while. 🙂

What’s on your nightstand?

The choice for for Carrie’s book club for the month of June is A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter, chosen by Stephanie at Simple Things. I had read both Freckles (linked to my review) and A Girl of the Limberlost as a child and for years had wanted to read them again, so I was glad this challenge gave me the impetus to do so.

A Girl of the Limberlost is a sequel to Freckles, but it can easily be read alone. Freckles and the Swamp Angel are referred to and appear later in the book, and the events of this book take place near the Limberlost forest and swamp.

But this is the story of Elnora Comstock, a teen girl about to enter high school, indeed to enter public school for the first time. Her mother doesn’t place much value in school and doesn’t give Elnora any encouragement or even advance preparation. So Elnora goes the first day and embarrasses herself by expecting books to be provided only to find out she has to pay for them and tuition as well. She is embarrassed by her clothing, hat, and shoes, too. Knowing her mother will never grant her the needed money, Elnora stresses over how to come up with it and then is told that the Bird Woman (also from Freckles and still not given another name) will pay for certain items of nature: moths, nests, cocoons, etc.

Elnora’s mother cares for her on some level, but that care is eclipsed by grief over her husband, who died in the swamp years earlier, and by resentment toward Elnora as the reason Mrs. Comstock couldn’t go to him.

The Comstocks’ neighbors, the Stintons, are friendly with Elnora and help her as much as they can. About the only time Mrs. Comstock ever takes any pains with Elnora is in a type of competition with the Stintons, or when she thinks others will see and care, such as with Elnora’s school lunches.

Things continue on this way until a couple of major incidents threaten to affect Elnora’s relationship with her mother permanently .

That’s the first half or so of the book: that crisis is resolved and the second half covers another storyline: a young man who is a relative of one of the townspeople comes to recuperate after being seriously ill. He sees Elnora hunting moths, knows something about them from his studies, and begins to help her. Her mother immediately sees him as a possibility for Elnora, but he is engaged to a “strictly ornamental” high society girl back home, and the rest of the book plays out that situation.

Elnora is not quite as idealized as Freckles was in the previous book, but she is still admirable for her pluck, determination, hard work, thriftiness, intelligence, and kindness. And there is again the theme of someone coming from humble circumstances yet working hard and making something of themselves, but without reference to “noble blood” this time.

I don’t know Porter’s religious background — I thought I had read that her father was a pastor, but I can’t find that piece of information now. But though I would not call this a Christian book, there are a couple of passages in the book that refer to God in a wonderful way, particularly when Mrs. Comstock watches a newly-hatched moth expanding its wings and is so caught up in wonder that she glorifies God for His wisdom in its creation and declares she never felt so in His presence as at that moment. In another place, when a different character has to face the consequences of her sin, the author says, “The wages of sin are the hardest debts on earth to pay, and they are always collected at inconvenient times and unexpected places.” My first thought was that I am glad that we don’t have to pay them, that Christ did for us. But she wasn’t speaking of that so much as the consequences or “come-uppance” a person has to deal with when their sin “finds them out.”

I spoke in my review of Freckles about the difference between naturalism and environmentalism. There is not as much of that kind of topic in this book, but one passage stood out to me. Elnora says “Sometimes I think it is cruel to take such creatures from their freedom, even for an hour, but it is the only way to teach the masses of people how to distinguish pests they should destroy from the harmless ones of great beauty.”

I had to admit I smiled a bit at all the mention of the beauty of moths: I tend to see them only as pests that eat clothes. And I thought it was absurd that a high society girl allows a whole ball given in her honor to be decorated in the colors of a rare moth when she personally couldn’t stand them.

I listened to most of this book as an audiobook and then finished it by reading the rest. Even though it is written in an old-fashioned style that is a little melodramatic and drawn-out in places, it was enjoyable.

The choice for for Carrie’s book club for the month of June is A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter. I had read it and Freckles by the same author when I was a child and wanted to read them both again: the book club choice provided a good opportunity.

Actually, I listened to them via audiobook, and I started with Freckles since it comes first chronologically before A Girl of the Limberlost.

Freckles first appears as an older teen-ager of Irish descent seeking a job at a logging camp in Indiana’s Limberlost forest. He had grown up in an orphanage where he had been left as a baby newly missing one hand. He was never given any other name. The boss, McLean, takes a liking to him and gives him a chance as his guard to walk the perimeter of his property twice a day and check the lines, making sure no one has trespassed. A former disgruntled employee had marked some trees to sell to a rival logging company, so theft was a real danger, as were rattlesnakes and other creatures native to the forest and the swamp.

Various noises and movements in the forest scare him at first, but soon he becomes used to them and then enthralled with the creatures and plants there. An urge to learn more about them leads to a purchase of nature books from the city.

After Freckles tells one of the men about the antics of one of the birds, the man suggests sending for a lady only known as the Bird Woman who travels around to photograph various birds. When she comes, she brings a teen-age girl as a helper. When Freckles first sees her, he dubs her the Swamp Angel, and that’s the only name we know her by. My main memory of reading the book the first time was the scene where he first meets her, and I couldn’t remember if she was a person or an image or what: it all seemed very ethereal in my memory. But she is very much a real girl.

The rest of the book details the various adventures and troubles they encounter and seems mainly to show Freckles’ character. It’s very much an old-fashioned book with the two main characters idealized to the point of almost no wrong, but they are both admirable: noble, loyal, kind, trustworthy, hard-working, going above and beyond the call of duty. There are some unrealistic places, such as the Swamp Angel giving suggestions to the logging camp men about how to best set up their tents and to the cook about how to prepare his meals, and they all take it appreciatively because she’s so wholesome and beautiful…

Though the book is not primarily a romance, the two do fall in love, but it is a problem because the Angel is from a rich family with a long and noteworthy bloodline, and Freckles’ heritage is unknown. It’s strange, but evidently the thinking of the time must have been that one’s character is determined by one’s bloodline: such a view doesn’t leave much room for salvation or a bettering of oneself. Freckles thinks he is unworthy of the Angel because of the people his must have been, but she feels his exemplary character must have come from a noble people. It’s sad that Freckles’ character and what he has made of himself doesn’t speak for itself.

Knowing Porter was a naturalist, I am not sure if her reason for writing the book was just to display a noble character in various circumstances or to place a story in her beloved Limberlost. I had a feeling the Bird Woman was based on herself, and there is much detail about the flora and fauna of the area.

The book also caused me to think about the differences between a naturalist, a conservationist, and what we would know today as an environmentalist. At least in this book Porter seems to love nature and want it preserved as much as possible and not wasted, but she also seems to have no problem with cutting down trees to make furniture or killing an otter expressly to make a muff as a gift for a lady. Nature is not intended for worship, it can be used, but it needs to be used carefully and wisely and not wasted or ravaged.

I was surprised at the number of occurrences of variations of the word “damn” in the book.

Though I usually enjoy reading actual ink and paper books more than listening to them, I think I might have grown a little tired of this one as a book. It worked well as an audiobook I could listen to while driving, etc. The production value was not as good as others I have heard: there was a little background noise, and it seemed as if it were read by a teacher or librarian, whereas with other audiobook narrators I had the sense the story was being told rather than read. Although the narrator didn’t employ different inflections or voices with different characters, I did enjoy the musicality of Freckles way of talking, tinged with an Irish lilt but not quite a brogue.

I’m glad I revisited this story. I don’t know that I would do so again any time soon, but it was neat to flesh out the memories of this book from my childhood.

(Updated to add: I just noticed that at the moment this is free for the Kindle. I don’t know how long it will be.)