In Every Heartbeat by Kim Vogel Sawyer is about three friends from the same orphanage awarded a scholarship to college just before WWI.

Libby wants to be a famous journalist. She’s not tomboyish exactly, but she gets along with boys better than girls and isn’t interested in the same things as her high-society roommate, Alice-Marie.

Pete is called to preach, and though he is the most spiritually mature of the three, he harbors resentment towards his parents because their sending him to work as a child resulted in an accident and the loss of his leg. His parents are the only ones living (as far as we know), and he thinks if he can just find them and get his feelings off his chest, he will relieve that burden from his mind.

Bennett is the most jovial of the three, always ready to jump into a good fight, and avidly searches for significance. He thinks he’ll find it by joining the most prestigious fraternity on campus, but makes an enemy on campus the first day who stands in his way.

As the back of the book says, “the friends’ differing aspirations and opinions begin to divide them.” I like the way the author detailed the flaws and problems of each character and wove them together. Each faces a crisis of some sort and learns and grows along the way.

One of the most important aspects of the book in my opinion comes up in Libby’s story. (Mild spoiler ahead.) She tries to find work at a newspaper but is told by one editor to come back later when she’s gotten through college and had some experience. She discovers in the meantime that she can write fiction for a women’s romance magazine to earn money and gain experience. From what I can tell it’s not lurid romance, but it does focus more on the physical. At the same time, Pete has to come up with a class project that involves “taking on” a problem of the day and finding a way to combat it and stand up for truth. When he sees some girls giggling over such a magazine as the one Libby writes for, he decides to take on that kind of titillating romance story and writes a letter to the editor in protest, unaware that his friend, Libby, is writing that kind of story.

In the course of the book, Libby has to come to terms with her writing (I’ll let you discover how in the book so as not to spill too much of the plot here 🙂 ), and the difference between a romance that titillates and a romance that reflects Christ’s love for his people is made pretty clear, in my opinion. Yet as I looked through some of the reviews on Amazon, I was very surprised that a number of reviewers there didn’t understand what the author was doing and made comments like, “Why is she criticizing romance novels when she’s writing one?” I wouldn’t classify this book as primarily a romance novel, though it has romance in it (that’s the type of book I prefer. I don’t usually go for books that are just “handsome boy meets beautiful girl and falls in love,” end of story.) But I have also seen good people sweep all romance novels, Christian or not, under the rug as portraying relationships in an unhealthy way. There certainly are those types of romances, even in Christian fiction, and we need to be careful that we’re not reading things that will either accent the physical or portray a hero and heroine  and relationship so perfect and unreal that we can never be satisfied with real life. But a romance that portrays flawed characters who find each other and find grace to overcome obstacles and love each other despite their flaws as Christ loved the church, with a love that wants the best for the other even at the cost of sacrifice to oneself — that’s pretty realistic to me, and I don’t see anything wrong with that. In fact, I think that can encourage the right kind of romance. And I think that’s what Libby discovers, too.

As I got into this book, I began to think some of the characters sounded a little familiar, and I realized they were from another of Kim’s books, My Heart Remembers. I had read that a few months ago and thought I had reviewed it, but I hadn’t. In Every Heartbeat reads fine without having to go back and pick up My Heart Remembers, but if you’ve read the first book you’ll enjoy the second, and if you’ve read the second you might enjoy going back to see where some of the characters came from.

I enjoy books that I get more out of as I think about them even days after finishing them, and this book is one of those.

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.

Here is what I have completed since last time:

Saving Graces: the Inspirational Writings of Laura Ingalls Wilder edited by Stephen Hines, reviewed here.

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, reviewed here. I think I am one of the last on the planet to read it, but I am very glad I did. Excellent.

His Ways, Your Walk, an as-yet unpublished book by my friend. Lou Ann Keiser, missionary in Spain. This was the first time I was honored to be asked to read someone’s manuscript. It’s mainly teaching from the few Scripture verses with direct instruction to women. I look forward to letting you know when it’s published!

Intervention by Terri Blackstock (audiobook). This and the next one are the first and last in the Invention series about a daughter’s drug addiction. Very good.

Downfall by Terri Blackstock (Kindle app).

The Big 5-Oh! by Sandra Bricker. Light, fun reading. Good.

The last three weren’t fully reviewed, but I bunched them up with a short review of each here.

Last time I had finished a couple of books but hadn’t reviewed them as of the Nightstand post. Those are The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie by Wendy McClure, reviewed here and Practical Happiness: A Young Man’s Guide to a Contented Life by Bob Schultz, with my youngest son, Jesse, not fully reviewed but discussed briefly here.

I am currently reading/listening to:

Everyday Battles: Knowing God Through Our Daily Conflicts by Bob Schultz, with my youngest son.

In Every Heartbeat by Kim Vogel Sawyer about three friends from the same orphanage awarded a scholarship to college just before WWI, the different routes they go, temptations they face, etc.

Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott, classic medieval knight’s tale (maybe the forerunner? I’m not sure — will have to check that out.) Was surprised to find Robin Hood making an appearance here. Evidently, from what I’ve read, though he was a subject of much folklore, but our modern conception of him began as he was depicted in Ivanhoe. I’m listening to this as an audiobook, and it was hard to keep my attention on it at first (a lot of description and background I’d have gleaned more from by reading), but now it is keeping me listening closely.

Next up:

It’s hard to choose which book from my spring reading plan list to read next, but I am leaning toward:

Infinitely More by Alex Krutov, nonfiction about an abandoned orphan in Russia whom God brought to Himself.

Grace for the Good Girl: Letting Go of the Try-Hard Life by Emily P. Freeman.

Loving by Karen Kingsbury, the last of the Bailey Flanigan series.

What’s on your nightstand?

Happy reading!

I finished a number of books over the last few weeks and haven’t had time or inclination to do a full review of them, but I thought I’d talk about them just briefly here.

Last month I reviewed Vicious Cycle by Terri Blackstock, which was the second in a trilogy, so I went back and listened to the first book, Intervention, from an audiobook and then read the newest and last in the series, Downfall, with my Kindle app for the Touchpad and iPhone.

In Intervention, Barbara Covington’s daughter, Emily, is an out of control addict, and after trying everything else she could, Barbara pays for a treatment center out of state which sends an interventionist to take Emily to the center. But the interventionist is killed in the airport parking lot and Emily is missing. Did she kill the woman, or is she in danger as well?

In Downfall, the Covington family has moved to Atlanta for a new start, but trouble seems to follow them with an attempt to bomb Emily’s car and two murders of people from the new treatment  center where she works. Though she’s been clean, evidence begins point to her involvement. Has she relapsed, or is she being framed?

This series arose from a situation in Terri’s own family (addiction, not murders), and with Jim and I both having members of extended family who have had trouble with drugs, I found the struggles both Emily and her family faced to be very realistic. And if you like suspense, Terri’s your girl! Her characters are realistically flawed while seeking God’s will. I enjoyed both of these.

The Big 5-OH! by Sandra D. Bricker is the next birthday of Olivia Wallace, and Liv is convinced that something dreadful is going to happen because of her “birthday curse”: something has happened on every birthday she can remember, all the way from losing a boyfriend to blizzards to a cancer diagnosis. For a change of venue and outlook, her friend urges her to go to her mother’s (the friend’s mother’s) place in Florida while her mother visits her there in Ohio , so Liv takes her up on the offer. Besides taking care of a dog in a lampshade collar, finding an alligator in a pool, and having a flirty 80-year-old as a neighbor, Liv meets another neighbor with a “toothpaste commercial smile” and begins to wonder if this birthday will be the best yet. This book was light, cute, fun — a nice beach or vacation read or just a change of pace from “heavier” books. I had found it on a clearance table at the Christian bookstore, but Amazon and Christianbook.com both have e-version for free at the moment.

I read Practical Happiness: A Young Man’s Guide to a Contented Life by Bob Schultz with my youngest son, Jesse, after having read two other books by that author, Boyhood and Beyond: Practical Wisdom for Becoming a Man and Created For Work. Though this has a lot of good points to ponder, I didn’t like it quite as well as the first two. It just seemed a little wordy and not as focused. He spends several chapters on knowing God’s voice and hearing Him speak, and I disagreed with him on some points there (I am always instantly suspicious when people say, “God told me…” anything), but it provided a good foundation for a discussion with my son on different views of that. But overall the book has more good points on the topic of happiness, contentment, and their enemies than it has problems.

So…I think that about catches me up. 🙂

Have you read any good books lately?

In The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, a number of children answer an ad for “gifted children looking for special opportunities” and take a series of tests. Four children ultimately pass all the tests and are asked to help a Mr. Benedict, who designed the tests, on a special mission. The four children also happen to be orphans except for one who ran away from home. The children are:

Reynard (Reynie) Muldoon, who has a special knack for logic, solving puzzles, figuring out “trick” questions, thinking “outside the box.”

George (“Sticky”) Washington, who remembers everything he reads and is generally very nervous.

Kate Wetherall, the most physical of the group (having spent most of her life with the circus), an one-woman (or girl) MacGyver with an ever-present bucket of useful items, including a spyglass disguised as a kaleidoscope.

Constance Contraire, who is very…contrary, small, sleeps a lot, and argues even more. The reason for her contrariness isn’t revealed until the last chapter, and it’s hilarious. It makes her behavior all through the book make sense.

The children are asked to go on a dangerous but important mission to thwart an evil Ledroptha Curtain, a mission that only children could successfully accomplish (all manner of government officials have not seen the danger despite Mr. Benedict’s numerous attempts to inform them), and in the process learn about themselves, about how to work as a team, about how to face fears and extend themselves. I can’t tell you much more than that without giving too much away, and this book is best unfolded at its own pace (for that reason, I’d advise not reading the Wikipedia entry on it til you’re done — it has way too many spoilers).

I have to admit it took me a while to get into the book. I had heard it lauded so much I think I was expecting to be wowed within moments, but it took a while for it to grow on me. It’s not until 80 or so pages in that I began to get some inkling what was going on, and I thought the remaining 400+ pages were going to go by slowly. But the kids are in the same boat as the reader, so it takes a while first for the clues to fall into place and then to figure out what to do about them, and it does reach “hard to put down” status after a while. I have to admit I almost rolled my eyes a little at the “world domination through thought control” idea (which made me think of Pinky and the Brain), but that’s the stuff of many a children’s book and superhero story.

But these children are not superheroes. I love that they are very real. They are gifted in different ways, but they each have their own struggles, strengths, weaknesses, doubts. They have to learn to lean on each other, to seek guidance yet to think for themselves. I love when books bring a character beyond what they think they can do, like Frodo and Sam in Lord of the Rings or Abbie in Keep the Lights Burning, Abbie (one of my favorite children’s books).

Though the book is not written from a Christian viewpoint, there are several underlying truths in it (someone once said “All truth is God’s truth”). Carrie saw some parallels to spiritual warfare and to differently-gifted people working together as a cohesive whole in the church, and I can see that. There is also an underlying love of truth throughout the book and a resistance to evil. It disturbed me when the children had to both cheat and lie at a couple of points, but it was justified as something which one would do in warfare that one wouldn’t normally do, and I can see that as well.

The word “clever” kept coming to mind as I read this, both in the wordplay and in the writing. I had wondered, with the idea of thought control coming through television and radios, whether the book was some kind of allegory concerning technology or wasting brains with media, but Carrie’s research indicated the author wrote in “all in good fun” with the main message being “Kids are people, too.”

I think my children would have liked this book when they were younger. I think my oldest in particular would have liked it during his Encyclopedia Brown days. I think they’d like it now, actually. Like Narnia, Anne of Green Gables, and the Little House books, it has great appeal to adults as well.

So…real, clever, interesting, fun, dramatic at points, all upon a bedrock of truth…I’d say those are components of a great book.