Welcome to the July 2016 edition of An Open Book, hosted both at My Scribbler’s Heart AND CatholicMom.com! Almost from the time we began dating in 1993,…
6 CommentsRelevant Fiction for Body & Soul
Category: My Scribbler’s Heart
When the sparklers have fizzled, the grill has cooled, and even the lightning bugs have taken to their beds, I have the perfect book for you! The final installment of Theresa Linden’s Liberty Trilogy is available today. You’ll want to start with the first book, Chasing Liberty. (I interviewed Theresa about the book when it was first released.) Now that the series is complete, you can read straight through Testing Liberty and then Fight For Liberty, because, believe me, you’ll want to!
Because it’s a holiday and your concentration may be sapped from fun and sun, I’ll make this simple.
Top 5 Reasons You Should Read the Liberty Series:
- Liberty. She’s strong, brave, and bursting at the seams with heart and integrity. Which makes up for her tendency to be impatient and impulsive.
- Dedrick. A gentleman through and through, he’s had his eye on Liberty for a long time. Chivalrous, courageous, and can also kick some butt when the situation warrants.
- The Evil Villain. Dr. Supero is the guy you love to hate as he doggedly pursues Liberty. [Insert maniacal laugh.]
- Edge of your seat. That’s where you’ll be throughout this fast-paced dystopian series.
- American as apple pie. Rather than letting that burst of patriotism dim with the last flickering firework, take a little time to reflect on the foundations of the United States. Good fiction deepens your understanding of concepts and values in a personal way. Let Liberty remind you of the importance of faith, family, and freedom by showing you what a world without them might look like.
Why small success? Because that’s the only kind I know! Even the big ones come in small steps. Here’s my paltry offering for the week:
- Finished a novena – This is a fairly large success for me. I’m notoriously bad at completing novenas, which are simply nine days of prayer with a particular intention, usually through the intercession of a particular saint. I’ve tried all sorts of tricks, and remembering to spend about two minutes with a prayer nine days in a row is barely shy of miraculous for me. But, with the help of the free Pray app, I did it! And I’ve even begun another novena. The app is simple and clean. Choose a novena and tick off the days as you complete them. You can even invite friends to pray with you. A once-daily reminder is the key for me. I could do with more nudges, but apparently the reminder and seeing a little notice by the app icon is enough.
Pray: The Catholic Novena App
by Guest Blogger Jeannie Ewing
My oldest daughter, Felicity, is newly fascinated with how babies grow in their mother’s wombs. Shortly after she turned five, she would muse aloud, “Tell me about when I was in your tummy, Mommy.” Without thinking, I shared the story of when my husband and I first saw her on the early ultrasound, when she was about eight weeks old. I was considered “high risk” for pregnancy, so my husband and I were relieved when we saw our “little bean” and heard her heartbeat on the Doppler.
Felicity’s eyes widened as I demonstrated how small she was at the time – “about the size of my thumb nail,” I told her. “Is that how small I was to begin with?” she inquired. “No, sweetheart,” I lovingly replied, “you were so small when you began that we wouldn’t be able to see you, almost like a period at the end of a sentence.”
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While summer technically only began two days ago, it’s felt like summer since the kids got out of school and the temperatures have stayed consistently above 60 degrees. Here are five of my favorite things about summertime! It’s a bit tough to narrow the list to five. Even lightning bugs didn’t make the cut.
Without intending to, I read a lot books in a short period of time in which the main characters either endured or were removed from traumatic childhoods. (Except in the case of The End of the World, in which the characters moved from bad to worse in moving from home to foster care.) I suspect fictional characters experience rough childhoods at a higher rate than the real-life populace. At least I hope so! After all, childhood trauma makes a great back story and provides the motivation needed for a strong character arc. The older I get, however, the more I see what profound effects a family origin has, even well into adulthood.
You may notice I removed the stars from my Goodreads ratings below. Truth be told, I hate star rating systems. I get that they’re a simple snapshot that indicates the reader’s satisfaction with a book, but, most of the time, I struggle with assigning stars. And looking at the books below, I don’t think my assigned stars correlated to how well the books were written when you look at these books side by side. (I had assigned them all four and five stars, but still . . . ) I’d rather let the written reviews stand on their own.
In looking over this list of books, I have to say, months later, the one that still makes my heart clench is The End of the World.
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I’m linking up with The Broke and the Bookish (which describes me quite well) for my most anticipated releases for the second half of 2016. Some covers are available, some are not. Some are already listed on Amazon, some are not. Some I’m not quite sure of the release date. (And one is a wee bit into 2017). I’m just going to link to whatever’s available, sans covers. Here they are in no particular order.
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