OFF THE BOOKSHELF: The Christmas Tree Treasure Hunt

The Christmas Tree Treasure Hunt is what I was taught to consider a "shared universe" story -- meaning multiple authors contribute to the story line/universe.

Authors: Joan Campbell, Jennifer Fromke, Sheryl Holmes, Deanna Klingel, Fay Lamb, J.A. Marx, Ruth O'Neil, Debbie Roome and Marji Laine. Each author contributed a chapter to the book.

Publisher: Write Integrity Press. www.WriteIntegrity.com or from Amazon -- I read this on Kindle, and am pretty sure it was a free book when I got it.

Grace is our narrator, grieving the loss of her grandmother as Christmas approaches, and still wounded from the betrayal of her twin sister, whom she has not seen since high school. Orphaned as children, she and her twin were raised by their grandmother -- now Grace is totally alone in the world.

That is, until she gets a package prepared by her grandmother before she died. As children, the twins loved going on treasure hunts created by their grandmother. This package has nine envelopes and sends Grace around the world to meet people important to her grandmother and to learn valuable lessons about forgiveness, second chances, and trusting in God.

Honestly, I teared up several times, reading this book. What's interesting is that many e-books open up to the table of contents and don't give you the cover art unless you flip backwards, so I and didn't realize there were nine authors. The various chapters came together so smoothly, the "voice" didn't change for me. Nicely done!

If you want a heart-warming story for Christmas that takes you around the world, this is the one to add to your reading list. Bravo to the authors!

OFF THE BOOKSHELF: A Darcy Christmas -- Jane Austen Tribute Anthology

A DARCY CHRISTMAS is an anthology of novellas in tribute to Jane Austen and probably her most famous couple -- Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet. I know I got this from B&N, but I honestly can't remember if this was a Free Book Friday book, or the featured book they offer first when you touch the "shop" button on your Nook. All I know is, I had to have it.

One word (can you really limit yourself to ONE word to describe this collection?): CHARMING.

Amanda Grange, Sharon Lathan and Carolyn Eberhart did a lovely job, going on after the last page of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE to speculate on "What if?" -- and setting all their stories at Christmas.

What if Mr. Darcy didn't ask Lizzy to marry him a second time? What if their first child was born at Christmas? What would the Christmases be like through the years, as they grew older and their children grew up and started falling in love?

Starting with a tribute to Dickens with "Mr.  Darcy's Christmas Carol" -- yeah, exactly! -- and then traveling through the years ... you'll smile every time you open your book and settle down for another little glimpse into the Darcy family's Christmas traditions and adventures.

Off the Bookshelf: THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOLY by A.W. Tozer

My discussion group on Wednesday night at church is reading this book. We're meeting until the middle of December -- I just finished reading this. Always a smart idea to have actually read the chapters you're going to discuss in class that night before you get there.

This is definitely one of those books that should be read and re-read on a regular basis. Even though it's fairly small -- only 94 pages in my iBooks application -- there's a lot to think about, a lot to learn.

Knowledge of the Holy = understanding all the many facets of the character of God, and what they mean. Even more important, how those different aspects of God relate to those of us who claim to be His followers, and what that means in our lives. The closer we come to a better understanding of the God we claim we serve (yes, I keep saying "claim" because how many of us actually live up to what we say we are, what we say we do, what we say we believe? I mean, really?) the deeper the implications and the more imperative it is to live what we believe.

This book presents and defends the premise that what the modern Church thinks it knows about God ... ain't necessarily so. Even though this was written a number of decades ago, the truths it presents and the fallacies that the Church and so-called Christians and the disbelieving world in general supports about God are still applicable. We are just as guilty now as the people of Tozer's day were of painting a picture of God that diminishes His power and holiness, changing Him from the God to whom we owe everything, and who we should adore and love and fear, to essentially a big cuddly, slightly fuddled grandfather who just wants everyone to get along and lets us do our own will instead of His.

I'm going to make it a goal to try to read this book at least twice a year. Enough time for me to be able to look back and see if the last reading made any difference. Maybe something will strike me as new, or what has happened to me in the last six months will have an impact.

I highly recommend you get this book, and others by Tozer, and get reading. They'll make a difference. The man is easy to read, which means you'll spend more time thinking about what he said rather than trying to untangle HOW he said it, and that translates into having an impact sooner.

From the Bookshelf: RADICAL, by David Platt

We've been reading this book as a church the last month or so. Pastor Dan has been preaching based on the topics/chapters, and different small groups and classes have been independently studying the book.

The subtitle is: Taking back your faith from the American Dream.

Huh? Why would the American Dream imprison or threaten or steal our faith? How?

Essentially, we have so MUCH that it's slowing us down, clogging our minds, making us sleepy, blocking our vision. Do we ever stop to think why God has blessed us in this country with so much? Yes, I do mean the entire country. Because when you look at the statistics, a lot of people in this country who consider themselves living in poverty are rich, living in comfort, compared to most of the people in this world.

Makes you stop and think doesn't it? And that's the purpose of the book. Near the beginning of our study, one of the men in our class at church spoke up and asked, "Why are we reading this book, when we KNOW all this already?" Essentially, he was asking why we had to spend money on the books, and waste our time covering material we already know. Well, I think the answer is that we KNOW it, but we don't ACT on it. We agree, yes, God gave us wealth and abilities and resources to use them for His glory ... but how many of us take what God has entrusted to us, and gone out and USED it? (How many of those glitzy, slick preachers touting a Prosperity Gospel actually TELL their congregations that God wants them to be rich so they can WORK for Him? I'm afraid too many stop at "God wants you rich," but never tell anyone WHY God wants them rich. Yes, God loves us, but He's not the kind of parent who gives His kids anything they want just because they want it. Daddy gives you a car so you can drive others to school. Daddy gives you a toolbox to fix cars to help others, and build furniture for others, etc., etc.)

The book finishes with several challenges to endeavor to meet during the next year -- just a year of living radically, sacrificially, and thinking about others instead of our own wants and dreams. It's easy to finish a book like this and be all fired up to go out there and start living like a servant, a disciple, an apostle -- but how long will the "Yes Lord!" attitude really last? How long can we go before we start losing people from the ranks and commitments are canceled and the burden rests on fewer and fewer, who burn out faster, until nobody is being RADICAL any longer?

How many times will I need to re-read this book before it sticks?
Read it. You'll probably get very uncomfortable -- but maybe guilt is good for the soul. It might actually get you off your chair and out moving and doing ... for a while, anyway.
If you're not uncomfortable after reading this book ... I'd worry, if I were you.

Off the Bookshelf: MIRROR, MIRROR

The yearly anthology by JD Robb, Mary Blayney, Elaine Fox, Mary Kay McComas, and R.C. Ryan is something I always look forward to. So yes, I broke my vow not to buy new books until I had cleared a shelf of my to-be-read bookrack.

This anthology takes classic faerie tales and puts them in more recent settings, either rewriting the whole story or using elements from them to weave a romance.

We have Hansel & Gretel, Goldilocks, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Matchgirl, and Cinderella. My hat off to these master storytellers. I've played with turning faerie tales and turning them into SF stories -- making them more close to our own time is a little harder, but they do it wonderfully. Read the book!

Off the Bookshelf: SNUFF by Terry Pratchett

*sigh*
Yet ANOTHER addiction of mine -- the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett.

What's Discworld, you may ask?

Fantasy -- British humor -- magic -- silliness -- clever -- satire.

Discworld -- a disk-shaped world/flat world -- floating through space on the back of four elephants, poised on the back of a giant, spacegoing turtle.

SNUFF regales readers with the further adventures of Sam Vimes, commander of the Ankh-Morpork Watch -- the city police. Poor Commander Vimes has given in and gone off to the country (foreign culture) with his wife, Lady Sybil, for a vacation. What's a copper to do? He doesn't have to look for trouble, though -- it finds him.

I LOVE Discworld, and I especially love going back again and again and watching favorite characters grow and develop as their lives change. Vimes is a man of the streets, yet somehow he ends up a duke and married to a noble lady -- who happens to raise dragons -- and now their son is growing up. Adorable, clever, precocious Young Sam. Other characters I love to visit again are the witches led by Granny Weatherwax, or the bumbling wizards of the Unseen University. Major fun to be had all the time.

And for the truly adventurous, there are graphic novels, as well as movies based on several of the books. I'd start with Hogfather, if I were you. Especially since Christmas is coming up, and Hogfather ... umm ... satirizes some aspects of the extremely commercialized holiday ... just saying ...

Off the Bookshelf: CALCULATED IN DEATH by JD Robb

What can I say? I am addicted to the adventures of Dallas and Roarke -- as in Eve Dallas, homicide detective in a near-future New York, and her Irish-born gazillionaire (her words!) husband.

It just goes to show how busy I've been for the last year, that I didn't get this book in hardcover when it first came out, but waited for paper. Of course, then I devoured it in three days -- after I got my day's writing and earning-a-living work done, of course.

Thank goodness the baseball season is over (for me, anyway) so my evenings are a little freer ....

CALCULATED IN DEATH starts with finding a murdered woman in a doorway on a frigid November evening. She's a wife, mother, accountant/auditor, and the murderer tries to make it look like a mugging. But of course, Dallas senses something is wrong. And as she follows the trail and uncovers the lies being told by multiple people, she gets the true criminals upset, then panicked, so they make big mistakes.

More important than the mystery and bringing justice for the victim, though, is the interplay of characters, the growth of the relationship between Eve and Roarke, the visits from people we've come to know and love, and chuckle quietly as Eve struggles with the trials and tribulations of being famous, despite her best efforts to just do her job. Her utter terror of the beautician, Trina. Her frustration with Roarke, who delights in showering her with gifts -- but the man knows how to make them useful, as in a thigh holster to go under her designer gown, or a leather coat with a stunner-proof lining. And then there's Peabody, her partner, and McNab, e-detective, and their relationship, the pop singer Mavis and her fashion designer husband, Leonardo, Dr. Mira and her husband and other members of the NYPSD.

I finished a big writing project, met a deadline, and despite my resolve not to buy new books until I cleared at least one shelf of my to-be-read bookrack ... well, I deserve the treat, the indulgence. Love the books!