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Here is the place to find reviews and information on Books of Interest. You can submit books reviews or recommendations by emailing muschfarm@yahoo.com . Put Apples Book Review in the subject line.
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*100 Bible Stories, 100 Bible Songs by Stephen Elkins (children's devotional/Bible story book with music CDs)
*An Irishwoman's Tale by Patti Lacy (women's fiction)
*A Summer of Kings by Han Nolan (young adult historical fiction)
*It's Not About Me by Max Lucado (Teen or Family reading)
100 Bible Stories, 100 Bible Songs
MAKING CHILDREN'S DEVOTIONS PALATABLE
I gave Stephen Elkins book 100 Bible Stories, 100 Bible Songs, the ultimate test. I handed it to my two grand-daughters ages 6 and 8. These are girls who only get to church occasionally, and most Bible stories are still pretty new to them. Last Easter we gave them a children’s Bible, so now the youngest has two books that she calls her “God Books”. What’d they think? They quickly scanned through the pages, stopping to read a couple of the stories, and were excited for me to play them the music CDs. Each CD contains 50 songs that span the years of familiarity. I was surprised that I knew so many of the songs. I thought that I would be hearing lots of new kids’ tunes, but was delighted to hear re-do’s of the many I loved as a child, and could now pass down to my grandchildren. Songs such as Kumbaya, Amazing Grace, I Will Sing of the Mercies, The B-I-B-L-E, and Oh You Can’t Get to Heaven, were delightfully sung by children singers.
As for the Bible stories contained in the book, I really found the layout desirable. Face it, little kids have very short attention spans. In the book, each double page capsulizes a story in one short paragraph on the left, and on the right a single-sentence synopsis to help them remember. On the bottom right is another single-sentence life application. Each story lists the Scripture reference where the story is found, as well as the correlating song on the CDs. The pictures are bright and engaging and fun.
If you are thinking of introducing daily Bible reading or devotions to a young child, 100 Bible Stories, 100 Bible Songs would make a marvelous start. It’s also a magnificent gift book.
An Irishwoman's Tale
“Ye can’t mean it,” Mam screamed. “Not now. She’s all o’ a bloody five.”
“The little eejit. Get ’er out.”
A fist crashed to the table. Cups and saucers and cigarettes flew. Tea splattered onto the wall, onto the front of Killian’s shirt.
“Ye swine.” Mam was in Killian’s face. “For the sake of St. Patrick, she’s my flesh and blood.”
“She’s got to go.”
Mary Freeman’s earliest memory has haunted her since childhood: An old oaken table, bloated faces drinking bitter tea, deciding what’s to be done with the “little eejit”—her.
At age five, Mary is torn from her beloved Ireland and thrust into another dysfunctional home, this one in Lisle, Illinois. After rejection and abuse push Mary to the edge of an emotional abyss, God provides a wonderful husband and two beautiful daughters, who live with Mary on an idyllic Indiana farm. Then Mary is saddled with the role of caretaker for her dying adoptive mother, and the past rushes in like the cold Irish wind.
It takes a crisis in her youngest daughter’s life—and the encouragement of Sally, a spunky Southern transplant—to propel Mary back to the rocky cliffs of County Clare. A harrowing journey brings the women face-to-face with Mary’s tragic past, leading them up the slopes of majestic Croagh Patrick. On the mountain named after Ireland’s hallowed saint, Mary experiences God’s healing and glimpses His sovereign plan.
“In her ability to span more than one generation and even more than one continent, Patti Lacy helps readers explore the external setting of a wild land while simultaneously studying the psychological interiors of her characters’ hearts and minds. It’s solid storytelling.”
—Dennis E. Hensley
Author of The Gift
Patti Lacy graduated from Baylor University with a B.S. in education. She taught at Heartland Community College in Normal, Illinois, until 2006, when she began to pursue writing on a full-time basis. She has two grown children and lives in Illinois with her husband Alan and a dog named Laura
FICTION / Christian / General
An Irishwoman’s Tale
Kregel
ISBN 978-0-8254-2987-3
August 2008
Patti Lacy
A Summer of Kings by Han Nolan, published by Harcourt, Inc, 2006
Homeschool Review:
A Young Adult story set on the stage of the turbulent 1960's civil rights movement, this story sets a powerful depiction of time and place. It offers a vivid picture of what the struggle for civil rights meant for individuals on a personal level. Homeschoolers studying the 20th century, or those interested in learning more about this era, will find the book historically informative while being swept up in a great story that is as entertaining as it is, at moments, heart-wrenching. A Summer of Kings makes a terrific read-aloud, as it provides many topics for discussion, including everything from "coming of age" topics, to Ghandi's philosophies.
from the back cover
It's 1963 and fourteen-year-old Esther Young is looking for excitement. Cursed with a lack of talent ina family filled with artistic types, Esther craves attention and vows to get it by initiating a summer romance with a black teen accused of murdering a white man in Alabama.
King-Roy Johnson shows up on Esther's doorstep that summer, an angry young man who feels betrayed by the nonviolent teachings of Martin Luther King Jr. He is readily swayed by a follower of Malcolm X's who uses radical teachings about blackl revolution to fuel King-Roy's anger and and frustration. With each other's help, both Esther and King-Roy discover the true nature of integrity and find the power to stand up for what is right and true.
National Book Award-winning author Han Nolan brings readers a bold new voice—by turns funny and poignant, innocent and worldly—in this powerful coming-of-age story set during the turbulent struggle for civil rights.
It's Not About Me (Live Like You Mean It) Teen Edition by Max Lucado
Reviewed by Naomi Musch
Wouldn't it be nice if we could all get to the place where we are living the life God meant for each of us to live? Wouldn't it be especially reassuring if we could find tools to help guide our teens in that direction. The world is already trying to tell them how to do that. It tells them to look out for #1, make all your moves to put yourself front and center in everything, rise to the top and claim your success.
The problem is, that can only set them up for disappointment, especially if they don't attain "success" as they define it.
In Max Lucado's teen edition of the book "It's Not About Me - Live Like You Mean It" published by Thomas Nelson publishers, the author looks into Scripture and explains how people can live a life that really makes sense by first bumping ourselves off "me-centered living" into "God-centered living".
Using an engaging story-telling style and real-life anecdotes, Lucado bring ideas of "God-pondering" and "God-promoting" to life. He helps readers to see and understand that everything we do is somehow about God. Our struggles? They're about God. Our successes? They're about Him, too. Our salvation, our dreams, our message, and even our bodies are not about us, but about God and His divine plan for our lives. Everything—it's all about Him.
In one of my favorite chapters titled "Just a Moment" Lucado helps readers to grasp their view of life's joys and struggles from God's perspective. He says that "(God) captures your life, your entire life, in one glance." From God's perspective our sorrows, our persecutions, our sicknesses, are all really only lasting for just a moment. It's as though while we are looking at life as though it were a long film unwinding, the Eternal God is seeing our entire lives in one flash frame—as just a moment. If we begin to examine all our trials and struggles from that same view, then it becomes easier to give them to Him. We can endure anything for His glory for just a moment!
Our family is always lookning for good devotional tools to use together in our homeschool, and "It's Not About Me" has taken place on our shelf of favorites. I originally read the adult version and was so motivated by the reading that I purchased the teen edition for our school. Up front, the only difference between the two versions is that each chapter in the teen edition includes a story of a real-life teen who has put principals into action of putting God's glory first. Each chapter ends with a thought question, and there is also a journaling section which could be used as a discussion guide in the back of the book.
Read this book with your family if you want to promote upward thinking, if you need encouragement about your relationships and your goals, or if you simply want to draw closer to God and discover the life you were meant to live.
