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This book has been on my to read list for quite a while -- and I'm glad that I finally got an opportunity to read it. Grace grace grace. Love love love. Manning understands that the Gospel is all about God choosing to love us and extend grace to us, that we cannot deserve or earn or repay. It is lopsided and sometimes we have a hard time accepting that. But that is all we have to do -- accept that we are loved and that our souls have been bought with the blood of Jesus Christ.

Manning challenges his readers to receive the amazing love of God, to live in such a way that expresses our confidence in that love. Like a little child, we are called to believe our Father and trust Him, even if it means acting in ways that don't make sense or following different rules than the world presents us with. Manning uses stories and historical ragamuffins (like St. Francis and Teresa of Avila) to connect as much as possible that this is a life worth living.

Title:	The Ragamuffin Gospel
Author:	Brennan Manning
Date published:	1990
Genre:	Religious
Number of pages:	235
Notes:	borrowed from Miriam

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Definitely not one of my favorite books. Once is enough. An engaging story for the most part, but nothing that stands out. Jennifer recently lost her husband and she gets a call saying her grandmother and best friend is in a coma. She rushes up to live in her grandmother's house and visit her and talk to her, and there is a series of letters written for her. So the story is Jennifer reading Sam's letters as her life continues and parallels the letters. Sort of.

Both Sam and Jennifer fall madly in love with a man they are not married to. And this love consumes much of their time and energy. Which is not for the best, in my opinion. Jennifer and Brendan spend the summer together and finally go to bed together. As the reader, you know it's coming a long way off. But it makes me angry that the assumption is if you love someone, you must have sex. That is false! Our society says that's okay and normal, but I don't believe that's true. I believe it is possible to love someone and decide to stay separate. Physical intimacy is not the only step that can be taken. There are other options, like waiting, like having a strong will, like asking God for strength.

If you want a book that's really not about much of anything, read this. It doesn't take too much time or thought, so can be enjoyable to get your mind off whatever's really bothering you. But -- if you want a good novel, pick something else. The end.

Title:	Sam's Letters to Jennifer
Author:	James Patterson
Date published:	2004
Genre:	Romance, Fiction
Number of pages:	263
Notes:	recommended by and borrowed from Rikki

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A Newbery medal winner. Well worth reading. I read this in the early 90s, but apparently I'm on a Spinelli reading kick, so I decided to reread this one as well. Themes of hope, family, home, not fitting into societal boundaries, and lots of humor thrown in. Maniac Magee is a kid who runs everywhere. We get a glimpse of his not so comforting past, and then see his interactions in a town called Two Mills. The town is segregated black and white, but Maniac doesn't seem to notice or care. His actions make everyone question some of their assumptions, for the better.

One fun trait of Maniac is his physical prowess. He can run for hours, catch a football and throw it long distance, easily hit homeruns, and untie crazy knots. This sets him apart from others, but he doesn't use it to hurt anyone or to prove himself superior. It is simply one facet of who he is, and another way that he relates to the world. Maniac likes going running in the morning, before everyone is up, and while the boundary between east side and west side doesn't really exist. Near the end of the novel, he gets a running partner and they run side by side. Breathing together and runinng together and becoming one for a small piece of time.

Amanda Beale might be my favorite character. She meets Maniac the first day he's in town and lends him a book from her suitcase. You see, she has to take her books with her to school everyday because otherwise her 3- & 4-year-old siblings will write all over them and her dog will chew them up. So, she carries her treasured books with her. And maniac ends up at her house for a while, living with her family and bringing some sanity to them as well as getting to be included. The Beales happen to live on the east side of town, and Maniac 'should' live on the west side of town, but he doesn't care and neither do they. Amanda has enough spunk to stand up to the meanest kid her side of town and to stand up for the truth no matter what. It's fun to see that in a young character, and really believe it possible.

Title:	Maniac Magee
Author:	Jerry Spinelli
Date published:	1990
Genre:	Young Adult
Number of pages:	184
Notes:	repeat reading (no idea what number..)

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This is the second book I've read by Gladwell, and thoroughly enjoyed both. His writing is clear, making subjects that could be very confusing understandable to the common human. This particular book is about epidemics of any variety -- diseases, trends, success stories. Gladwell describes three main factors -- the law of the few, the stickiness factor, and the power of context. Some ideas are intuitive and others don't make any sense on their own. In the afterword (which was added in the second edition), Gladwell shares some of the stories he's heard as a result of this book. It is exciting to see that by being wise and careful in how we go about things, the effects can be greater.

The first factor is called the law of the few, which is the idea that some people have power in the specific senses that allow them to influence the masses. These three types of people are connectors, who know people from all walks of life and maintain these relationships well; mavens, who gather information and want to share it, such as knowing what car is the best deal and why; and salesmen, who can convince anyone their message is useful and helpful. These sorts of people all have power in different senses which can help social epidemics to 'tip.'

The second factor is called the stickiness factor, which means that for something to 'tip' it must be memorable. Sometimes this can just be a certain image, or directions to a location. It doesn't make intuitive sense that adding or taking away one detail could affect how well the message is remembered. The third factor is the power of context, which means that our environments do have a greater amount of control than we expect. For instance, they decided to deal with the graffiti on the subway cars and the farebeaters who jumped over the turnstiles, and greatly decreased the crime because the environment made people feel safer and less likely to act criminally because they didn't have examples in front of their faces.

Gladwell is definitely a translator. By this I mean that he is able to take research from specialized fields and combine them to prove his thesis. Not only that, but he does so in a manner that makes sense in daily life by taking examples from things most Americans know like Sesame Street and smoking. His books read fairly quickly and some important ideas stick with you (stickiness factor!), as well as a new way of understanding this world we get to live in.

Title:	The Tipping Point: How Little things Can Make a Big Difference
Author:	Malcolm Gladwell
Date published:	2000
Genre:	Popular Science
Number of pages:	280

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Savored this book (including the British words). It is the story of a woman named Kitty who discovers that life is not as she wants it to be, or as it appears, or even as other people want it to be. Kitty is sensitive to those around her -- to how they are reacting to her and what sort of relationship they have or want to have with her. She has 5 brothers, a father, and a husband who are all wonderfully particular and have varying relationships with her. None of these relationships are stagnant, and each time she interacts with any of them she tests the waters to see how they both have changed. Her awareness of details is wonderful -- because they are not typical details.

The title refers to the way Kitty sees colour in the world, and understands people (who they are, what they are feeling, how they fit together) in colour. This applies to couples and if they fit together or not. For instance, her husband, James, is all white with very little colour, and she is mostly 'frenetic whirls of colour' (p95). But sometimes they are able to match each other and fit properly so things make wonderful sense between them without trying. Colour is used in various places in the book, but I wish it had been used more fully. It seems there are more situations where Kitty's perception of colour and emotion would have enhanced and tied the title in more completely.

Kitty has some wonderful ideas and questions throughout the book, because things affect her so deeply. Dealing with hard pieces of life (life, death, children) within the mind of someone who is 'on the edge' gives morrall an interesting opportunity to speak that these are serious issues and don't always make sense. That sometimes our reactions to them need to be questioned and our motives checked. Because her father isn't captured well in photographs, she wonders if she only sees half of her mother in photographs. (p74) There's an older woman who has Kitty over for tea and tells her stories that don't all fit together, and Kitty wonders if memories are simply pieces of truth that have gotten confused and disconnected. (p118) Do you become invisible if people stop noticing you and being affected by you? Can you just disappear? (p147) She wonders if you can make up for abandoning children by caring for other children. Does 2 known children make up for 1 lost child? (p215) Is it worth going backwards and remembering the past to have a chance to move forward? (p310)

Morrall also makes some wonderful connections with Narnia and Neverland. They are both separate realities where there are different rules for life. The fact that these are two of the main connections with literature is intentionally done. Kitty is a reader of young adult manuscripts, so it makes sense these 'children's stories' would come into play. But they are not just for children. Sometimes adults also need places to escape to, and stories to hear that are not their own.

Title:	Astonishing Splashes of Colour
Author:	Clare Morrall
Date published:	2003
Genre:	Fiction
Number of pages:	322
Notes:	Recommended by Betty

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I enjoyed this book, mostly. The first part was more intellectual than I wanted to read at the time - but the second half of the book connected with where I am. Clark says that as humans we all long for intimacy, and defines that as self awareness, self disclosure, and doing those two things in the hearing of others. That idea rings true.

Clark also talks about how often when beginning relationship, we think "I want to get to know you." He raises the question that instead, maybe we should think "I want to let you get to know me" -- and as we self-disclose, the other person will be willing to share themselves too. That is challenging -- being willing to share who I am with others, even before I know they want to know or will share who they are with me. That doesn't happen often in our society. We are all so afraid of being rejected or disliked that we pretend to be someone else to fit in.

One point that I loved and will put into my life is the idea of using homosexual and heterosexual as adjectives only, not nouns. It is so easy to think 'us' and 'them', so it can be really helpful to identify others as people instead of a certain kind of people. This is something which will take time and effort on my part, to use longer descriptions and be more proper and healthy in the way I think of and speak about others.

Throughout the book, the idea of loneliness and neediness comes up -- that often we are in relationship to fill needs and ask others to fill those needs, which can be very dangerous. Humans are all needy and broken and alone. Only in God can we be utterly fulfilled. As we relate to others in healthy ways, it must be such that we are grateful for who they are and for allowing us to know them. Gratitude should be central in relating to others, instead of need. Gratitude builds up and allows for growth in relationship, while need can stunt growth and damage what is already in place. With maturity comes depth in relationships, and in that one finds true intimacy.

Title:	Being Sexual... and Celibate
Author:	Keith Clark
Date published:	1986
Genre:	Autobiography, Sexuality
Number of pages:	182
Notes:	Borrowed from Sue

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This comic book is a brief arc (published as three issues last fall), set between the end of Firefly (the TV series) and Serenity (the movie). The book collects all of the nine variant covers (one for each of the main characters), and adds a lovely introduction by Nathan Fillion, who is a comic book fan himself. The artwork is beautiful, the dialogue feels and sounds like a Firefly episode, and there are enough twists and insights to keep the story entertaining. We discover that Dobson isn't all that dead, and get to see that the men with "hands of blue" also have blue-covered chests, too. We also get to see Inara preparing to leave Serenity (and Mal postponing their arrival at her departure point), and see the moment when Book recognizes that he needs to leave Serenity as well.

This is a quick read; it' a bit too short to feel like a full episode of Firefly, but it's still a lot of fun, and I'll take my Firefly/Serenity in any form I can get it. The artwork is nice; it seems a little tricky to have to draw a comic book to look like the actors we know and love in these roles. Most of the time the drawn characters are convincing, but every now and then they look a little bit off-- I suspect this is because they don't look quite like I imagine the actors would at that moment, or with a particular facial expression. Still, there are some wondeful pages as well-- especially some great depictions of Serenity herself. I love that they also incorporated the Chinese dialogue into the comic book, and only wonder where I can find a site that translates it for me.

Title:	Serenity: Those Left Behind
Author:	Joss Whedon, Brett Matthews; artwork by Will Conrad
Date published:	2006
Genre:	Science Fiction / Graphic Novel
Number of pages:	104

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Read this in less than 24 hours, and plan to lend to two friends. Another wonderful book by Spinelli! Stargirl (self-named) is a new student at the town high school, and she doesn't fit the mold. Nobody knows how to handle someone who doesn't care what they think -- who is unashamedly herself. She sings happy birthday with her ukelele during lunch, wears what might be called costumes to school regularly, has a rat, asks unrelated questions -- all in all people don't have a box for her besides 'weird' or 'unusual'. But there is gradual change from both Leo, the narrator, and the school -- and not in one direction.

"So I just enjoyed the feeling and watched the one amorphous student body separate itself into hundreds of individuals. The pronoun "we" itself seemed to crack and drift apart into pieces. Ironically, as we discovered and distinguished ourselves, a new collective came into being - a vitality, a presence, a spirit that had not been there before." (p41)

That is the beautiful truth - that as individuals become more uniquely themselves, there is deeper freedom. 'We' does not just describe people who act and look like, but instead can describe people with common goals and fears and joys -- who may act and look very differently. This is one thing I take great delight in as a Christian - mature Christians I know are mostly able to be themselves, however 'unusual' it may look. There is freedom in Christ to be myself. Not to be like someone else, but for God to make me more like Christ and in the process make me more the way I was created to be. It is common for fear of rejection and disapproval to keep us from living outside the norm - but Stargirl brings hope that isn't always necessary.

There is an oratorical contest, and Stargirl wins and get to go to state. She practices her speech with Leo, with their wise teacher friend, to her rat and other creatures in the desert, and enthralls them all. When she finally gets to the contest, she gives a completely different speech. Her ability to connect ideas and to speak in ways that people understand is wonderful. Almost mythical.

One of the biggest problems the students have with her is that she cheers for everyone. She doesn't need to win to enjoy life. At football and basketball games she cheers when anyone scores. Where did the idea come that we have to win to be important? How much would it change our lives if we were able to cheer for anyone else who had something good happen to them? What would it take for us to be so comfortable with ourselves that we could rejoice with other people regardless of how we were affected?

Title:	Stargirl
Author:	Jerry Spinelli
Date published:	2000
Genre:	Young Adult
Number of pages:	186
Notes:	Second reading

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This book took me months to read -- because it is the story of a people who have always been marginalized, denounced, mistreated... Never have they had a place to call home. No one is sure where they came from, and for as long as anyone can remember and any records show, their history has been one of suffering at the hands of others. But as a whole, they are a people who are good at everything - they are enterprising, assertive, tell wonderful stories, make the best of situations, take care of family. Hope is to be found in the fact that despite their past, they are still surviving and even thriving as many groups of people - and even beginning to come together under one name.

The Gypsies are a people who have been enslaved, treated as non-people in many ways, viciously treated and murdered during the Holocaust, and used as a common enemy between other divided peoples -- especially after the velvet curtain fell in 1989 in Eastern Europe. Their memories often only go back as far as the oldest person in their families or clan and no further. Fonseca posits the idea this is because their past is so painful, that it does them little good to remember it. Because of the past that is remembered in this book, there is much pain to be seen, so I will probably never read this book again.

Roma (the name they are beginning to unite under, depsite all the intricacies of their family relations) don't fit into any normal boxes. Humans love to classify 'us' vs 'them', and with some people that comes very easily. Roma have strict rituals about the way things are done, who may do what tasks, how people are valued, and what is clean & unclean. They are known for their traveling and nomadic lifestyle, so home to them is not so much where they are but who they are with. Without family, you are lost.

There is also an attitude of not caring what others think, which makes them intimidating to societies where it is important to please those around you and to have a certain appearance or act certain ways. This is not to say that Roma don't value anyone's opinion -- it is important to stay healthily connected to your family and to respect those in authority and to follow the rituals and rules. We have much to learn from them - that sometimes being unashamedly oneself is dangerous but the only honest way to live. How often do we change our appearance or actions or words to fit in? Be challenged to live honestly!

Title:	Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and their Journey
Author:	Isabel Fonseca
Date published:	1995
Genre:	History, Gypsies
Number of pages:	305
Notes:	Recommended by and borrowed from Jude

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