May 25 2010

Talking to Terrorists: Why America Must Engage with its Enemies by Mark Perry

I do not make it a habit of reading books about current events, but Mark Tyler’s most recent book, Talking to Terrorists: Why America Must Engage with its Enemies, intrigued me.  After reading the news reports about our country’s war on terror for the past few years - some saying we are winning, others saying we are losing – I wanted to read a perspective that I would not normally advocate.

The book is divided into two parts – one explaining the insurgency in Iraq and how a few Marines and American civilians reached out to Iraqi insurgents and helped turn the War in Iraq in favor of the United States and its Iraqi allies and the second looking at the complex relationships between Israel and its arch rivals Hamas and Hezbollah.  Keep Reading

By Jeff Grim • Reviews • 0

May 21 2010

Is the Book the Body or the Soul?

J. Mark Betrand ruminates on the End of the Book debate.  I particularly liked this passage:

Book is a shifty word, denoting both the physical object and the content within. As an author, I think of myself as having “written books,” when in fact I’ve typed hundreds of pages of fiction and nonfiction into various word processing files, e-mailed them to my editors, and only much later seen them take physical form. To say all that, however, seems pedantic. To describe myself as, say, a “content provider,” however fitting the term might seem, strikes me as something akin to insult. I write books.

And I’m a lover of books, too, unaccustomed to making a body/soul distinction where the printed word is concerned. The book is the object and its contents, inseparable in my mind. I dwell in a house lined with shelves, most of them bowed by the weight of their printed content. Beautiful books and ugly ones. Read and unread. Objects of comfort, outrage, derision, admiration. Some pristine and others scarred. Some bound in leather, some in paper (at least one in shagreen). Prized and cheap side by side. Tangible things, each with a history. I can tell you where they came from, where they’ve been. The ones I sought out and the ones I discovered unexpectedly. The ones kept under glass in dark bookstores and, all too often, the ones overnighted from the clean, well-lit warehouses of Amazon. All of that will disappear when the book’s body does.

By Kevin Holtsberry • Views • 1 • Tags: , , ,

May 19 2010

Radical by David Platt

Cover of "Radical: Taking Back Your Faith...

Cover via Amazon

This book was provided for review by the WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group

I will confess I have always been a little defensive about books that approach economics or American society and faith. Far too often, from my perspective, these books easily move from relevant spiritual issues into garden variety leftist critiques of capitalism, etc. In this way they turn me off from the message by delving into politics – and usually poorly at that.

Radical by David Platt may seem to be headed toward this territory. After all, the subtitle is Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream. Title and subtitle would seem to indicate  that this book comes from the less talked – and fretted – about religious left.

But Platt takes no such turn and as a result it is a much stronger book. Don’t get me wrong. Platt doesn’t get into conservative politics or economics either. He plays it straight and sticks to his Biblical and spiritual points without getting sidetracked into politics or economics.

Here is a quote from the publishers blurb:

In Radical, David Platt challenges you to consider with an open heart how we have manipulated the gospel to fit our cultural preferences. He shows what Jesus actually said about being his disciple–then invites you to believe and obey what you have heard. And he tells the dramatic story of what is happening as a “successful” suburban church decides to get serious about the gospel according to Jesus.

My thoughts below.

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By Kevin Holtsberry • Reviews • 0 • Tags: , , , ,

May 19 2010

In the Mail: Life Over Cancer

Life Over Cancer: The Block Center Program for Integrative Cancer Treatment by Keith I. Block, M.D.

Library Journal

Surgery, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy may treat cancer but can also necessitate huge changes in lifestyle and body image and predispose the patient to other diseases, recurrence, and death. Block (medical director, Block Ctr. for Integrative Cancer Treatment) lays out a comprehensive complementary-therapy program designed to enhance conventional treatments, and he provides advice that will better a patient’s life and improve chances of a full cure. Block stresses that patients should not abandon traditional medicine and should consult their health-care team before adding less traditional treatments. He details an anticancer diet, with specific recommendations for foods and supplements, as well as exercise plans and spiritual maintenance. Methods of boosting one’s immune response while providing a less friendly “bioterrain” for cancer cells are suggested, as are techniques to counteract the ill effects, e.g., nausea and fatigue, of traditional cancer therapies. This dense book may overwhelm some readers, but considering the prevalence of cancer, it’s sure to be a popular title.

By Kevin Holtsberry • In The Mail • 0 • Tags: , , ,

May 18 2010

In the Mail: The Third Rail

The Third Rail by Michael Harvey

Publishers Weekly

A series of terrifying crimes threatens to paralyze Chicago in Harvey’s stellar third novel featuring Chicago PI Michael Kelly (after The Chicago Way and The Fifth Floor). First, a gunman executes two people, apparently at random at different locations, while they ride the T, the city’s elevated railway. Next, the sniper shoots at commuters on Lake Shore Drive, killing three people while missing Kelly’s girlfriend, Judge Rachel Swenson. Kelly suspects the shooter has an accomplice, a theory dismissed by official law enforcement. The hard-boiled investigator, who at age nine survived a horrific subway accident at the site of one of the T murders 30 years earlier, wonders if there could be a link between that past tragedy and the current spree. The author deftly alternates between his hero’s first-person perspective and third-person accounts of the mindsets of the men Kelly seeks. Harvey stakes a persuasive claim as the pre-eminent contemporary voice of Chicago noir.

By Kevin Holtsberry • In The Mail • 0 • Tags: , , ,

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