There was just something about the layout of the last theme that wasn’t quite right. This one allows for more customization and I like the overall style better.

Let me know what you think and I will return to blogging reviews shortly.

Image via Wikipedia

Excuse the colloquial and inartful title, but it seems to capture my perspective on this subject.

And what exactly is the subject here? Well, my inability to stick to any particular genre or subject or age group, etc.  It seems to me that basic strategy when it comes to building an audience online is know your audience and give them what they want. Pick what you know, or want to know, and cover it well.  Unfortunately for me, I seem unable to do either. Heck, I can’t even settle on a theme or design for this blog for very long.

(I take that back. My audience is Google and I give them what they want by leaving these review for them to find in their searches. My strategy is bet the house on the long tail …)

But the more specific point I wish to make is that if any one is reading this blog on a regular basis – as opposed to surfing in from search engines (when you have a book report due or when you are looking for reviews in preparation for writing your own, trying to decide whether to read said book, or look for reactions to a book you just read) – then I want to warn you about the book reviews headed your way in the days and weeks to come.

You might already have noted that there has been a higher ratio of non-fiction of late and with a spiritual or theological flavor. This will continue. I am not really sure why but I have gotten onto a theological kick of late and so have been reading books in that realm. I have both more time on my hands and less information to process these days so non-fiction is something I am able to read more of. Right now it’s theology and spirituality but there is sure to be history, culture and politics thrown in as well.

And since I review fiction faster than I do non, I end up with a large backlog of non-fiction books to post on. I tend to post these then as I am able and am in the mood. So in reducing this backlog, I will be foisting more reviews that touch on theology and Christianity.

But as soon as those who enjoy such reviews get comfortable, I am sure I will switch back to reading young adult fantasy or literary fiction or some other genre or focus. But to be fair, the title of the blog is Collected Miscellany. Eclecticism and unpredictability is the name of the game around here.

Hence the title of this post …

Which then causes this …

I was also trying once again to revive Right Reads (both as a web page and as a Twitter account). The idea was to have my reviews here focus on fiction and my reviews dealing with faith, culture and politics land at Right Reads. I was going to try for niche blogging.

One small problem: I didn’t have the time, energy or focus to make it work.

So. I think I should stop trying to kid myself. I don’t have the time or focus to write serious non-fiction reviews nor to keep content going on two separate blogs. Not. Gonna. Happen.

It seems better if I just let Collected Miscellany be just what the title implies – a variety of content from all over the map. In other words, I think I will just make CM my one and only blog. And stop worrying about it.

Will this have much of an impact? No, as the vast majority of traffic here is from Google searches anyhow. But allow me to keep pretending people read this blog OK? Thanks.

The bottom line is that there will be no niche. Just whatever books I happen to read.

Carry on.

Here is the publishers synopsis:

Imagine the dangerous life of a First Century Christian. You’ve embraced your new found faith in Christ but fear the risk of persecution or death at the hands of the pagans living around you. Then a trusted friend tells you about some of Jesus followers who secretly meet. He whispers into your ear, Look for a fish carved into the entrance way to the burial chambers beside the Via Tiburtina. You smile in gratitude.

Comparatively, modern society is awash in those same Christian symbols that kept early Christians safely connected: they appear on churches, bumper stickers, mugs even mints and stuffed animals. Yet, we are often ignorant of the origins of these symbols having lost the urgency of our spiritual ancestors hostile environment.

Noted author Mike Aquilina conducts an intriguing tour of symbols that guided the first four centuries of the Church s existence. He explains how Christians borrowed pagan and Jewish symbols, giving them new, distinctly Christian meanings. Recover the voice and urgency of our spiritual ancestors symbolic language and discover the impact the symbols still have.

Black and white illustrations by Lea Ravotti of artifacts uncovered throughout the Middle East beautifully complement the text, showing the variety of contexts in which they were found and the range of skills displayed in their execution.

Besides the obvious introduction to the basic symbols of the church in its infancy, what the book gives the readers is a greatr insight into the circumstances and cultural and spiritual perspective of the nascent body of believers. It shows you their focus and their spiritual and psychological needs.

A couple of things that struck me. One I never really thought about the cross not coming until later in church history. The fish and other Christogrpahs came first and dominated the early church.  Also, the early church was focused on Communion and the Eucharist in ways we simply are not today. They seem to have had this holistic view where the bread and wine symbolized both the provision of God in their daily lives but also the spiritual life they he had provided for them.  This tied back into the centrality of the church as a place where nourishment and life was to be found. Believers could not live spiritually without Christ and the church was the place where that connection was made and nurtured. The communion table was a powerful symbol of the relationship of both the believer to Christ and the church to the believer and of the centrality of God in all of life.

In a similar way the church chose symbols that were simple and culturally common and made them spiritual and profound. From the anchor, the lamp and the shepherd to the vine and bread we already mentioned, these symbols were adopted and adapted to bring meaning to everyday things and to point beyond the everyday.

For each chapter Aquilina provides a nice background into the academic and archeological debate, and lists sources at the end, as well as locating the symbol and its meaning into the life of the early church. In this way you get a sense of what historians and archeologists and other experts things and a sense of the meaning and importance of each symbol. He balances this just right so that each chapters is an intriguing introduction; not to dry or too crammed with information.

A lot of the basics most Christians, and non for that matter, will be familiar with (fish, vine, lamb, shepherd, dove, cross, etc.) but there are some that might not be so familiar (The Orant, the Peacock, the phoenix, the Ankh, etc.).

As I said above, I would recommend this to anyone looking for a nice introduction to the symbolism of the early church; particularly those looking to get some basic information before deciding where and how to dig further.

One note for my protestant readers, Aquilina is Catholic and brings that perspective but I don’t think it is problematic in the least. Readers of all denominations and perspectives will enjoy this enlightening and educational book.

I think this is a handy way to showcase the books that come my way, but that I might not have a chance to review, without taking up a full blow post of its own.

And to be honest I am drowning in books and so don’t need to ingratiate myself with publishers quite as much as I used to …

The previous theme had the featured post slideshow setup I really liked but I couldn’t get the stats tracking services to work. This might seems like a small price to pay for a nice, and free, theme but it was one of those things that really got under my skin because I couldn’t understand why it wasn’t working.

So I switched back to this theme to verify that the theme was the problem. And sure enough, as soon as I switched to a different theme the stats plugins started tracking traffic again.

Just thought I would make a note of this for informational purposes and in case there were any technical folks reading this who might be interested in helping me solve this problem.

Perceptive regular readers (who knows if I have any of those left) will have noticed I once again have been mucking about with the themes around here.  I had thought to go with a more “magazine” style theme since I posted less often and mostly just reviews and “In the Mail.” Bit for a variety of reason I never really like the theme even though I like the idea of a front page with book covers to tempt you into reading more reviews.

I toyed with using Tumblr to “blog” and offering more formal type reviews here but ultimately decided against that idea. Partly, because the fancy magazine themes require skill with code and images that I lack (and book cover are tall and narrow rather than the short and wide image locations so many seem to feature).

I want to try to write more, and more thoughtfully, and one way to do that is to blog more about what I read – the content as I am reading – rather than just post reviews. So a more traditional blog look would match that focus.

So here we are with yet another theme and layout. FYI, the five latest reviews will scroll across the top while the rest will fall in reverse chronological as befitting a blog.

Sorry for any inconvenience and I hope you like the new layout. Carry on.

*Ten points for the person who names the author of the phrase used for the post title without Google …

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.