Don’t feel like writing a review, well just let us know what you’ve got piling up, even if you haven’t gotten around to reading them yet. Reply to this post to share what’s on your nightstand, don’t be shy….
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins . He uses sound logic and reasoning to disprove the idea of an benevolent omnisicient supernatural being. He pieces through the mythology surrounding the idea of a ‘God’ and shows how a blind unquestioning approach to modern religions is hurting society as a whole. Overall a very good book that everyone should read and think about. I really enjoyed the chapter on fundamentalism and the subversion of science.
Jesus Land: A Memoir by Julia Scheeres. The author recounts her childhood with her two adopted black brothers in a white, highly-religious (Calvinist) household in Indiana and her subsequent experiences with the closest of these two brothers in “scared straight”-sort of bible camp in the Dominican Republic. A very disturbing story about what passes for Christianity in our society.
Just finished Flight by Sherman Alexie, and wow, what a page turner. Alexie’s protaganist, a fifteen year-old who asks the reader to “call me Zits, everyone does” finds himself transported through time at the moment he is about to commit a terrible act of violence. Landing at integral points throughout history like Red River, Idaho, the Battle of Little Big Horn, the evening before a U.S. calvary led slaughter of an Indian camp, in an airplane cockpit with a terrorist and as a drunk old Indian man in Seattle trying his best to die. Not for the faint of heart, this book’s magical moments are buried deep beneath layers of the pain and neglect that goes hand in hand with the historical treatment of Native Americans in the United States. Like Alexie’s other works, you will laugh and you will question yourself because of your laughter, but in the end you will be glad you picked this book up.
This is a follow up to Putnam’s Bowling Alone in which the author describes the decline, since about 1960-65, in U.S. “social capital” — the density of social connections that allow people to accomplish projects more effectively; exchange goods, services, and information more fluidly; and live more healthily.
Better Together is a series of case studies in social capital: how it was and continues to be built, and how its development (usually in response to a particular situation) has helped groups of citizens, neighbors, church-goers, and co-workers reach common ground with each other and with their opposition. It shows a number of ways in which citizens have become more empowered in their government, workers have become more valued in the workplace, and ideological opponents have come to understand and value one another.
Bowling Alone is certainly not a prerequisite for Better Together. If anything, Better Together may whet your appetite for the more dryly academic book — and pique your interest in engaging in your community.
I just finished The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaimen which is an incredibly vivid story about growing up in a cemetary. I have visions of this book floating around in my head. I want my husband to read it, so it is still on the nightstand. I’m also reading The Sharper the Knife, the Less you Cry (a memoir about a woman attending the Cordon Bleu school in Paris), Dreams from my Father, by Barack Obama and Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons.
That’s the magic of great picture books, they keep going and going and going. We’ve got a few that Finn just read to death. I’ll have to check out Alligator Boy. If it’s anything like, I Would Really Like to Eat a Child, then I’ll check it out.
May 17, 2007 at 3:45 pm
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins . He uses sound logic and reasoning to disprove the idea of an benevolent omnisicient supernatural being. He pieces through the mythology surrounding the idea of a ‘God’ and shows how a blind unquestioning approach to modern religions is hurting society as a whole. Overall a very good book that everyone should read and think about. I really enjoyed the chapter on fundamentalism and the subversion of science.
May 18, 2007 at 8:21 am
Jesus Land: A Memoir by Julia Scheeres. The author recounts her childhood with her two adopted black brothers in a white, highly-religious (Calvinist) household in Indiana and her subsequent experiences with the closest of these two brothers in “scared straight”-sort of bible camp in the Dominican Republic. A very disturbing story about what passes for Christianity in our society.
May 22, 2007 at 9:33 am
Just finished Flight by Sherman Alexie, and wow, what a page turner. Alexie’s protaganist, a fifteen year-old who asks the reader to “call me Zits, everyone does” finds himself transported through time at the moment he is about to commit a terrible act of violence. Landing at integral points throughout history like Red River, Idaho, the Battle of Little Big Horn, the evening before a U.S. calvary led slaughter of an Indian camp, in an airplane cockpit with a terrorist and as a drunk old Indian man in Seattle trying his best to die. Not for the faint of heart, this book’s magical moments are buried deep beneath layers of the pain and neglect that goes hand in hand with the historical treatment of Native Americans in the United States. Like Alexie’s other works, you will laugh and you will question yourself because of your laughter, but in the end you will be glad you picked this book up.
August 24, 2007 at 8:20 pm
WALDEN, by Michael Dolan, not Thoreau. Funny campus novel. Salinger for the college age. Powerful novel of discovering ones’ self.
February 17, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Almost finished with Better Together : Restoring the American Community by Robert Putnam and Lewis Feldstein.
This is a follow up to Putnam’s Bowling Alone in which the author describes the decline, since about 1960-65, in U.S. “social capital” — the density of social connections that allow people to accomplish projects more effectively; exchange goods, services, and information more fluidly; and live more healthily.
Better Together is a series of case studies in social capital: how it was and continues to be built, and how its development (usually in response to a particular situation) has helped groups of citizens, neighbors, church-goers, and co-workers reach common ground with each other and with their opposition. It shows a number of ways in which citizens have become more empowered in their government, workers have become more valued in the workplace, and ideological opponents have come to understand and value one another.
Bowling Alone is certainly not a prerequisite for Better Together. If anything, Better Together may whet your appetite for the more dryly academic book — and pique your interest in engaging in your community.
February 17, 2009 at 5:25 pm
I just finished The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaimen which is an incredibly vivid story about growing up in a cemetary. I have visions of this book floating around in my head. I want my husband to read it, so it is still on the nightstand. I’m also reading The Sharper the Knife, the Less you Cry (a memoir about a woman attending the Cordon Bleu school in Paris), Dreams from my Father, by Barack Obama and Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons.
February 17, 2009 at 5:40 pm
Sherri and Paul. Thanks for taking the time to post your commentary about the inhabitants of your nightstands.
March 11, 2009 at 9:34 am
Nightstand read,
Alligator Boy for my grandaughter. it was a big hit, and required four repeat readings on my part. – Marco
March 13, 2009 at 1:03 pm
That’s the magic of great picture books, they keep going and going and going. We’ve got a few that Finn just read to death. I’ll have to check out Alligator Boy. If it’s anything like, I Would Really Like to Eat a Child, then I’ll check it out.