What are you reading currently?

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Originally Posted by inudesu

Awaiting the King

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This one took me a little while. Pretty academic, not exactly a page turner. But towards the end there were some things he said that resonated:

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I share this affirmation of the goodness of creation and the good of politics. But one of the dangers of eagerly diving in to the political sphere is that it tends to underestimate the strength of the currents already swirling around in that "sphere." In other words, such Pylesque eagerness tends to think of politics just as a matter of strategy (and hence getting the right strategy in place), as something that we do, and underestimates the formative impact of political practices, that they do something to us. It is here that I think Augustine's more nuanced analysis of the politics of the empire has something to teach us in the twenty-first century. Because he defines the political in terms of love, and because the formation of our loves is bound up with worship, Augustine is primed to recognize what we might call the "liturgical" power of political practices, which engenders critical nuance.

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Pylesque there is a reference to the titular character in Graham Greene's The Quiet American.

Memory Man Series by Baldacci.

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Originally Posted by inudesu

This one took me a little while. Pretty academic, not exactly a page turner. But towards the end there were some things he said that resonated:



Pylesque there is a reference to the titular character in Graham Greene's The Quiet American.

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thanks for clarifying. i was trying to figure out how gomer pyle figured in...

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Originally Posted by arkansasbob

thanks for clarifying. i was trying to figure out how gomer pyle figured in...

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That'd just be a difference in degree. :)

I started Jayber Crow this week. It was slow to get started, but about 10 chapters in and I'm enjoying it.

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Originally Posted by johnnylightnin

I started Jayber Crow this week. It was slow to get started, but about 10 chapters in and I'm enjoying it.

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I don't like it as much as the person who recommended it to me, but there are some really good passages in there.

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I have got to the age now where I can see how short a time we have to be here. And when I think about it, it can seem strange beyond telling that this particular bunch of us should be here on this little patch of ground in this little patch of time, and I can think of the other times and places I might have lived, the other kinds of man I might have been. But there is something else. There are moments when the heart is generous, and then it knows that for better or worse our lives are woven together here, one with one another and with the place and all the living things.

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Originally Posted by inudesu

I don't like it as much as the person to recommended it to me

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I guess that could be setting the bar pretty low if you dont much like that person.

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Originally Posted by Champ967

I guess that could be setting the bar pretty low if you dont much like that person.

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It seems that my writing is somewhat less clear than Wendell Berry's tends to be. I guess I need to revisit my Strunk and White.

Here’s my favorite piece so far: If you could do it, I suppose, it would be a good idea to live your life in a straight line - starting, say, in the Dark Wood of Error, and proceeding by logical steps through Hell and Purgatory and into Heaven. Or you could take the King's Highway past the appropriately named dangers, toils, and snares, and finally cross the River of Death and enter the Celestial City. But that is not the way I have done it, so far. I am a pilgrim, but my pilgrimage has been wandering and unmarked. Often what has looked like a straight line to me has been a circling or a doubling back. I have been in the Dark Wood of Error any number of times. I have known something of Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, but not always in that order. The names of many snares and dangers have been made known to me, but I have seen them only in looking back. Often I have not known where I was going until I was already there. I have had my share of desires and goals, but my life has come to me or I have gone to it mainly by way of mistakes and surprises. Often I have received better than I deserved. Often my fairest hopes have rested on bad mistakes. I am an ignorant pilgrim, crossing a dark valley. And yet for a long time, looking back, I have been unable to shake off the feeling that I have been led - make of that what you will.

What are you reading, you ask? Why...history! Plenty of books, articles, and primary (first hand) documents. Often truth is stranger than fiction.

Just started Daniel Silva's "The Other Woman". Believe it is the 18th of the Gabriel Allon series. Highly recommend the series to lovers of the spy novel genre. Silva does a great job with character development so I feel I " know" Gabriel and his cohorts. And clearly Silva has connections with the real world of international intrigue.

Another good one from Jayber Crow:

Christ did not descend from the cross except into the grave. And why not otherwise? Wouldn’t it have put fine comical expressions on the faces of the scribes and chief priests and the soldiers if at that moment He had come down in power and glory? Why didn’t He do it? Why hasn’t He done it at any one of a thousand good times between then and now?
I knew the answer. I knew it a long time before I could admit it, for all the suffering of the world is in it. He didn’t, He hasn’t, because from the moment He did, He would be the absolute tyrant of the world and we would be His slaves. Even those who hated Him and hated one another and hated their own souls would have to believe in Him then. From that moment the possibility that we might be bound to Him and He to us and us to one another by love forever would be ended.
And so, I thought, He must forebear to reveal His power and glory by presenting Himself as Himself, and must be present only in the ordinary miracle of the existence of His creatures. Those who wish to see Him must see Him in the poor, the hungry, the hurt, the wordless creatures, the groaning and travailing beautiful world.

Good stuff.

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Originally Posted by techman05

Memory Man Series by Baldacci.

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I'm about to finish the Memory Man book. Have found it rather disappointing. I liked Last Mile (sequel I guess?) but I haven't been as positive about MM. Frankly, I think I like the cleaned up version of Decker better. As far as the book: A bit preachy and a bit heavy on just following around each new clue -- rather than really being strong on deduction. OK, but I've wondered if someone else is writing this one for him.

On the history line, check out Agent ZigZag by Ben McIntyre. It's about one of Britain's more interesting double agents during WW2. The guy was a small-time crook and slightly cad-ish character who was very likeable and who managed to make an SS agent believe he really wanted to be a German spy. It's a very interesting story.