A Few of Our Favorite Things - February 2024
Books and Conversations that Captivated Us This Month at The Englewood Review
Chris Smith and Katie Selby here. As editors of The Englewood Review of Books,
we're trying out a new feature here ...
One email at the end of the month that highlights a few of our favorite book reviews or conversations that appeared on the ERB website that month, and a link to an article, podcast, or video from elsewhere that we have been enjoying... Drop us a line and let us know what you think.
A Gift of Grace for Parents
Wendy Kiyomi reviews this superb new book:
Parenting: The Complex and
Beautiful Vocation of Raising Children
Holly Taylor Coolman
(Paperback: Baker Academic, 2024)
“Parenting is so difficult right now,” my friend said, dabbing her eyes after church. “My son falls apart over minor disappointments, and every night seems like a battle. It feels horrible.”
I wasn’t used to seeing her this way. My friend was a resolute, energetic woman who had raised three kids already – young adults who were kind, responsible, and working or in college. I touched her arm, wishing I had more to offer. If someone so experienced felt overwhelmed, it boded ill for the rest of us.
My own household was having a teenage moment at about the time I was reading the adolescence chapter in Holly Taylor Coolman’s Parenting: The Complex and Beautiful Vocation of Raising Children. My husband and I were finding that our teens needed just as much mentoring and accountability as when they were younger. Staying on top of their internet use and navigating the high school social scene often required more resources than we had to give. My friend said aloud what many parents feel: we are making it up as we go along, and the wheels just might fall off this bus.
“To be a parent is to be in over your head,” Coolman writes, but it brings unique rewards. The biblical picture of God’s parental posture indicates that in tending children, parents imitate his love and discover joy for themselves as well as for their children. As a theologian and parent of five children with unusually diverse needs, she explains that preparedness isn’t the most important qualification. She puts much more stock in parenting within the right framework, where parents are embraced by a well-knit community and open to God’s unfolding grace.
[ Read the full review… ]
Listen to our podcast conversation with the authors of the new book,
Disabling Leadership: A Practical Theology for the Broken Body of Christ
Recorded live at the Christian Community Development Association conference last fall in Cincinnati, ERB editor C. Christopher Smith sat down with the three co-authors of the new book, Disabling Leadership: A Practical Theology for the Broken Body of Christ, at the recent CCDA conference to discuss their work in the intersection of the topics of disability, inclusion, ministry leadership, and the life of the church.
[ Listen now ]
We need your help…
In March, we’re going to be running a bracket-style competition to find the most important theology book of the 21st century.
For now, we’re doing a survey to nominate titles that might be contenders for this award. Please take a second and let us know what book is, in your opinion, the most important theology book of the 21st century (so far), and you can also name a runner-up if you wish.
[ Nominate a Book ]
And stay tuned for our Theology Madness tournament coming in March!!!
[Katie]
Watch this great podcast conversation with Ruha Benjamin about her new book, Imagination: A Manifesto — from the Poured Over Podcast at Barnes and Noble.
Imagination: A Manifesto by Ruha Benjamin reminds us that our imaginations already know what a better world looks like. From education to challenging our systems of oppression and more, this insightful work shows a new place for us all to start from. Benjamin joins us to talk about the split between imagination and technology, changing our narratives to tell new stories, the importance of community and more with Miwa Messer, host of Poured Over.
Watch this episode now …
Found elsewhere...
Tommy Orange is back with a hypnotic new novel
A Review of Orange’s new novel, Wandering Stars,
by Washington Post book critic Ron Charles.
Six years have passed since Tommy Orange published his debut novel, "There There," but the echoes of that story still reverberate in the minds of those who read it. A member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes, Orange introduced a large cast of Indians in modern-day California and drew them to the Oakland Coliseum for a powwow that offered a chance for cultural celebration, commercial enterprise, spiritual reflection and, most notably, grand larceny.
With varying degrees of success, these characters struggle to carve out a livable haven amid the caustic crosscurrents of American racism and historical amnesia. By listening sympathetically and refusing to elide their challenges — or their mistakes — Orange demonstrates that Indians are not feathered Hollywood tropes or wooden icons of Old West mythology. His fiction explores the complex challenges faced by people struggling to understand their identity within a dominant culture determined to bleach and sentimentalize the past.
[ Read the full review * ]
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Time is running out
to get the superb ebook deals
in the Kindle monthly sale for February!
Here are a few of our recommended ebooks in this sale...