TBR - Part 2

7. The Daily Message: Thru the Bible in One Year by Eugene H. Peterson

The perfect one-year reading Bible that allows for both flexibility and time to let God's Word soak into your heart and mind. (from Amazon.com)

8. Dreams from my Father by Barack Obama

Obama argues with himself on almost every page of this lively autobiographical conversation. He gets you to agree with him, and then he brings in a counternarrative that seems just as convincing. Son of a white American mother and of a black Kenyan father whom he never knew, Obama grew up mainly in Hawaii. After college, he worked for three years as a community organizer on Chicago's South Side. Then, finally, he went to Kenya, to find the world of his dead father, his "authentic" self. Will the truth set you free, Obama asks? Or will it disappoint? Both, it seems. His search for himself as a black American is rooted in the particulars of his daily life; it also reads like a wry commentary about all of us. He dismisses stereotypes of the "tragic mulatto" and then shows how much we are all caught between messy contradictions and disparate communities. He discovers that Kenya has 400 different tribes, each of them with stereotypes of the others. Obama is candid about racism and poverty and corruption, in Chicago and in Kenya. Yet he does find community and authenticity, not in any romantic cliche but with "honest, decent men and women who have attainable ambitions and the determination to see them through. (from Booklist)

9. The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff

At the start of Groff's lyrical debut, 28-year-old Wilhelmina Willie Upton returns to her picturesque hometown of Templeton, N.Y., after a disastrous affair with her graduate school professor during an archeological dig in Alaska. In Templeton, Willie's shocked to find that her once-bohemian mother, Vi, has found religion. Vi also reveals to Willie that her father wasn't a nameless hippie from Vi's commune days, but a man living in Templeton. With only the scantiest of clues from Vi, Willie is determined to untangle the roots of the town's greatest families and discover her father's identity. Brilliantly incorporating accounts from generations of Templetonians—as well as characters borrowed from the works of James Fenimore Cooper, who named an upstate New York town Templeton in The Pioneers—Groff paints a rich picture of Willie's current predicaments and those of her ancestors. Readers will delight in Willie's sharp wit and Groff's creation of an entire world, complete with a lake monster and illegitimate children. (from Booklist)

10. The Good, Good Pig: The Extraordinary Life of Christopher Hogwood by Sy Montgomery

For writer and world traveler Montgomery, the grounding force of her New Hampshire home was a 750-pound pig. This book is not merely a chronicle of her love for and life with Christopher Hogwood, but also a testament to the lessons learned through her 14-year relationship with him. Usually preferring the company of animals to most people, Montgomery developed an extensive network of friends who were willing to cache and freeze their food scraps for the always grateful, bottomless pig. In turn, these friends witnessed an enjoyment of life's bounty as only a pig can experience–with utter abandon. Montgomery's delightful anecdotes about Christopher's personality, neighborhood wanderings, and haute skin care à la Pig Spa are entwined with biographical details about her family life and fascinating animal-research projects. Christopher was undoubtedly Montgomery's muse for this introspective account of personal growth and her underlying mantra of caring for all the Earth's creatures. He also helped her weather the pain of intractable parents who would not accept their Jewish son-in-law. (from School Library Journal)

11. Schultz and Peanuts: A Biography by David Michealis

For all the joy Charlie Brown and the gang gave readers over half a century, their creator, Charles Schulz, was a profoundly unhappy man. It's widely known that he hated the name Peanuts, which was foisted on the strip by his syndicate. But Michaelis, given access to family, friends and personal papers, reveals the full extent of Schulz's depression, tracing its origins in his Minnesota childhood, with parents reluctant to encourage his artistic dreams and yearbook editors who scrapped his illustrations without explanation. Nearly 250 Peanuts strips are woven into the biography, demonstrating just how much of his life story Schulz poured into the cartoon. In one sequence, Snoopy's crush on a girl dog is revealed as a barely disguised retelling of the artist's extramarital affair. Michaelis is especially strong in recounting Schulz's artistic development, teasing out the influences on his unique characterization of children. And Michaelis makes plain the full impact of Peanuts' first decades and how much it puzzled and unnerved other cartoonists. This is a fascinating account of an artist who devoted his life to his work in the painful belief that it was all he had. (from Publishers Weekly)

12. Jesus Creed: Loving God, Loving Others by Scot McKnight

Amid a sea of books on Christian spiritual formation, McKnight, professor of religious studies at North Park University in Chicago, brings us a simple, highly readable one focused on the weightiest teaching of Jesus: love God and love others as yourself. The "Jesus Creed" of the title is a trimmed down version of the Shema of Judaism (Deut. 6:4–9), which declares we are to love God with all our being, amended to include caring for one's neighbor as oneself (Lev. 19:18). Packed with vivid and touching stories—from the Bible, history and the author's life—this book covers important aspects of what it means to love God and others. McKnight shows great respect for the Jewish heritage of Jesus and offers readers scholarly, yet highly accessible, illustrations of the sociocultural landscape of first-century Palestine. The book is slim on doctrine, making no comment on the thorny theological squabbles that divide many Christians. That's refreshing for the reader tired of the squabbling, but may leave others wondering what love does require in certain difficult situations. Still, this book is an excellent introduction to Christian spirituality. Its pages glow with compassion, generosity and the invitation to understand what was important to Jesus and what is crucial for Christianity. (from Publishers Weekly)