After a slow reading month in May, I've been devouring books. Several are worth recommending - in fact, many of the books that I have read this summer have been worth recommending.
First, I finished a couple of books that were written by people I know or know of. The first was written by a deacon from our former parish in Coronado, All Things New by Bobby Ehnow. Bobby is a great guy. You'd never guess that he spent 3 years in prison when you meet him, especially now that he's a deacon and works for the Archdiocese of San Diego. He served jail time for white collar crimes that he inadvertently got drawn into while working as a government contractor. This book is the story of his redemption, as well as an argument for restorative justice, which is the field in which he works now for the diocese, after getting a PhD in leadership studies. His book describes problems in the justice system, but it also explains how his prison experience was transformative. While I particularly enjoyed this book because I recognized many familiar names and places, the book is worth reading as a reminder of the need for ministry to prisons and prisoners and for alternative ways to restore justice.
The other local book I read also focused on a tragedy, but this time it was the story by a friend of a friend, Stephanie Meeker, called When the Unthinkable Happens. This book centers around the tragic death of the author's best friend, who was murdered by her angry ex-husband. The author takes in the four children of her friend, first as a temporary solution, then as a foster parent, and later as an adoptive parent. The book describes challenges in the court system, as well as difficulties at home with the kids, who struggle with their mother's death. One of the children does not want to be adopted and runs away at one point. Because the case has to be tried in both criminal and civil court, the investigation and court appearances go on for years. The father is in and out of jail during this time before his final sentencing. In the midst of all of these difficulties, the author describes how faith gave her and her husband strength to face both the big and small challenges. While the book is written in a way that sometimes simplifies or avoids revealing too many details because of the sensitive nature of sharing a story about children, the virtues displayed by the people in the story - the perseverance of the Stephanie and her husband, the support of the community, and the resilience of the children - inspire readers to do more for others. Nonetheless, it is clear how superhuman grace is needed to carry on and to love when exhausted.
Another book I finished recently also described acting with generosity and love towards others iout of a missionary spirit. For book club, I finished Christy by Catherine Marshall. This book is so familiar to me - I either read the book or watched the movie sometime in the past. Or maybe I just saw the cover at the book store or my grandparent's house. At any rate, I knew the premise - a young, naive woman, Christy, leaves home in Asheville, NC, to be a missionary and teach school in the mountains of North Carolina. She devotes herself to helping the children learn and to befriending the women of the hills and teaching them as well. Christy seems preternaturally optimistic, but she faces challenges and learns from her mistakes as the story develops. Part of what I liked most about this book were the descriptions of the hills and mountains which seemed somewhat familiar from our recent trip to the Smokies. I also liked reading about Christy's teaching methods in the one room school and the solid advice from her mentor, Miss Alice Henderson, the Quaker missionary who was a single mother and teacher herself. She has some of the best lines of the book, and her unflappable and charitable demeanor are admirable in the face of hostility, illness, poverty, and physical exhaustion.
While those three books are not necessary exemplars of literary artistry, Graham Greene's The Heart of the Matter and The End of the Affair do offer more in terms of style and content, although both are rather bleak tales that capture the darkness of the human heart and the need for redemption. The End of the Affair was a Well Read Mom book club pick, but I missed the meeting for the discussion. When I read these books back in my late teens - I can't remember now if I was still in high school or early college, I was enamored by Greene's slow reveal of how a skeptical character's encounter with faith caused them to revisit their previous misconceptions. The End of the Affair has a much more hopeful and almost mystical ending, while The Heart of the Matter ends with a character's suicide because he believes he is beyond redemption. The characters are all rather self-absorbed and pitiable, and reading them again later in life is not as stunning. I am less sympathetic to the characters. But I appreciate Greene's perspective on the seriousness of faith. It is something that should be taken as seriously as these characters treat it. I was sorry to miss the discussion about Bendrix because at the end of the novel we learn a little more about acts of kindness he performs that aren't evident from his narration. The novel leaves open whether he follows in the path to conversion that his lover Sarah began.
Two other books that I finished were bestsellers. Theo of Golden by Allen Levi and The Correspondent by Virginia Evans have been making people's lists for their favorite books of the last two years. I think they both came out in 2025. My sister-in-law recommended them because her book club read them. I am sometimes skeptical of bestsellers because they can lack the literary merit of books that require more thought. Nonetheless, I enjoyed both of these, particularly The Correspondent. You know when you feel like praying for a character in a book at Mass that the character is particularly vivid. I started this book at my in-laws' house and could barely put it down, even on the way to church. And then I sat there frustrated with the main character, Sybil, wishing *** spoiler alert **** she had gone where she said she was going to go and that she would make up with her daughter. I think it took about 6 hours to read. Told through the letters of law clerk Sybil to her best friend, to the young son of a lawyer friend, to her children, and other characters with whom she has relationships, the novel conveys the develop of a character already aged, but still learning and forming new relationships and repairing old ones. I appreciated the subtle development of the story line - not a thrilling plot, but a slow development of character that proves satisfying, even if not surprising.
Theo of Golden was also a bit predictable, although the final couple chapters tied some loose ends together in a way I didn't quite expect. I expected unexpected coincidences, though. The story follows a strange visitor to the small town of Golden who begins to make friends by buying portraits at the local coffee shop and giving them to the person in the picture. People open up to Theo and tell them about their hopes and struggles. He seems to see through their masks and to recognize their worth, which he shares with them. In return they grow in confidence and become attached to Theo. While the story is a little saccharine, it touches a chord. The town of Golden seems charmed, and full of people who just need a friend to open up their hearts to, someone who will give them the love and encouragement they have been craving. In the end the book won me over despite my skepticism. I see why everyone is recommending it.
Two books I finished had theological themes: Bright Evening Star by Madeleine L'Engle is a memoir of her charmed childhood with her journalist/artistic parents who often went to the theater or parties, leaving her at home presumably with a nannie. Because she was frequently alone she developed an active imagination, but she also developed a love for Christ and faith in him. This is a short book, but an interesting and inspiring description of how and why she is a faithful Christian. In Lore Wilbert's Understory, we also meet Christian theology combined with memoir and natural history text with an ecopoetic lyric added in. It was informative, descriptive and meditative. It made me want to head to the woods for a long time.
Part of the reason I didn't read much in May is because I spent a long time trying to finish The Way We Live Now a long Victorian novel by Anthony Trollope. Less caricature than Dickens, but more urban than Austen, Trollope's novels often feature both marriage plots and political maneuvering. This story features a newly rich family who come to London and soon feature prominently in the social scene despite everyone's snobbery. Meanwhile, the rich young lads seem to be dissipated and unreliable, and the marriageable young women want both reliability and romance and can't seem to find them both in the same young man. At nearly 800 pages, Trollope's book carries this on a long time.
I've also read a few journals - a couple issues of Plough and Notre Magazine and the movie and film reviews of one of the CSC priests here, who shares his thoughts on the cultural offerings of the last six months. His public, spiral bound journals predate blogs. In between that, I've started reading up on film for my course and finishing the Life and Times of Wendall Berry. After that flurry of reading activity, I have to turn my mind to course planning. How to manage a 105 minute class of seniors? Time to get serious with planning my literature of redemption class. It will be a busy fall.
