Archive for Book Reviews

I realize that this book has been on this site for awhile as a book I’m reading.  I obviously haven’t been reading it for months but just haven’t taken the time to work on this blog and update things.  Well, it’s definitely time for that! :)   Here is my review of this book that has been a long time coming!

Title: The Karma of Jesus

Author: Mark Herringshaw

ISBN: 978-0-7642-0734-1

Genre: Non-Fiction; Religious; Spirituality

Pages: 206

Publisher: Bethany House

Rating: 4 stars

This was a GREAT book!  I have to admit I was skeptical of it at first simply because of the title.  There seem to be so many people nowadays mixing religions and making up their own as well as saying that any path you choose is the right path.  I’m tired of that kind of gobbleygook (don’t you love my description of it!  haha!) and I want a book by an author who knows Truth and isn’t afraid to talk about it.  Well, this book delivered in my opinion.  Mark Herringshaw does a good job of teaching about Christ and the love that He gave to us.  He compares the concept of karma with the forgiveness that we receive from God and explains how we can receive God’s perfect love and forgiveness.  He weaves some wonderful stories into the book and it’s actually one of those books that was hard to put down!  I would highly recommend it!!

Nov
06

Book review: The Last Ember

Posted by: momlovesbeingathome | Comments (0)

Title: The Last Emberember

Author: Daniel Levin

ISBN: 978-1-59448-872-6

Genre: Fiction

Pages: 418

Publisher: Penguin Group  – Riverhead Books

Rating: 3 stars

From the cover flap:

Jonathan Marcus, a young American lawyer and a former doctoral student in classics, has become a sought-after commodity among antiquities dealers. But when he is summoned to Rome to examine a client’s fragment of an ancient stone map, he stumbles across a startling secret: a hidden message carved inside the stone itself. The discovery propels him on a perilous journey from the labyrinth beneath the Colosseum to the biblical-era tunnels of Jerusalem in search of a hidden 2,000-year-old artifact sought by empires throughout the ages.

As Marcus and a passionate UN preservationist, Dr. Emili Travia, dig more deeply into the past, they’re stunned to discover not only an ancient intelligence operation to protect the artifact, but also a ruthless modern plot to destroy all trace of it by a mysterious radical bent on erasing every remnant of Jewish and Christian presence from the Temple Mount.

With a cutting-edge plot as intricately layered as the ancient sites it explores, The Last Ember is a gripping thriller spanning the high-stakes worlds of archaeology, politics, and terrorism in its portrayal of the modern struggle to define–and redefine–history itself.

My thoughts:

I had a hard time deciding what to rate this book.  In some ways I could give it a four but decided to go with a three.  It is a very well-written book and I was impressed with the writing style but I had a really hard time staying connected with the story.  Much of the storyline and plot were things that I’m just not very familiar with so it made it hard to follow.  I found myself getting lost and wondering what was going on.  Many books will have a heading when the characters change or the location changes so that the reader knows what’s going on and which characters are in focus at that point.  This book didn’t do that and each time it switched it would take me a minute to figure out what was going on and what part of the story I was in.  If you have any knowledge of the main topics of the book I think you’ll really like it.  If not, it might be a little confusing.

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Title: Lavender & Peachlavender

Author: Mae O’Steen-Grant

ISBN: 978-1-4327-3910-2

Genre: Religion, Christian Life

Pages: 257

Publisher: OutskirtsPress.com

Rating: 2 stars

I’m really sorry to say that I just really didn’t get this book.  It seemed to just go in circles and I felt very confused the whole time I was reading it.   I only read part of the book as I could not figure out exactly what the point was.  I finally just decided I needed to move on to something else.  So, unfortunately, this book is not a book I would recommend.

Title: World Geography: Building a Global Perspectivegeography

Publisher: Prentice Hall

ISBN: 0134359909

Genre: Geography, Curriculum

Pages: 748

Age: middle school and high school

My kids are using this book for geography this year and I really like it.  The book is separated by regions and countries and has a wealth of information on land, weather, culture, people groups, etc.  One of the things I really love about this book is that it has great, colorful pictures throughout that show everything from famous landmarks, to cultural items, to just interesting tidbits.  It has great charts, graphs, and especially maps.  I would highly recommend this book for homeschooling geography!

Title: Darwin’s Racists: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrowdarwins-racists

Author: Sharon Sebastian & Raymond G. Bohlin

ISBN: 978-1-60264-393-2

Genre: Religion, Christian Life, Science

Pages: 216 pages

Publisher: Virtualbookworm.com Publishing, INC.

Rating: 4 stars (you can look here to read about my rating system)

Book’s website

From the back of the book:

Who are you? Where did you come from? Are you being told the truth? How does what you believe link you to the world’s worst mass murderers, being judged by the color of your skin, super babies of the future, and today’s school curriculum?

Mere generations ago, a man named Charles Darwin introduced his Theory of Evolution which permeates today’s society. Its premise is that some groups of people are less evolved than others and, therefore, inferior. As a result, millions have died when targeted by race, class or disability.

There are those who say that this same philosophy, that helped fuel Hitler’s ovens, has crept into America’s school system when no one was watching. Others contend that evolution, which was rooted in racist and class elitism and is today being taught, makes some of us superior and more “fit” to live on the planet. Are you fit enough? Is your family fit enough? Who survives? Who decides?

In America, are we one nation under God or one nation under Darwin? As two worldviews of race and class collide, it is time to decide what you believe regardless of your social status or the color of your skin.

This books does a fabulous job of pointing out the flaws in Darwin’s Theory of Evolution.  They delve into many areas that some scientists have claimed as fact when, in fact, they have not been proven to be so – they are ideas that are pure speculation.  They also do a great job pointing out many problems that have arisen, not only in our society, but in other societies of the world since Darwin first presented his theory.

There are many great quotes in this book, there are two I’d love to share here.

Spurgeon quickly noted a double standard that was pro-evolution and anti-creation and used sarcasm to criticize Darwin’s unproven theory.  In his monthly magazine, The Sword and the Trowel, Spurgeon wrote the following to all those who recognized God as Creator.

“You are not to be dogmatic in theology, but for scientific men it is the correct thing.  You are never to assert anything very strongly; but scientists may boldly assert what they cannot prove, which may demand a faith more credulous than any we possess.”  Charles Spurgeon

With what he calls almost seemingly endless attacks on religion – through lawsuits, misleading television programs and a bias towards the faith of Darwinism, Author and President of Amerisearch, William J. Federer sees an alarming irony.

“Religion provides social order and tolerance for all people.  Now, in America, everyone is tolerated except the ones who came up with the idea.”

These are just two of many great thoughts shared in this book.  If you are interested in learning about how the Theory of Evolution has shaped our world this book is a great book for you to read.  It is packed full of great information and great quotes.  (If you are interested, you can click on the title above and it will take you to Amazon to purchase the book.)

I do have to add one negative because I’m a bit of a grammar freak.  When using quotation marks the rule is that periods and commas ALWAYS go inside of the quotation marks.  It doesn’t matter if the quotation marks are part of the whole sentence or just around one word at the end – they ALWAYS go inside the quotation marks.  Numerous times in the book the authors have commas and periods outside of the quotation marks.  I know, I know – you’re probably thinking, “Who cares!”  Well, I’m sorry, but I do. :)

Title: Reading Your Male: An Invitation to Understand and Influence Your Man’s SexualityReading your male

Author: Mary Farrar

ISBN: 978-1-4347-6871-1

Genre: Religion, Christian Life, Women

Pages: 303 pages

Publisher: David C. Cook

Rating: 4 stars (you can look here to read about my rating system)

Mary Farrar has written a fabulous book with a peek into the male mind.  After much research, she does a fabulous job in this book of explaining how our men think, what they expect out of life and marriage, what issues they struggle with, and how we, as their wives, can best be their helpmate.  Men and women are so different in their thinking and their emotions and I would recommend that every wife or soon-to-be wife read this book.  It can be a tremendous help to your marriage to understand what your husbands needs are and how to best fulfill your role as his wife.  The most important aspect of this book, in my opinion, is that everything she says is from a Biblical standpoint – she explains how to fight the enemy with God’s truths.

I received this book from Phenix & Phenix and they were kind enough to send a couple of copies so that I could have a giveaway!  So, I’m excited to announce my very first giveaway on this site!

  • For 1 entry eligibility, just leave me a comment – you can just say, “I want to learn more about my man” if you want ;)
  • For 2 entries, leave a comment and also subscribe to my blog through email by entering your email address in the subscription box at the sidebar then come back and leave another comment letting me know you did so
  • For 3 entries, do both of the above and twitter or blog about this blog post leaving a third comment letting me know you did this as well.

I will have a drawing next Wednesday, September 30th, for both books.  I will e-mail you at the e-mail address you use to comment to let you know you have won and to get your mailing address.

Sep
13

Book Giveaway

Posted by: momlovesbeingathome | Comments (0)

One of the things that I started doing when I moved my blog to my own domain name was book reviews.  I have only done a handful so far but I plan to do many more.  In fact, I have several books in my “to read” stack that have been sent to me by companies so that I can read them and review them.  The first company that asked to send me one also wanted to send me some extra copies so that I could do a book giveaway on here.  I have not done any giveaways in the past and am curious to hear from those of you who have what your favorite method is in order to do that.  What has worked best?  Have you figured out things to avoid doing?  Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated!  Tthe giveaway will begin soon!  :)

Categories : Blogging, Book Reviews, Books
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Aug
22

No Fear Shakespeare

Posted by: momlovesbeingathome | Comments (0)

Shakespeare Literature is a class I’m teaching at our homeschool co-op this year and I’m already having so much fun and learning so much with it!  One of the reasons is this book that I’m using as a teaching aid:

shakespeare companion Title: No Fear Shakespeare: A Companion

ISBN: 978-1411497467

Pages: 320

Publisher: Spark Publishing

Rating: 5 stars

This book has been a wealth of knowledge about Shakespeare.  It’s full of facts but it’s also easy to read and not dry at all.  If you want to learn about Shakespeare and his plays I would highly recommend this   book!

I don’t know about you but we area gearing back up for school again.  In fact, in some ways summer has already ended.  This week was the beginning of football practice which means four nights a week we’re at the practice field.  My daughter also had cheer camp this week so she’s been gone all day for that too.  Next week will be a little calmer because cheer camp will be over but the week after that is when school begins.  I’m actually kind of excited!  Which doesn’t surprise me because I always am by this time of the summer.  I enjoy taking the summer off very much but I’m always ready to get back into a routine by the end of it.  :)

One thing that I’ve been working hard on recently is the class that I’m teaching at our co-op this year.  I’m getting really excited about it and looking forward to being with the new group of kids and seeing what they bring to the class.   I teach high school literature so we get to sit and talk about what we read each week.  It’s so fun!  The kids amaze me sometimes and it’s always fascinating to hear what they get out of it.

One thing I’m adding to my class this year is two big writing assignments.  Last year we just did smaller papers once a month but this year I’m having them write an essay first semester and a research paper second semester along with their other assignments.  I found the coolest books to help me teach them how to do this:

essay How to Write an Essay

by Sparknotes Editors

ISBN: 978-1-4114-9976-8

Publication: Spark Publishing 2006

and

research How to Write a Research Paper

by Emma Chastain

ISBN: 978-1-4114-2341-1

Publisher: Spark Publishing 2008

I’m really excited to have found these!  They are going to be a great teaching tool for me this year.  :)

Title: False Pretensesfalse

Author: Catherine Coulter

ISBN: 0-453-00641-8

Genre: Fiction/Suspense/Mystery

Pages: 380 pages

Publication: New American Library 1988

Rating: 3 stars (you can look here to read about my rating system)

I have been a fan of Catherine Coulter’s books – specifically her FBI series – for quite awhile.  Her books are always very suspenseful with great story lines – so much so that I usually hate even putting the book down!

I have to admit that I had a harder time with this one though.  This is one of her older books and I think she must have gotten better with time.  This book did have a good story line and it was, for the most part, pretty suspenseful which kept me interested enough to keep me reading it but some of the dialogue and topics in the book were a little much for me.  There was quite a bit of bad language and some pretty vulgar/risque material and I am not a fan of any of that kind of thing.   I came close to putting it down a couple of times early on in the book but since I was familiar with her other works I kept reading.  It did seem to get a little better further into the story and the plot of the story did keep me very interested so  I feel like it did end up being a good read.  I just wouldn’t say it’s anywhere close to my favorite of hers.

So, if you don’t mind putting up with the bad in order to get to the good, this book is a good read.  If you don’t want to subject yourself to any bad language or anything then this book is not for you.

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