Month: June 2015

musings

Jesus Style – Part 1 – The Jesus Approach aka to LOVE

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

jesus style -gayle D. erwinNow, this is a book that a small group at my church is starting to read. Knowing me and this website, I love to read, but I will be frank and honest here. Sometimes theological words and ideas are so intense that they just fly over my head and I have trouble getting through large chapters just simply because they are so intense. Like, I sit there staring at the pages and think to myself, what in the world did I just read? And what exactly did that mean? Could you please put it in layman words for us ordinary folk?

However, I must say, getting through the first few chapters of The Jesus Style has proven this is not the case for this book. I love Erwin’s style of writing. It doesn’t try hard to sound eloquent with the fancy words and the smart-sounding way of putting things together as a sentence. It’s simply…well, understandable. It may not be the writing style for everyone, but it makes it easier to digest the basics of what he is trying to say. Or in other words, what the author is trying to remind us folks who have professed to be “Christ-like” for some time.

Now, this post isn’t exactly a review, per se. Hence, it’s placed under my “Other Musings” tab on this website. As my group and I go through this book over the course of the next few weeks, I will be occasionally putting my thoughts down as I do still love talking about books.

So, before you decide that this is some long speech and I’m just going to just go on and on about the same book for more than one post, I hope that you’d give my musings and thoughts a chance.

Who is this Jesus and why the heck am I reading about his “style”?

I have once watched video, on Youtube I believe, where someone went around a city and asked random people on the street what they thought about Jesus. Not about what they thought of religion or their opinions of people who profess to be following one. No, they simply just asked people what they thought of some guy named Jesus who may have lived approximately 2000 years ago, give or take.

And you know what’s surprising? Most people had a great many of good things to praise about this man called Jesus. Things like “love, good and compassion” or “he was an excellent man” or “you just gotta have a good opinion about him”. And why is that? Even with people who don’t necessarily put themselves into a religion or denomination, this response is just the same.

And that is why I am rather excited to read this book. There’s enough with church rituals that throw people off. Sometimes it even throws me off. At the end of the day, I think the heart of the matter is what Jesus did. I could only hope to be able to invoke a response in people akin to what these others say about Jesus.

How shall I do that? Simple. By learning what his style of living is and to hope to be a better person like him.

His main doctrine is love

So far, reading into the first few chapters, it seems the answer is simple. How to be like someone like Jesus? Love like he did. That sounds rather obvious, right? If I were to love everyone and truly care for people, then of course people down the generations would associate me with “compassion and goodness”.

Then I sit and ponder and let it sink in for a moment. Crap. The moment of realization where….well, I don’t love everyone. Heck, I barely have patience for some people, and for sure I don’t take the time of day to show “love” for everyone. That’s a mighty large order to fill. Does it have to be everyone? And how exactly do I love them? Does that mean I have to do things for all the people around me? Let them take advantage of me by telling them I’d be willing to do anything they ask of me?

Well, I guess I’d have to answer that question by the old saying “What would Jesus do?”

But for now, I think starting off small is just as meaningful. It’s not about the actions that matter. It’s that the intent behind it was with love. Think of the flip side. If someone were to do so many charitable things but didn’t intentionally do it because they cared (or did it for selfish reasons), would that action mean as much? As for me, maybe my first task is to not just step over a homeless person (which I swear is like every several blocks down the road in certain areas of the heart of the city), and to take the time to help with a physical need like a drink. Or maybe I should volunteer at a soup kitchen this summer.

Either way, for once I think it’s not enough to just want to be someone who loves, but to finally be someone who does. My question is: how about you? I’m not asking some giant theological question or anything. I’m simply asking, would you be willing to learn to love and think less on oneself for a moment?

YA

Review: Crossed by Ally Condie

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Matched #2

crossed -ally condie

The Society chooses everything.

The books you read.
The music you listen to.
The person you love.

Yet for Cassia the rules have changed. Ky has been taken and she will sacrifice everything to find him.

And when Cassia discovers Ky has escaped to the wild frontiers beyond the Society there is hope.

But on the edge of society nothing is as it seems…

A rebellion is rising

Chasing down an uncertain future, Cassia makes her way to the Outer Provinces in pursuit of Ky–taken by Society to his certain death–only to find that he has escaped into the majestic, but treacherous, canyons.  On this wild frontier are glimmers of a different life . . . and the enthralling promise of rebellion. But even as Cassia sacrifices everything to reunite with Ky, ingenious surprises from Xander may change the game.  On the edge of Society, nothing is as expected, and crosses and double crosses make Cassia’s path more twisted than ever.

3 Drink Me Potions

After having read Matched not all that long ago, I can’t say I was absolutely dying to read its sequel. And although this book was by far not any better than its predecessor, it wasn’t as terrible as it could have been.

My first concern was that it would be a truly boring tale. And it could have very much been just that. Extremely boring. Yes, Cassia comes across certain hardships on her road in chasing down Ky in the Outer Provinces where he was sent at the end of Matched. But were they necessarily exciting? Or just realistic challenges that she probably had to face trekking through these barren lands that no one’s really been living on in a while.

What made it bearable was Ky’s point of view. It kept the pace feeling less like it was dragging on and on because it switched to what he was doing and facing rather quickly, giving an air of illusion that the pace was quicker than it honestly was, when I look back on it.

I’ll be honest with you. The romance was not too heavy in this book either. Sure, Cassia is going after Ky because of her love for him, yet I still feel like she could turn towards Xander at any point. I’m not exactly against that. He’s a great guy too, a rather strange stance as I normally am on some “team” or other. But seeing the world through Ky’s eyes was a smart move on Condie’s part because it made me understand and possibly even like Ky more. He felt kind of distant and surreal in the first book to me. Like I couldn’t understand why he loved Cassia, and only glimpsed who he was through the strips of his life story that he gave her to read. He sounded like a nice guy who went through a ton of hardships at such an early point in life, but did I really understand him all that much? Nah, not really.

Plus, honestly? I think I like Ky’s narrative voice better than Cassia’s. Sometimes I find her a little naive, like she doesn’t really understand the scope of the world outside the Society’s imprint on her life.

To keep this review short, Crossed can at best be described as a mediocre book that somewhat carries the plot further. Imagine it as the line that connects the first dot (aka Matched) to a second dot (aka the third book Reached). It helps to understand how one thing connected to the other, but I don’t think it was absolutely amazing or anything.

It could be just Condie’s writing. You can tell she taught and loved English. Her writing style is somewhat poetic and descriptive in that sense. Chapters can be occasionally very short and scenes easily and rather abruptly change from one to another. It’s not my particular cup of tea, but it’s not to say it wasn’t nice at times. Just…not for the whole length of the book.

Overall Recommendation:
Cassia has embarked on her journey to the Outer Provinces to find her beloved Ky, although her heart seems to have the potential to still love another. With a pace that’s deceptively decent due to the alternating POVs between Ky and Cassia, Crossed introduces life outside of the Society and its control of the people trying to survive there. The plot may further the storyline, but besides giving us an amazing glimpse into Ky and who he is, it doesn’t do much more besides make us wait for whatever conclusion Condie is setting up for in the final book.

 

YA

Review: From a Distant Star by Karen McQuestion

Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

from a distant star -karen mcquestionSeventeen-year-old Emma was the only one who hadn’t given up on her boyfriend, Lucas. Everyone else—his family, his friends, his doctors—believed that any moment could be his last. So when Lucas miraculously returns from the brink of death, Emma thinks her prayers have been answered.

As the surprised town rejoices, Emma begins to question whether Lucas is the same boy she’s always known. When she finds an unidentifiable object on his family’s farm—and government agents come to claim it—she begins to suspect that nothing is what it seems. Emma’s out-of-this-world discovery may be the key to setting things right, but only if she and Lucas can evade the agents who are after what they have. With all her hopes and dreams on the line, Emma sets out to save the boy she loves. And with a little help from a distant star, she might just have a chance at making those dreams come true.

2.5 Drink Me Potions

A copy of this book was given by Netgalley for an honest review.

The cover’s gorgeous. Too bad the story itself couldn’t match that.

To be honest, the whole story felt way too slow. It was understandable at the beginning because it took time and skill to catch us up to what happened to Lucas and to get a glimpse at his relationship with Emma. After that though? Not so much. It really tried my patience.

And this may seem like a spoiler – but honestly, you’ll figure out what’s so “different” about Lucas pretty quickly. Think a cross between The Host and E.T.. Did you guess it? That’s right. An alien has crawled his way into Lucas and is using him as a host body. Think that’s freaky in a cool way?

Guess again.

If there were more exciting moments, this would’ve been an interesting premise. If this story wasn’t just solely based on Emma’s journey in getting the alien – his name is Scout – back to his home planet, I would have definitely upped my rating. As it stands, the whole “journey” was rather predictable….and slow . I swear the driving part was where I was really contemplating putting this book down. And I NEVER really give up on books. So I’m serious when I say it was slow-paced.

But obviously, there were certain things that saved the novel too, in a way. After all, I managed to get through the rest of it, right?

For you romance lovers out there? Don’t expect too much. I FINALLY found a YA novel that does NOT centre on it. That’s not a bad thing. A rather refreshing accomplishment as most books throw it in rather heavily. Emma’s love for Lucas, the true Lucas and not Scout who’s just using Lucas’ body, was steadfast. From a Distance Star is not a book where someone falls in love with the alien trapped in the human body (aka The Host). No, this is the kind of love that speaks of believing till the very end. No cheating or even slight temptation at loving some other guy in that way. She never gave up on him, even when his family seemed to think there was no hope left for him.

And by that, I do mean his parents practically had his funeral and everything planned out. Man, I hated his mother. Mrs. Walker literally demeaned Emma, barely standing her presence in the house while she stayed and comforted Lucas – who was in a deep coma, by the way. Absolutely detested her. She even explicitly told Emma she did not hate her, she despised her. My goodness, Emma was some strong girl to have stayed respectful towards that woman.

You’d think I really liked Emma from the sounds of that, don’t you? Well….I can’t say I loved her completely. She was the dependent person in the relationship, always letting Lucas decide everything for them. Where they ate, what movies to watch, etc. That irked me a bit. Girl, some backbone, will ya? But she did grow from the experience as Scout obviously didn’t know the ways of Earth so Emma had to take charge. That is what I appreciated. Character development.

The only other redeeming quality was a few of the characters. Lucas’ younger bro, Eric, was just lovely. He’s brilliant in his own way, yet their mother obviously favoured her golden boy and firstborn. He never let it get to him, and was the one who convinced Emma to help Scout out. Speaking of our resident alien, I couldn’t decide on what I thought about him at first. There are tiny chapters that look at the situation from his perspective, though not written in first person. It made understanding him easier and I found his shy and caring personality endearing. I almost wished Emma couldn’t send him back to his home planet. He had a childlike wonder at everything on Earth that reminds me of how much I take all this planet has to offer for granted. That’s oddly deep…from a book that lacks in pretty much everything else.

Overall Recommendation:
From a Distant Star had the slowest storyline and nearly no twists in its plot, but there was just something that managed to keep my attention. I wouldn’t recommend it for everyone. Maybe just for those who don’t mind a slower paced book. A few of the characters were solid and it was a refreshing look at teenage love that is based more on actual friendship than attraction and lust. At the end of the day, it wasn’t great, but it wasn’t all terrible either. Reading it is up to you.