Happy Catholic Bookshelf
Benedict Cumberbatch Reads via Awesome People Reading Read more
Benedict Cumberbatch Reads via Awesome People Reading Read more
Since Bleak House got brought up yesterday and I have just begun it myself, I thought I’d share this bit from Dickens’ preface, which cracked me up. Once I knew that there had only been two Chancery judges at a time for several hundred years (and that was still the state at the time of this book) … AND … that Dickens himself had once been a solicitor’s clerk before becoming a journalist … well, that added layers that made... Read more
The first lines to the preface of On Stories and Other Essays on Literature by C.S. Lewis. “You can’t get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suite me,” said C. S. Lewis. … He certainly meant what he said, for at that moment I was pouring his tea into a very large Cornish-ware cup and he was reading Bleak House. Walter Hooper Read more
In case you hadn’t guessed … The Bells by Edgar Allen Poe … a little lagniappe from Forgotten Classics. Read more
The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate by Ted Chiang My rating: 5 of 5 stars This is actually a short novella from Ted Chiang and the first of his work I ever experienced when JJ Campanella read it (brilliantly) for StarShipSofa podcast. I recently received a signed (!) copy from a friend who was clearing out his bookshelves and took the chance this weekend to reread it. It is told in what I’d call Scheherazade-style, of a story within a... Read more
Assam & Darjeeling By T.M. Camp; Read by T.M. Camp Podcast Download (iTunes and RSS Feeds can be found |Here| – Approx 23 hours – [UNABRIDGED] Publisher: T.M. Camp Published: 2008 A masterful and nuanced book, Assam & Darjeeling is the story of a quest straight into legendary, mythological landscape. Two children’s’ efforts to save their mother serves as a lens through which we see pure love, redemption, and sacrifice. It all begins with a car accident on a snow-covered... Read more
A Cross of Centuries: Twenty-five Imaginative Tales About the Christ by Michael G. Bishop My rating: 3 of 5 stars I picked this up dirt cheap after Scott Danielson told me that Jesse Willis brought it to his attention. Editor Michael Bishop is a Christian but is interested here in presenting stories by believers and unbelievers alike, as long as the stories are good ones. Therefore, this is a collection of pieces by some of the most celebrated science fiction... Read more
Three more chapters of Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart is ready and waiting at Forgotten Classics. As well as a podcast highlight from over the sea! Read more
Ripe: A Cook in the Orchard by Nigel Slater My rating: 5 of 5 stars If the book just was published can I still call it a classic? If I just got it, can I really know it is 5 stars? Let’s just say that I have every confidence in Nigel Slater’s Ripe being just as fantastic as Tender (his vegetable garden and cookery book) was last year. It has the same gorgeous photography in a stunningly produced book. It... Read more
God Is Love–Deus Caritas Est: Encyclical Letter by Pope Benedict XVI My rating: 5 of 5 stars This was my third time through Pope Benedict’s brilliant first encyclical God Is Love. Our Catholic women’s book club read it for our May discussion. Just reading the opening paragraphs made me remember what a wonderful piece of thinking and writing this is. And how brilliant Pope Benedict is at expressing not only the intellectual but also the heart of the matter. He... Read more
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