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<\/a><\/p>\nI don\u2019t always do themed 7 Takes, but, as every newspaper insert has insistently told me, Christmas shopping season is coming up, so I\u2019d like to use this blog carnival to highlight excellent books that I have loved, in case anyone is looking for inspiration. \u00a0In normal blogging news, I\u2019ll be posting the first part of my defense of covenant marriage this afternoon (sparked by this discussion<\/a>), and I\u2019d love feedback on yesterday\u2019s post about the problem of evil<\/a>.<\/p>\n This week was a magnificent one for me, since my college seminar on Stephen Sondheim<\/a> took a trip to New York City to meet him in person. \u00a0I loved hearing him talk about the process of crafting many of my favorite musicals (Sweeney Todd, Assassins, Pacific Overtures, Sunday in the Park with George, etc), and, delightfully, everyone can get a sense of Sondheim\u2019s creative process now that he\u2019s released Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) with Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes<\/a>.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0He includes a lot of cut songs or edited songs so you can see the edits he\u2019s made and he explains why he\u2019s made them. \u00a0It\u2019s a wonderful insight into his mind.<\/p>\n If Stephen Sondheim hadn\u2019t become the most important living musical theatre composer, it turns out he would have liked to be a number theorist. \u00a0Needless to say, I was delighted by this news. \u00a0Math is essentially the study of beautiful puzzles, and if you want to introduce someone to the real subject, not the\u00a0arithmetic\u00a0drills and formula memorization many people remember from high school and college, I recommend Flatland<\/em><\/a> by Edwin Abbot. \u00a0The book teaches you how to visualize four dimensions by telling the story of a square, living in a two-dimensional plane, that is visited by a Sphere, who introduces him to the wonders of the third dimension. \u00a0Anyone, with any level of mathematical experience can read and enjoy this book.<<\/p>\n If you have a little more mathematical experience under your belt, you should check out G\u00f6del, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid<\/em><\/a> by Douglas Hofstadter. \u00a0This is one of my favorite books, melding music, mathematics, and philosophy of mind. \u00a0(And Sondheim likes it, too!)<\/p>\n All the above is particularly interesting to me this\u00a0semester, since I\u2019m taking a class on lyric writing for musical theatre. \u00a0Of course, since I am distinctly unsentimental, while other students are writing excellent romantic songs, I am writing a song about\u00a0diphtheria\u00a0and the discovery of the diphtheria anti-toxin.<\/p>\n My major resource for this song is the magnificent\u00a0Microbe Hunters<\/a>\u00a0by Paul de Kruif. \u00a0This is the book that got me into science and disease research. \u00a0It is beautifully written and completely accessible to a non-scientist. \u00a0It\u2019s impossible to read it without getting swept up in the excitement and wonder of the early days of vaccine research.<\/p>\n Luckily, once you\u2019ve finished\u00a0Microbe Hunters<\/a>, you don\u2019t need to be consumed by grief that, for the rest of your life, no disease nonfiction book will match the glorious\u00a0heights\u00a0you\u2019ve reached, because, this year, Rebecca Skloot published The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0This book tells the story of the African-American woman whose cancer cells became the first immortal cell line for laboratory research. \u00a0It is certain that someone you know has benefited from medical therapies that were tested on Henrietta\u2019s cells.<\/p>\n The story Skloot tells is as much about bioethics as about scientific progress. \u00a0Henrietta\u2019s cells were used without anyone ever asking her for informed consent. \u00a0Her family wasn\u2019t notified for years, even as scientists contacted them looking for additional samples. \u00a0As she contacted the Lacks family for interviews, Skloot ended up being the first person to actually explain to the Lackses what scientists had done with Henrietta\u2019s cells.<\/p>\n I can\u2019t let a book recommendation list go by without taking a moment to plug one of my favorite novels: Good Omens<\/em><\/a>, co-written by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. \u00a0I can\u2019t describe it better than does the jacket copy: \u201cIt reads like the Book of Revelation, rewritten by Monty Python.\u201d<\/p>\n The last book on my roundup I can\u2019t recommend yet, since I haven\u2019t started it, but I\u2019m looking forward to reading Umberto Eco\u2019s The Name of the Rose<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0Freddie deBoer has started an online book club centered on the book hosted at his new blog, The Rose in Winter<\/a>. \u00a0I\u2019m looking forward to a discussion of Eco\u2019s story and theology, and I\u2019d love to see some of my readers and commenters join me over there.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/_b7Eh98KJ_qI\/TPiNptYM9NI\/AAAAAAAABJ8\/tezow1ygAfU\/s320\/FinishingHat.jpg\")
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