Didn't have much free time during Holy Week, but the first 3 weeks of March gave me enough time to enjoy my typically eclectic assortment of articles and books. Here's to another month of reading!
5 Articles I Like This Month
"Burning Out: What Really Happens Inside a Crematorium" by Caren Chesler, Popular Mechanics. 23 minutes.
In the last few generations, more and more people have opted for cremation as a less expensive alternative to the traditional burial. In this fascinating article, Caren Chesler dives deep into exactly how cremation works and how it has gone from socially unacceptable to the preferred option for 48% of bereaved families.
"How to Raise a Boy" by Will Leitch, The Cut. 11 minutes.
I'll just excerpt the article,
because it makes for a good summary and tease: "The power white American boys have been taught to seize
for generations comes
from the already powerless, women, people of color, everyone who isn’t us. Which is why, in a macro sense, the
lessening power of men (straight and white particularly) is an unquestioned
societal good. When others rise, we must fall. It will be good not just in a
moral sense, but a practical one. As a patriotic American who believes our
country is a better place when all have an equal chance, and who believes it is
time for the historical ledger to be balanced, this is what I want for the
future. The only thing is: There are two little
future white men who live in my house, and I love them very much."
While Texas barbecue has spent the last decade acquiring national fame and a cult-like following, Tex-Mex—which the author convincingly argues is eaten much more often by the average Texan than barbecue—is disrespected as a cheese-covered, processed, cheap meal not worthy of the label 'cuisine.' In an article guaranteed to make you hungry, Meghan McCarron dives into the past, present, and future of Tex-Mex, passionately making the case for it as a misunderstood and delicious state food.
"When Winter Never Ends" by Wright Thompson, ESPN The Magazine. 19 minutes.
While I don't relate to it (probably because I don't relate to it), I find the almost pathological obsession of elite athletes with their sports—think Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods, etc.—endlessly interesting. Ichiro Suzuki, indisputably the greatest Japanese import to Major League Baseball of all time, certainly qualifies as one of those obsessive, my-sport-is-who-I-am athletes, as this well-written, insightful article makes clear. A great look into the life of an athlete whose been in our highlight reels for 15 years now, but who we still don't really know.
"The Lost Kids on the Line" by Bronwen Dickey, Popular Mechanics. 21 minutes.
If you've ever spent any time on a college campus or at a summer camp, at some point you've probably seen a kid balanced precariously on a bungee cord tied between two trees, trying to stay balanced as he or she walks across it. "Slacklining," as this article taught me, is a sport invented by mountain climbers, and one of the best tests of concentration (and humility, since it's impossible to do it in a dignified way) out there. And now, courtesy of an energetic group of nonprofit workers, it's a way to bring some much-needed fun to Syrian refugees whose lives haven't had much room for it in the last 7 years. This is a beautiful, heartwarming, life-affirming story; I can't recommend it enough.
ANYWAY ANYTIME ANYWHERE VOL. II by Ken Camp
Back in November, I read the first volume of the official history book of the Texas Baptist Men, which chronicled the origins and early ministry of an organization that grew in size, scope, and faith over its first 30 years. Now, just in time for the 50th anniversary of TBM's formation, author and really excellent father Ken Camp is back with a second volume, picking up where he left off and filling in readers on the last 20 years of TBM's work.
Like in the first volume, Dad (I typed "Camp" initially, but it felt weird and stilted) spends most of the book detailing the responses to different disasters over the last two decades, from wildfires in the Hill Country to floods in the Midwest to earthquakes in Haiti and Japan. Particularly with the bigger disasters, such as Hurricane Katrina or the West fertilizer plant explosion, readers will be interested to see what role TBM played in immediate relief efforts. Statistics are supplemented with anecdotes in a way that keep the narrative flowing and prevents compassion fatigue for the reader.
While most of the book deals with TBM's disaster relief efforts (understandably, since it's what the organization is best known for), Dad spends the early chapters charting the growth and efforts of TBM's other ministries, from the builders of church camps and churches to the Royal Ambassadors and Challengers programs that have changed the lives of so many young believers. The first and last chapters also deal with the internal politics of TBM and how the organization navigated the denominational battles of the 1980s and 1990s. For someone fascinated by Texas Baptist history (I come by it honestly), I found these accounts particularly interesting.
Look, I'm pretty biased, but you should buy this book. All proceeds go to support TBM, and you'll walk away with a better grasp of what arguably the most widely respected Baptist group in the nation has been up to for the last 20 years. I enjoyed reading it and it will sit proudly next to its preceding volume on my bookshelf.
GREAT PRAYERS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT by Walter Brueggemann
My expectations going into a book play a big part in determining how I feel about it, for better or for worse. Sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised by a book I expected to be tedious or mediocre. Other times I go in expecting to be wowed, whether because of the book's reputation or its author or some other factor, only to be disappointed by the book itself. Unfortunately, Great Prayers of the Old Testament fell into the latter category.
Walter Brueggemann is, without a doubt, one of the world's foremost scholars on the Old Testament, a gifted expositor, lecturer, and writer. So the premise of this book—12 chapters, each devoted to explaining a different prayer from the Old Testament and showing what it teaches us about God, humanity, and prayer itself—seemed like guaranteed gold. Sadly, I went in expecting an accessible, applicable, prophetic work along the lines of Brueggemann's The Prophetic Imagination. What I got was a surprisingly technical, dry biblical commentary. And while commentaries make for good reference materials, they're not great books to curl up with before your coffee kicks in.
Make no mistake, there's good historical and exegetical background information to be found in Great Prayers of the Old Testament, and Brueggemann draws some general conclusions at the end of each prayer (though never with quite the verve of his more popular works). But this book is best suited for those needing to do next-level research on one of these prayers—for my fellow preachers and teachers out there, it's much closer to the Word Biblical Commentary in approach than to Broadman or Barclay. A nitpick to prove my point: the biblical text of each prayer is not included in the chapter, which drove me crazy, since it meant I had to have my Bible open alongside this book just to understand it...would it have been that difficult to print the verses in each chapter? Any book which requires the employment of another book just to be fathomable is not intended to be enjoyed, but used—and that's how Great Prayers of the Old Testament will serve me in the future, as a tool and not a treat. Recommended, but now you know what you're getting better than I did.
THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
After sitting on my shelf intimidating me with its length, reputation, and presumed difficulty for years, March was the month I finally tackled The Brothers Karamazov, widely considered one of the greatest novels of all time. Ostensibly a story about three brothers whose father is murdered (and one of whom is accused of being the murderer), The Brothers Karamazov is ultimately about what it means to live well, tackling issues of morality, love, family, and more. Classics are hard to review, and this one's no exception. So lets look at the positives and the negatives.
On the plus side, this wasn't nearly as hard to read as I was worried it would be. Maybe I was still feeling burned from the nightmare that was Ulysses, but I went in thinking that reading this would be more akin to homework than entertainment, and I was pleasantly surprised. Turns out that unless your name is James Joyce, your writing has to actually be readable before you get "exalted author" status. While the book did drag at times (and what 718 page book doesn't?), for the most part I was compelled by the plot, characters, and ideas of The Brothers Karamazov. Dostoyevsky has a lot of deep thoughts he wants to get across in this book, but his novelistic genius is to preach them through the vehicle of a murder mystery. So even if and when he was going over my head, I was at least being entertained by the story.
On the negative side, this is a Very Important Book, and I'm 100% sure I missed a lot of the philosophical meat that has made it part of the literary canon. Books like this are, in my opinion, best read in the context of a classroom or book club, where you can talk through the themes and ideas after reading. If you're reading it alone, as I did, you're guaranteed to miss a lot of what lies beneath the surface...and it's frustrating to spend a full month reading a book and then feel like you missed something.
Am I glad I read it? Definitely, and not just so I can say that I did and cross it off a list. Did I get everything out of it that I was supposed to? No. I'd love to hear from other folks who have read The Brothers Karamazov: what did you think? How was your reading experience?
A LOWCOUNTRY HEART: REFLECTIONS ON A WRITING LIFE by Pat Conroy
Some authors write in order to make you think, to stretch you intellectually with their fiction. Think Jonathan Franzen, David Foster Wallace and...ugh...James Joyce. Others write purely to entertain you, like Stephen King or John Grisham. Pat Conroy, while capable of both of these feats, sought to do something else: he wanted to make you feel. And in my case, he nearly always succeeded.
I discovered Conroy during my training for a marathon a few years ago, when I started browsing the public library's database of downloadable audio books to listen to on long runs. There I stumbled upon My Reading Life, Conroy's memoir of sorts about the books and authors which have shaped his life. I'd never heard of Conroy, but I love books about books, so I gave it a try and fell in love with his prose about 20 minutes into the first chapter.
Since then, I've bought 4 Conroy books, and fully intend to eventually buy and read his entire bibliography. My Lowcountry Heart is presumably his final entry on that list, released posthumously after his death in 2016. Half of the book collects essays he posted on his blog and Facebook page in the last few years of his life, while the rest is an assortment of speeches he gave, letters he wrote, and tributes to him written by friends and family.
What happens over the course of reading is that you find yourself falling in love with the man and his gift for language. Whether he's talking about literature, lifelong friends, his beloved South Carolina, or anything else, his prose drips with emotion and beauty. He was above all else a storyteller, and every essay reads with the clarity and warmth of a friend sitting next to you in your living room.
If you're unfamiliar with Conroy, I'm not sure I'd start with this book, since he writes about events from his life that you'd like only know about from his other works. But for Conroy fans, this book is a fitting tribute to a man whose writing has made me laugh and cry in equal measure.
ESSENTIAL WARLOCK VOL. 1 by Jim Starlin, Roy Thomas, Chris Claremont, Gerry Conway, Gil Kane, John Buscema, et al.
Sometimes it just takes a character a while to come into his own. Adam Warlock's first appearance came in the pages of Fantastif Four as a cocooned, biologically engineered McGuffin known only as "Him." When he reappeared in Thor #165, he was still going by that less-than-descriptive name, but now at least had a body (though no costume). By the start of his adventures in Strange Tales, where this Essential volume begins, he had been scooped up by the godlike scientist and sometimes villain called the High Evolutionary, who gave him a name, a costume, and a purpose, to protect and cleanse Counter-Earth (a world virtually identical to Earth, albeit without superheroes) of evil. But not until Jim Starlin, Marvel's greatest cosmic storyteller, did Adam Warlock finally become the cosmic savior he is today. And let me tell you, the end result is, in this case, the best result.
As mentioned, this Essential volume actually does not begin with Warlock's debut, probably because it is so far removed from the character he'd become as to be virtually irrelevant. Instead, it picks up with Warlock's first solo stories in the pages of Strange Tales, told by Roy Thomas, Stan Lee's successor on virtually everything in the late 1960s-early 1970s. The story Thomas tells is a heavy-handed (very heavy-handed) Christian allegory, with Warlock serving as the exemplar and savior of Counter-Earth, ultimately dying and rising again so that they might live. The seeds of greatness are planted in these tales, but they are overwhelmed by Thomas's tendency to be way too on the nose with his allegorical writing (e.g. in the issue where Warlock sacrifices himself for Counter-Earth, he cries out in his death throes, "High Evolutionary, why do you forsake me?!")
When the reins were handed over to Jim Starlin, on both writing and art, the impact was immediate. For the majority of his time producing Warlock's issues, both in Strange Tales and the eponymous Warlock title, he was telling one overarching story about Warlock's attempts to alter a future that sees him transformed into the Magus, a dark mirror image of himself, the Antichrist to his Christ. These issues combine elements of hard sci-fi with space opera with mysticism, but never take themselves too seriously, a criticism I have of Thomas's run. For example, in the same issue where Starlin introduces the dark figure of the Magus, he also introduces Warlock's best friend and sidekick, Pip the Troll, a wisecracking, cigar-chomping...well, troll.
Toward the end of Starlin's run and stretching into a couple of crossovers with other Marvel heroes like the Avengers and Spider-Man, the villain shifts from the Magus to Thanos, Starlin's greatest creation. As big a threat as the Magus is, Thanos leaps off the page, and his appearances are the highlight of the book. Who could have known in 1977 that when he and Warlock faced each other again a decade later in The Infinity Gauntlet, it would form the basis of what will soon be one of the biggest movies of all time!
As you may have gathered, this is not really a superhero book, especially during Starlin's run. But, even for someone like me who doesn't typically enjoy the sci-fi genre, it is a compelling cosmic adventure, and well worth the time. The writing is charmingly bombastic (especially during Starlin's run), the art is crisp and detailed (especially during, you guessed it, Starlin's run), and the evolution of the character is fascinating even in its convolution. Glad I picked it up, and now I just may have to start collecting all Jim Starlin's Infinity crossovers to see what happens next to Warlock, Pip, Thanos, and company.
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