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The Chronicles of Narnia, Book Three, The Horse and His Boy

Nov4

In reading this book, I realized that, no, I’ve never actually read the whole thing before. For many, this is their favorite of the Chronicles of Narnia series. It was an enjoyable read, and pretty funny in parts, although I though the latter part dragged a bit, but then I always tend to think that about many stories.

The story largely takes place in Calormen, a neighboring country to Narnia with a strip of a country called Archenland between them. If Narnia represents English/Western culture, Calormen represent Arabia or Middle Eastern culture. As Narnia is our hero country, its culture is of course portrayed as superior to Calormen’s. This essentially connects to C.S. Lewis’s allegory that runs throughout the series that the lion Aslan who created Narnia is a stand in for Jesus. Because Calormen doesn’t follow Aslan, their culture is thus inferior. As a Christian, I can agree with then. Generally, cultures rooted in Christianity have more regard for human life, for example. Sadly, my own county and culture has been in hot pursuit of ungodly things for a long time.

The whole clash of countries and cultures really stood out to me in this book, as we have both our hero, Shasta, and his friend, Aravis, trying to espcape the country and culture they grew up in, desiring the peace and freedom that Narnia offers. We eventually find that Shasta is from Archenland by birth, and is royalty to boot. Although Archenland isn’t Narnia, their culture is closer to Narnia than Calormen’s and Aslan walks there. Calormen revolves around tyrants and slaves, forcing people to do things, etc., so it’s not surprising that those enslaved or forced to do things against their will would want to escape. Also, got a kick out of the Calormen’s referring to Narnian King Edmund as the “White Barbarian King,” and the ridiculous way Edmund and Susan talk.

The names in this book are spot on, especially Shasta–kept thinking of the soft drink–and the villain Rabadash. I had sympathy for the latter, the handsome, young prince, who for once couldn’t get his way. Aravis was great as well, smart and athletic, and of course she becomes BFFs with Lucy. Yes, that is the really cool part of The Horse and His Boy – we get to see Peter, Edmund, Susan, and Lucy in their time as the reigning kings and queens of Narnia. It’s great to see them as young adults and to think eventually they will go back to England and become children again. It’s great also to see Aslan show up at the end and see how defiant Rabadash is to the end, even against the great lion. He is to be pitied.

The talking horses Bree and Hwin were great and, for me, a lot more interesting than some of the talking animals in Narnia thus far. Their interactions and statements were often hilarious. And how clever to frame the story with the title The Horse and His Boy, rather than the Boy and His Horse. Gives us great insight into the talking horses and how they view themselves.

The desert trek was great, as was the mixup with Shasta and Corin, as was the whole thing with Queen Susan being wooed by Rabadash. She must have been so disappointed to find he wasn’t someone she could marry and only wanted to get control of Narnia. I suppose that’s a major drawback of being royalty, you’re not wanted for yourself much of the time. The whole journey through Archenland was where I kind of lost interest, and I didn’t quite get the purpose of the Hermit. Perhaps I will have to read it again sometime and start in the middle and keep my focus going. Again, the ending was great with Rabadash and Aslan and I love how Shasta and Aravis quarrel so much they end up getting married. Some couples really find enjoyment in arguing with each other.

All in all, I can see why for some this is their favorite Chronicles of Narnia book. It has a lot of adventure involved and we get to see many familiar faces. It’s also full of humor that both kids and adults can grasp and enjoy, and the allegory isn’t too overbearing.

The Chronicles of Narnia, Book Two, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Oct19

Like Agatha Christie, C.S. Lewis is great at describing the character of people, more than their appearance. Especially for new writers, it’s easy to get overly anxious about describing what the characters and people look like, rather than focusing on who they are and how they act. How someone looks is important, but how someone acts is more important, especially in a good story.

But that’s all just an aside. Today I will be reviewing The Chronicles of Narnia, book two, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, or LWW, because my typing fingers are tired today. The beginning of this book is a classic in fantasy. Is there any better beginning than Lucy hiding in the wardrobe and finding Narnia? It’s almost a cliche reference at this point, so engrained is it in western society. In the fairly recent movie remake of this by Disney this scene and also when Lucy meets Mr. Tumnus, the faun, they did almost perfectly. Whoever cast James McAvoy as Mr. Tumnus should be congratulated, as he is one of the best actors out there. Also, remember LWW was the first book written and published in the series, and an awesome beginning. I don’t think if The Magician’s Nephew had been published first the series would have been quite so popular. LWW has more action and thankfully lacks the creepy uncle.

Despite liking this book very much, there’s so much of the story that as a kid I found tedious and boring and as an adult as well. Always at the point when the kids reach the Beavers’ house everything slows down and I have to take a break from the book. Something about animals in stories, even talking ones bores me to tears. Although I like animals, I wouldn’t describe myself as an animal lover and have never owned a pet, so perhaps that is the heart of the problem.

More striking in the book and the series as a whole: Lewis does not shrink from blood, fighting, battle, none of it. And sometime’s it’s almost shocking to think this is in a “kids” book, but I like that it is, and it’s good that it is. It’s also refreshing to have the boys doing the big fighting here. The girls also do not insist on fighting to prove something for all women. Men are generally better and more interested in physical fighting than women are. That’s okay. We understand from Susan’s and Lucy’s characters that they are capable and willing to fight if necessary. Susan with her bow and arrows, Lucy with her faith and persistence. Lewis’s complete embrace of fantasy is also refreshing. It’s okay for fauns, satyrs, nyphms, etc., to exist, even in a “Christian” work.

Speaking of Christianity, although Aslan isn’t a perfect stand in for Jesus Christ, the lion is a great symbol of our Savior and his sacrifice for all mankind. Because we have such a strong sense of justice built into us, it is often hard to reconcile someone dying to save others. The “others” feel unworthy. That’s okay, we are unworthy, but our feelings of that should quickly just be gratitude. We can’t earn salvation and we’re not going to earn salvation and faith helps us make peace with those feelings. Edmund is saved and forgiven and becomes a stronger young man, one who easily thereafter steps into being a king of Narnia. I also like the picture of a lion to reference Christ because we all too often think of Jesus being harmless and really, he is the Son of God, the most powerful being in the universe, and although he is loving, he is also the most dangerous person in same universe.

Reading this book reminded me that I still haven’t ever tried Turkish Delight. I have always wondered what this wonderful dessert is that Edmund eats. Maybe it was common in England back when this story was written, but today in America it’s just not something really around. Perhaps it goes under a different name here. I don’t really know. Anyway, it’s on my bucket list of things to try. Now, if it was Tiramisu, I would instantly understand the addiction.

I still really like the idea of the White Witch and how she’s controlled Narnia for long, as I do the parts seeing when her power fails and things are beginning to melt, but Jadis just isn’t really as interesting a villain to me as she was in The Magician’s Nephew. Probably because I already know she’s going to fail and will only be a footnote in Narnia history thereafter. As a side note, the casting for the White Which in the Disney movie was so off, despite Tilda Swinton being a very good actress.

All in all, I enjoyed the LWW, but was really looking forward to book five, the Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The ending, however, is truly marvelous. The four siblings stay in Narnia and become kings and queens in it. They live there for years upon years–who know how many year–and then one day rediscover the lamppost stuck in the ground and then the back of the wardrobe that leads back to our world. Upon arriving, they are kids again, and it’s only a few seconds or minutes since they left! They quickly revert back to being kids again, but their adult lives in Narnia are sort of always with them, maybe like our courage and strength in our daydreams are always with us, too. I sorta like the ridiculous way they talk as adults in Narnia. I mean, if one is going to be a king or queen in a fantasyland, one has to do it right and completely.

The Chronicles of Narnia, Book One, The Magician’s Nephew

Oct14

In my rereading of The Chronicles of Narnia, I just finished book six and am onto book seven, so might as well begin my reviews. C.S. Lewis doesn’t disappoint. He has such great ways of describing things and was also such a thinker of his time, but also a forward, big picture, thinker. Both are reflected in his writing.

The Magician’s Nephew

Copyrighted 1955. This is actually the second book Lewis wrote in The Chronicles of Narnia, but in order of the series timeline, the first. It is the creation story of Narnia. This one has always been in my top three of the Narnia books and even now, I’m still not sure if I like this or The Silver Chair better. This is the story of how Digory and his neighbor Polly run into Digory’s wicked uncle and end up in fantasyland.

Although there’s something about this story that always feels unformed to me, I think it works in the series as a whole, for on the one hand the plot is merely a precursor to the the next book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. On the other hand, in it’s own right The Magician’s Nephew deals very well with sin and evil. As the series is a Christian allegory, the sins of Digory, Uncle Andrew, and the rest are fully on display here, echoing the fall of humanity into sin in the Garden of Eden. It’s a good foreshadowing of more mistakes, temptations, and evil to come with the rest of the series, but also the promise that Aslan, a stand-in for God, or more specifically, for Jesus Christ, will reconcile everything and make it good again.

The magic green and yellow rings always fascinated me in this book, as did the long row of houses and how Polly and Digory move from one to the other in the attics and accidentally find Uncle Andrew’s office. Speaking of him, Uncle Andrew is seriously creepy! It’s an entirely different experience looking at him from an adult perspective rather than the child and young adult I was when I first read the series. He’s a gamma if there ever was one, even later thinking that the witch, Jadis, would fall in love with him. What a riot! Even to the end, he calls her a “dem fine woman.” Today he would totally be a male feminist. Uncle Andrew’s also so proud to be a super special secret magician, not once considering that just because one can do something, doesn’t mean that should do something. He perfectly embodies the mad scientists of today with their gain of function research and other monstrous experiments. Ironically, Uncle Andrew is important. Without him, the rest of the series wouldn’t have happened. Just as if Adam and Even hadn’t fallen, our great awesome salvation story wouldn’t have happened? Well, it’s interesting to think about, anyway.

The dying world Jadis comes from is interesting in its emptiness and of course Digory just has to ring that bell. I would be the same. It would be too tempting. As for the new world just beginning, I love the way Lewis describes Aslan and the creation of Narnia here. It’s a cool way to picture what the creation of our own world might have looked like.

Jadis is a haughty, evil diva. She is a more worthy opponent than evil guys like Uncle Andrew. She is through and through a villain. So is Andrew, but he’s so pitiful, one would rather just avoid him. Okay, now I can’t decide which kind of evil is worse, the one one you know you should confront right away, or the one that is awful, but doesn’t seem worth fighting, at least at first. Both have their place and both have been used throughout the world’s history.

I also like how Lewis embraces fantasy–really embraces it with all the weird creatures, not thinking them bad or wrong, but they could possibly exist. God could/could have create/d the and that would be just fine. Great, even. He can embrace it, because he has a good root, a sure faith in the real world and truth. I also like how humble people like cabbies can become kings. And what an awesome origin story for the lamppost!

As for the overly religious part: I like how Lewis deals a bit with the Tree of Life and how later Aslan tells Digory that if he had given some to his mother both would have regretted it. We don’t often really seriously think about what would have happened if Adam and Eve had eaten from the Tree of Life after Eating from the Tree of Knowledge. Imagine the constantly degrading world, constantly decaying, one’s body decaying and giving out and then not even being able to die. A whole different ball of wax than what we have now. In The Magician’s Nephew, Digory ultimately resists the temptation. This is a test from Aslan, a way to right Digory’s wrong of bringing Jadis to this world. I am happy he passes the test. I wish we could all pass the tests given to us, but it takes great faith, courage, and humbleness. The sacrifice of God necessary to truly atone for sin, Lewis leaves, or rather, wrote first in the second book that introduces us to the future kings and queens of Narnia: Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy.

And, cooly, Lewis slips in that Digory is The Professor in the next book and how the wood from Narnia was made into the magical wardrobe from The Lion, the Witch, and the….

Ignorance is Death: Plague of Corruption Book Review

Sep8

Oftentimes we think of corruption as a minor ailment in our society. The saying is that power corrupts, right? Anyone in a position of power is likely to be a bit corrupt, that is, a bit selfish and looking out only for themselves and their own interests, and their own agendas. And while it is true that in a sinful world we can never stamp out corruption completely, we should still be smart enough to understand that it shouldn’t be tolerated. Corruption isn’t just a rot slowly eating away at something, no, it is the complete distortion of something. A corrupt government, for example, is not a government, but a different entity entirely. A government governs, a corrupt government destroys a country.

Plague of Corruption by Dr. Judy Mikovits and Kent Heckenlively deals specifically with corruption in healthcare and science. This corruption is horrifying, but really not surprising considering that almost every level of our society is now corrupt. Almost every institution in America, and other countries as well, is doing the complete opposite of what they were created for. Selfishness doesn’t adequately describe it, and it’s certainly not a minor ailment. What this book describes is abominable on so many levels. Health care is so far from being about health that the question arises: What exactly is the purpose of the health care industry now today? Science, too. Whatever “science” is that people love so *&^% much, it’s not the observation of the real world and how it works. And it’s certainly not about asking questions.

This book was a good read, but the latter half is much better than the first. The authors take their time and use a roundabout way to get us to the destination. I enjoyed the second half largely because I was familiar with much of the information already and was intrigued to see it all fit together with the information from the start of the book. Mikovits begins with a harrowing tale that could easily be a crime show segment or something from a John Grisham novel. Those already skeptical of what’s coming would at this point perhaps roll their eyes and put down the book. But if they did that they would be missing a great deal. Not missing so much the information this book gives, but the questions it raises. Questions we should all be asking now and questions we or our great-greats should have been asking from the beginning. Ignorance is not bliss, as the saying goes. Ignorance is death.

My brother-in-law is fond of saying that babies are stupid. From one perspective, yes, they are; from another, babies are simply ignorant, and that is why for the first few years of life a parent’s number one job is to keep their child alive. Parents have to teach their kids about all the ways they could die and how to avoid them. Babies will really stick their fingers in an outlet, because why not? Babies are so cute and innocent, and as adults we can aspire to be like that because it’s good, but we should never aspire to ignorance. As this book shows. Ignorance equals death, if not for ourselves, perhaps for future generations.

As you can already tell this is going to be a lengthy review. I have a lot of thoughts about the material and there’s just so much to unpack in the book and about Mikovits’s story. She is a scientist that began work in 1980s largely dealing with retroviruses, cancer, and the like. She and her colleague, Dr. Frank Ruscetti, who was a founder of the retrovirus field, and isolated XMRV, or Xenotropic Murine Leukemia Virus, and its connection to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Yes that Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. The most famous retrovirus is HIV and the book has much to say about that, too, and the corrupt Dr. Fauci.

As the book unfolds, it describes corruption in science, corruption in the law, corruption in government, corruption in testimony for the government’s vaccine court, which few know exists, but the heart of the matter is the physical manifestation of all of this corruption: Vaccines. Vaccines don’t equal dollar signs so much as they equal power, and absolute power at that. This book was written just before COVID hit and it’s obvious how all of the corruption and problems Mikovits describes are directly correlated to the medical tyranny we see today, right down to that dapper little Fauci.

So what’s wrong with vaccines, exactly? That’s the wrong question. Maybe the question should really be, what’s right about them? Mikovits takes one component: animal cell lines used in the manufacturing of vaccines and other medical research, and explains in detail the harm just that one thing in a jab is doing to the human body. Or could be doing to the human body. The staggering thing is, we really don’t know the affects and/or damage. Mikovits would encourage further study. Who knows, maybe further study would reveal more about what’s right in vaccines?

In her career, Mikovits came across quite a few instances where it was clear that these retroviruses were from animals and had been passed onto humans somehow. Each time she questioned a medical source, whether growth hormones given to cows, or vaccines given to people, she ran into trouble. Questioning these things is not allowed. Basically our corrupt institutions know quite well that these things are damaging people. They know exactly what they are doing and either they simply don’t want to get caught or they just don’t care. The animal cell lines used in manufacturing vaccines are directly related to HIV, XMRV, and other retroviruses and they are being passed to us, into our bodies are doing damage, causing AIDS, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and who knows what else.

“We are mixing animal and human tissue in laboratory cultures, then injecting them into human beings in a way that bypasses their traditional defenses, such as stomach acid breaking down pathogens.” – p. 124

Not only that, but we are injecting several pathogens at once with complete ignorance of what that combo does to the human body. In addition, we have no idea what injecting multiple pathogens along with animal cells, human cells, and the host of other poisons and chemicals also in vaccines actually does to the human body. How is this at all considered either safe or good for one’s health? I say ignorance, because it’s true. No one wants to know, not so many of the patients, or the doctors, or the health officials, or the scientists. When a person has a health problem after getting a vaccine, the vaccine being even a possible cause is across the universe in most people’s minds. When the CDC does a study on autism and vaccines and finds there is a connection that they should study further, they instead destroy the evidence. For some strange reason vaccines are considered a holy thing. A perfect creation made by humanity, far superior to the immune system that God gave us. Far superior to any medicinal plant God created. Sometime it’s like something beyond ignorance or even brainwashing of the general public. It’s a spell. If there ever really was an actual spell on people, this, to me, is it, this unquestioning acceptance of all things vaccine.

It’s only now, with COVID that more and more people are actually starting to question vaccines. And evil is showing its stupidity in forcing the vaccine, causing even more to question not only its effectiveness, but especially its safety. The stories Mikovits shares of people suffering, really suffering from vaccines and the disease and autoimmune disorders they have brought, are heartbreaking, as is the callousness of the powers that be. There are plenty of doctors and scientists who are not corrupt, who do want to, and can actually help. It’s just that they all have been and are now so often silenced from the public discourse.

Mikovits mentions her faith in God a few times in the book, but the fact that she ends in hope speaks volumes as well. She has hope that all this immune dysfunction people have now from vaccines can be remedied. Among the remedies, she mentions diets like keto and also practicing fasting. I cheered at that. So many people are finding better health by doing and especially eating the opposite of what their doctors tell them. Is it possible for corruption to simply fail when no one’s buying into it any longer? I hope so, I really do. People are waking up to the truth, and it has been a very slow process, but the tyrannical overreach has hastened things along considerably. That’s a strange thing to be grateful for, but I am.

No matter what side you’re on when it comes to health and science, I think Dr. Mikovits’s story is important and this book worth reading. We should be able to agree that both health and science need major cleanups for the good of future generations. We should be able to agree that people asking questions should not be silenced, but listened to. We should be able to agree that in matters of especially health, people need good information to make their decisions, and also that it is their decision. We should agree that those in power in both health and science need to be held to account. Again, ignorance is not bliss, it’s death, the death of our health, the death of our society, the death of even the knowledge that we’ve collected. If science cannot be questioned, then it is no longer science, but a cult or religion. Even God himself allows questions, invites them, even.

Not sure how many times I used the word “corrupt” in this review, but, whew, it was a lot. Plague of Corruption showcases how corruption is a plague on almost every aspect and institution supposed to keep us safe. This, I knew, and this we all know on some level, but Mikovits’s story really brings it home with all the connections from her research from the 1980s until now. A good read and thought provoking, giving many aspects to go and research for oneself, if one so chooses, and hopefully many have and do.

Until next time! –Pixie

RRR: The Duchess and the Devil

Aug31

As you can tell by the title, this Regency Romance was ta-cky! By Sydney Ann Clary and published by Zebra Books. This was a second printing in 1991, copyrighted 1988. Surprisingly, this is the first of this box that has actually been a smutty romance novel. I half-expected most of the them to be smutty and was happily surprised when they weren’t. Eh, it would only have been a loss of $5, anyway. Because written porn is just as bad as the visual kind, I did not finish the book, but I do have some comments, so enjoy.

Clary is a great writer and storyteller. A lot of romance novelists are, but romance is given such a bad rap, not many maybe know this. It’s the smut that does them in, I’m pretty sure. Also, the majority of the stories follow the exact same formula: Man and woman meet, hate each other, then like each other, then fall in love. Why this is exciting over and over again, I can’t really explain, but there’s just something satisfying about either winning the other person or both winning each other together.

Our hero in The Duchess and the Devil is Deveril St. John, the Duke of Castleton. He’s tall, dark, and handsome, and has a temper and mommy issues. Groan. His mom’s a totally harlot. Double groan. Our heroine is Bryony Balmaine, also tempestuous, and used to doing as she pleases. Both are connected to her uncle, Lord Ravensly, who somehow gets each to promise to marry the other.

I’m sure that farther into the book the two do actually fall in love, but the fighting, fighting, fighting was just so irritating here. In everyday life this would be exhausting. Bryony is very annoying. Refusal of common sense just to refuse. Blah. Worse, Deveril forces himself on Bryony and later, though at least they are married, he thinks it’s ok to bed her while she totally out of it. I mean, he didn’t actually have a bottle of the date rape drug, but he might as well have. And this is our hero?

Due to his woman issues, Deveril also assumes that Bryony is basically a prostitute or has slept with many men. He concludes this simply because she had an poor and unconventional life in France. Deveril is a jerk. Any man who assumes this about a women is a jerk. Any woman who assumes the same about a man is a jerk. Thus, Deveril thinks Bryony is experienced enough that he doesn’t need to be gentle! Seriously, I can’t even.

He even says, and I quote: “Only a woman would risk further injury to herself to protect her virtue.” Doubtful that only women are concerned with virtue, but casting that aside, Deveril, dear, sometimes virtue is the only thing we woman have! And it should be considered as gold. It used to be considered as gold.

I’m sure as the story goes on, both behave better, but I didn’t really care to find out and had to retreat to an Agatha Christie mystery to recover. Christie’s great, because although her romances happen rather quickly in her stories, they are actually romantic.

Anyway, tacky, tacky, tacky! Did not finish.

Book Review: Speaking Boldly

Aug19

As I am not super consistent with my devotions and Bible study, it took me a lot longer to get through Speaking Boldly: Sharing God’s Word Every Day than planned. Written by Edward O. Grimenstein, Speaking Boldly is about just that, instructing and encouraging Christians to speak God’s Word in their everyday lives. And, being published through Concordia, it’s a book from a Lutheran religious perspective.

I liked this book because it can be used for devotion and Bible study and it’s also really simple, breaking everything down to show why we don’t need to be at all afraid of speaking God’s Word in this world. The biggest point Grimenstein makes is that God’s Word is God’s. It’s not ours, and if those we share it with insult or mock us, it is really God that they are insulting and mocking. What makes the Word powerful, is exactly that it is God’s Word. Salvation and forgiveness of sins were never humanity’s idea. If we conceive of salvation at all, there’s only one way: A person must work his or her way into heaven. That’s about our extent of imagination on the subject. Generally, the reality that any good works we do can never make up for the sinful marks that we bear is brushed aside. Humans often ignore the truth or do not know the truth, so that necessarily limits our imagination.

Fortunately, God isn’t limited in this way, and He had a better plan, to send His Son Jesus Christ in our place to live a holy life, a perfect God-Man being who did every right thing that we could not and even remembered to do every right thing we forgot. But even that wasn’t enough: Jesus’ righteousness had to pass on to us, in order for us to benefit from it. Jesus took on the punishment we deserved and died once for the whole world. He died in our place and suffered hell and ultimate separation from God himself. And then Jesus rose from the dead to show that He had defeated death, hell, and the devil, and that now peace reigns between God and Man. We are forgiven, truly forgiveness, for what we have done, and we are right with God. It is literally the most amazing thing this universe has or will ever have witnessed. It is the ultimate sacrifice and the ultimate love.

Anyway, all of that, all of that history, that Word, it’s God’s, not ours, and it is far older than this age, and we shouldn’t be afraid to speak it confidently and boldly to our fellow man. It is this Word of this forgiveness and salvation that everyone in the world needs to hear. Speaking Boldly begins by going through Creation and the wonderful news of salvation, and then digs into the definitions and uses of God’s Law and Gospel. Sometimes people are in a place where they need to hear the Law, as they need to come to repentance. Sometimes they need to hear the Gospel as comfort for when they are repentant or when they need comfort.

In our modern world, we often avoid talking about things like spirituality and religion, so how on earth is a Christian to even bring up Law or Gospel with anyone? Speaking Boldly goes through it step by step, but basically we must form genuine relationships for the speaking to even happen. And Grimenstein says the best way to relate to people is to listen to them, to really listen. Put down the smart devices, turn off the TV, forget about what you’re doing, and really listen to the person in front of you. If we listen well, it will become clear to us what we are to say, if we need to share Law or Gospel or both. Christians really listening will instantly distinguish us from the rest of the world. Instant light, instant salt.

Although in the past year I have become better, I am not a particularly patient person. Once upon a time, I used to be a very good listener, but lost it. Because it’s a skill that involves being around people, that’s perhaps why I lost it, becoming too involved in watching shows and reading books, plus the addition of living alone. When one is not around people, it’s easy to forget how to relate to them. This year I have been trying to do better at listening, and the results are amazing. Connections are made where there were none or fizzled ones before. Having patience is basically about time: Make it not exist when you are with other people. We can’t always do it fully, and it depends much on the situation and circumstances, but it becomes its own reward, being a great way to learn how people think and learn more about what they need and want. And most everyone wants some level of hope, love, and forgiveness, and that’s where we can step in to share God’s Word.

Grimenstein spends awhile on listening, as it’s just that important. Just like a doctor is no good if she doesn’t listen to what her patients are telling her, neither are we good if we don’t listen, either. It is vital for us to know when to share Law and when to share Gospel. Later on, he discusses other aspects to consider using the parable of the Sower and the Seed from Luke. There are a number of reasons why God’s Word is not received well or even rejected by those that hear it, and it’s more complicated than that they simply don’t believe. It’s important to understand what people are dealing with, their cares and concerns in the world, if they are believers, if they are being mocked or persecuted for their faith, or if they are simply not grasping that God’s Word and salvation is for them personally. Even Christians sometimes doubt that we’ll be in heaven. In those times, we desperately need a fellow Christian to speak the Gospel to us.

For the last chapter, Grimenstein discusses when the world “talks back.” He goes through many of the ways that right from the get-go, the world prevents us from speaking God’s Word and how to address that. The first thing, again, is that it’s not our word, but God’s. Salvation is real and should give us the ultimate confidence and boldness, for we are not speaking for ourselves, but for God who loves us far better than any human can comprehend. It’s more than okay if we lose our own lives in the speaking of God’s Word. We are but a mist on this earth, and then we are gone. Heaven is eternal, and that is where our true, eternal lives will be led someday, though I can scarcely comprehend what that will be like.

I realized reading this book that I need to improve on listening to people, but it also hit home that my everyday speaking needs to improve also. A great majority of the time I am among Christians, fellow Lutherans, and the Law and Gospel aren’t as much of our speaking as they could be. What Grimenstein is talking about is not just talking to people, but having heart to hearts with people, making things matter in the ways that they should. The examples he uses are fitting, and a couple of them surprised me–the possible depth of the conversations surprised me. I live in Minnesota. We’re “nice” and often don’t talk about things when we should talk about them. Worse, sometimes that evolves into being passive-aggressive, an underlying malice underneath that nice veneer. Shudder. It can be a difficult wall to break down, but, boy, is it worth it when it is broken down. Even so, it’s not talking about “things” that’s so important, but talking about our Salvation and Justification, our forgiveness of sins and why Heaven is obtainable for everyone. It’s not about us, it’s about God and what He has done for us in saving us.

This is a great book for either group or personal study. It’s not glamorous, but simple, in a good way. And it showcases how God so often uses imperfect people to get his message across. So many of those stories are in the Bible for us to consider. Humanity’s history is intricately tied up with God. That history is written down for us so that we can emblazon it on our hearts and speak boldly the truth of God’s Word.

Dr. Mütter’s Marvels: Book Review

Jul20

After reading a mystery story about a cabinet of curiosities, Dr. Mütter’s Marvels, A True Tale of Intrigue and Innovation at the Dawn of Modern Medicine, was a good next nonfiction read. This book is by Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz, and not only is it a fascinating tale, but the book is very artistically designed.

Thomas Dent Mütter was a famous surgeon in Philadelphia, 1811-1859, at a time when surgery and medicine were a free-for-all. One didn’t have to have a medical license to practice, and surgery itself was positively barbaric compared to today. Mutter, who later added the umlaut affectation to his name, was quite a character, brilliant to his students, compassionate to his patients, and a true innovator, especially in the field of plastic surgery. He often worked on the poor unfortunates whose defects and deformities no one else would touch. O’Keefe Aptowicz visited his famous museum in Philadelphia as a child and became so fascinated by him that she ended up researching his life and writing this story.

What an amazing story it was too read! All the infighting between doctors and surgeons and all out in public, the dramatic and bombastic medical lectures, the competition between the University of Philadelphia (America’s first medical school) and Jefferson Medical College, the weirdness of Mütter, who often wore silk suits to surgery, and his colleagues like Charles D. Meigs, the differences in experience from Paris to Philadelphia, the amazing surgeries and cases–this story would make an awesome TV show. Meigs could even be the villain in the piece, but he’s more to be pitied than anything else. Sometimes time passes people by, sometimes people don’t change with the times when really they should.

Doctors and surgeons are not gods; neither is the medical industry infallible. In the early 1800s, perhaps the mistakes made in medicine can be excused somewhat, as everything was just getting started with regulating and licensing and all that, but in many ways doctors and medicine have not changed. Even today there are big controversies and differences of opinions in the field, and as it was then, the doctors that don’t fit the industry narrative are silenced as much as possible. It’s sad that more aren’t willing to let all opinions be heard, but that’s they way it so often is with many things. That Mütter made any change is remarkable, and it seems to me he was blessed by God in this, but also that God had him born at the right time, a time when people were willing to change and to consider change. Near the end of his life, America went through a Civil War over slavery, that’s how much things were changing. Today, it’s tempting to think we’ve figured things out medically, but it wasn’t so long ago that most did not know or did not believe that infection and disease could be transmitted by not washing ones hands. Meigs was one such surgeon and refused to change. How many died by his hand when they didn’t need to? It’s a sobering thought. How many die today at the hands of medical professionals who refuse to looks at standards of care that are doing just the opposite for their patients? Fortunately, there are always some, like Mütter, who are true forward thinkers, people with genuine smarts and common sense.

The most striking aspect to me about Mütter was his compassion for the patients–the time he took to get them used to what would happen in the surgery in a time when the only anesthesia was wine, the quickness with which he performed his cutting and stitching, and his brilliant idea of installing aftercare. He really brought the “care” into medical care. It’s mind boggling now to think that patients were given wine and held down for a surgery or amputation and forced to go through with he surgery no matter what, then dumped into a bumpy carriage to recover at home, all performed in front of hundreds of medical students. Compassionate care is more or less standard in America today, though we still have a long ways to go, too. So, so many people are sick today, especially with things like cancer and chronic illness, that it’s too easy to start treating patients like numbers. That’s what I see with vaccines and COVID, the patients are numbers and everyone wants a part of the staggering amounts of money being thrown in at both things. There are doctors who very clearly disagree with the narrative, who have tried explaining that COVID is fairly easy to treat, that it’s not the worst thing since the Black Plague, and that for most a vaccine isn’t even necessary. A step beyond that, there thankfully are many medical professionals also decrying the hasty use of the COVID experimental vaccines, calling attention to the concerning reactions and side effects. As in Mütter’s day, they are purposefully being drowned out, but not for long, I think, for the truth does will out.

Take anesthesia, a new innovation in Mütter’s time, and something that actually bypassed the need for his brand of surgery preparation, which was to meet for weeks with he patient touching and massaging the area to be cut open, so that they wouldn’t be afraid when the surgery finally happened. Instead of being angry about it, however, Mütter embraced the technology, knowing that if it was better for the patient, it would be better for the surgeons too. He also stressed that for the doctor and surgeon, a surgery should be a last and best step–most all other avenues should be tried first. This is a big way we fail today. Surgeries are recommended today so often as to make them routine. Perhaps this should not be. Perhaps there are other ways and better ways to heal. I think of the experience people have had changing their diet, going on keto or carnivore. Much of their inflammation and distress disappears. The truth is getting out there, little by little, especially as people perhaps now have less money to spend on expensive surgeries, but it’s still only a precious few doctors that really embrace these cheaper means.

This story is a great read and of course whatever one’s experience in the medical field, different aspects will resonate more keenly. What I got out of it, would not be what you get out of it. What a fun trip it would be to go to Philadelphia someday and see Mütter’s museum and all of the curiosities collected there. It is amazing that even today we really don’t know sometimes what causes odd growths and deformities on a person. God’s creation is complex and we have a long way to go.

RRR: The Grand Passion

Jul15

And so, we come to another Regency Romance Review! This one is The Grand Passion by Elizabeth Mansfield. Although I didn’t like this one nearly as much as the wonderful The Fifth Kiss by Mansfield, I read the whole thing and enjoyed it. If I get any more Regency Romances from thrift stores, she is now an author I will look for. This book was published by Jove in 1986.

The plot has a good hook right at the beginning: We are introduced to the newly engaged Matthew John Lotherwood, Marquis (above a count and below a duke) of Bradbourne. He’s a party his aunt is having, and for entertainment she’s hired a fortune teller. Although he doesn’t believe in that stuff, Matt ends up getting a reading anyway, and the fortune teller says he will soon be married, but not to the woman he is engaged to. Instead, she points out a different young woman to him, tall, with short, dark hair, and blue, mesmerizing eyes. With that as his first introduction to the heroine of our story, there was no way Matt was walking away from this without falling in love with her. No way. As an aside, I didn’t like the name Lotherwood and wished all throughout to change it. It just didn’t seem fitting.

Next we are introduce to Tess Brownlow, the heroine, and a lady who lives in the country. She, too, gets engaged, though with misgivings, as she doesn’t feel as much love as she should for Jeremy Beringer. Her mother has pumped her with stories of what love and romance are all about, that a woman must have at least one “grand passion.” Tess isn’t sure what her mother means by this, but she’s sure she hasn’t experienced it yet. Sadly, she never gets to find out if what she feels for Jeremy will ever turn into a grand passion, for the night before their wedding, he is killed in an awful stagecoach accident. Months later, Tess is still stewing over this and tries to find out who the driver of the coach was. The man wasn’t a real stagecoach driver, but a member of the gentry, drunk with drink, and also part of the four-in-hand club, or FHC. Basically, the members of that club are expert drivers of horse-drawn everything. The gentlemen insisted on driving the coach that night. Tess eventually learns this man’s name was Lotherwood and she is determined to make him pay for what he did.

Tess’s idea is ridiculous, although it is very much punishment fitting the crime: Get the man to fall in love with her and then fake her death the night before their wedding. She engages the help of her friend in London to help carry out her plan, and hires the fortune teller to give a very special reading to Matt Lotherwood. Matt’s rich aunt, Lady Wetherfield is also in on the scheme, as she doesn’t like who’s he’s picked for a bride, so, yeah, no chance for the poor guy. Tess is introduced to him as Sidoney Ashburton.

Everything goes according to plan, except that it doesn’t. That is to say, Matt instantly becomes smitten by her, leaving his bride-to-be, who’s really nothing more than a placeholder to him. He’s happy that Viola Lovell is pretty and accomplished, but not a woman he can “lose his head over.” He’s proud to be a Corinthian, a man young, rich, handsome, and interested primarily in sport and gaming. Even so, because Matt is the one who proposed to Viola, society says he can’t go back on his offer: Only the girl has the choice to end the engagement. I’m trying to imagine any modern man submitting to such a rule…oh dear. But men truly are about honor, so my bet is few of them would really propose to a woman without planning to follow through. Yes, the plan works, Matt falls in love, but so does Tess! This, she doesn’t expect, and she falls in love even though she knows he must be a drunkard and murderer.

Yes, you guessed it, Matt is her grand passion. And yet she seems to not be able to put two and two together. Matt never gets drunk around her or behaves drunkenly. In fact, he saves her from a drunken lout, and mentions with some embarrassment that he himself has been drunk before. But everything about him indicates that that is something that must have happened far in the past, long before the stagecoach accident. Despite now being in love with her quarry, Tess stubbornly insists on carrying out her plan, thinking this drunken lout and murderer must be punished. Her friends relay to Matt her sudden death under the wheels of a stagecoach and she retires back to the country despondent and depressed because she doesn’t have her man. And Matt, reeling in shock and grief-stricken, becomes depressed as well. Why do people do this to themselves? Ah, but then we wouldn’t have a story.

Eventually, the truth comes out. Tess’s mother takes her abroad, hoping to cheer her spirits and who should she happen upon, but a drunken lout going by the name of Lotherwood, although it’s not Matthew. Yes, yes, Matt has a younger brother named Guy, and although he clearly hasn’t kicked his alcoholism, he is truly sorry for what he did, causing the death of Tess’s fiancee, Jeremy. Tess’s reaction to all this is revulsion. Revulsion at herself for planning out a punishment that she now realizes is worse than the crime.

It’s only through a similar chance encounter that Matt finds out the truth–and when he’s does he’s boiling mad, and I don’t blame him. His eventual confrontation with Tess is accusatory. What right had she to act as judge, jury, and sentencer without him even knowing he was accused? Without even hearing what he would have had to say? He’s right, and Tess is doubtful of ever getting him back, as she really does love him. He rightly tells her that he would never do something like that to someone he loves. True, men have honor; women often don’t. Oh, we have other good attributes, but honor isn’t really one of them. It’s a good thing Tess doesn’t have honor, for otherwise she wouldn’t get him back. And of course she gets him back, because that’s how these stories go.

This time she takes up the name Annie and becomes a servant in his large estate house, helping Matt in any way she can to be more comfortable and successful in his house and efforts to improve and protect the estate. Good thing all her suggestions are the right ones and she has a knack for knowing how to assist in what he needs, or she’d really be up a creek. When he finally realizes that “Annie” is actually Tess, Matt is boiling mad again, but not for long. He really does love Tess, too, and I think all her crazy schemes kind of excite him, despite him lecturing her to stop taking on assumed names and roles. Really, their “grand passion” is physical chemistry, which is so often what it really boils down to, isn’t it? But, the two went through a lot together, and sometimes a journey like that will cement things in a way nothing else can.

As for Viola, Matt’s former betrothed, she’s at least smart enough to know that he doesn’t really want her and that it’s better to be “married to a viscount who truly desires you than a marquis who feels trapped.” Thus, she moves on to Matt’s friend, the viscount, who admires only her and truly cares for her, too. She can also be herself around him without being belittled–Matt has always seen her as beneath him, a placeholder who is pretty and just someone to get married to because he has to get married to someone as some point. The viscount is also very rich, handsome in his way, and “more easily controlled.” Ha. If only Matt knew the controlling side of Viola, it may have actually increased his impression of her. She has calculated exactly what she wants in a man and in marriage. I do agree with her that it’s better to be with a man who wants you, who truly wants you and loves you. Like her, I don’t think it necessarily has to be a “grand passion,” but everything probably works a lot better if both parties in the couple have passion for each other.

A good read, and I look forward to reading more of Mansfield’s stories. Also, Tess is oh, so tacky. I mean, with her imagination, she could almost be a writer or something…

Up next time: A review of Dr. Mütter’s Marvels.

Half-Book Review: Unwind

Jul11

Being a fan of Neal Schusterman’s Arc of a Scythe series, the third book of which I have yet to read, I wanted to try another of his series. Schusterman likes weighty moral topics and is a great writer for young adults. Not many authors are truly able to write YA. It’s a delicate balance between being too childish and too adult. He succeeds by simply treating his characters as people, and giving them introspection without navel gazing. Although teens and toddlers are the ages of humans in which we are most likely to act the most immature and the most selfish, these are stages of life, not a place where any human stays. Toddlers grow out of their tantrums and teens eventually get a handle on their hormones and emotions. Basically, I like that Schusterman doesn’t dwell so much on the kids being teens as he does on the societies in which they find themselves.

I really loved Unwind, but only got halfway through. Right now the topic is just too heavy for me. Unwind is set in an alternate America where there was a Heartland War with the pro-life people fighting the prochoice people. Yes, as in for or against abortion. Really don’t know why the abortionists get a pass with “prochoice.” The stance is really pro-death, not really about having more choices. Certainly not more choices for the babies in question. Anyway, in this war, the pro-life side basically ended up losing. A compromise was made that is a mockery of honoring life. Abortion is now illegal–unwed mothers and/or fathers, and or married/unmarried couples who conceive a child are required to complete the pregnancy and bring the baby into the world, caring for it as they should. However, once a child reaches the teenage years, their life is suddenly forfeit. The parents or guardians can sign away their lives, marking them to be “unwound,” or all of their body parts used in transplants to other younger or older people who need them.

This plot immediately brought to mind Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, as it deals with a similar world and plot: Clones are raised to be come organ and limb donors and everyone pretends this is okay. As the teens in Unwind are not clones, and still live and interact with supposedly loving parents who decide to unwind them, Schusterman’s world strains credulity a bit more than Ishiguro’s does. However, when considering the topic of abortion and the atrocities done to those babies, not only murdering them, but murdering them for body parts and research to improve the lives of older people not denied life, Schusterman’s world could be possible if the love of most for human life continues to grow colder and colder.

The most terrifying thing about reading this book was how normal everything was, how legal, how every i of the law was dotted, how every t was crossed. But of course that’s how it works with psychos who want to take life. Psychopaths will say they talked too loud or something, psychopath abortionists will say the babies are unwanted, or won’t live full lives. Same with euthanasia advocates. And then once the abomination is sufficiently normalized, the dotting and crossing doesn’t matter so much, and Schusterman gives us evidence of that in this world, too, as pretty much any teen can be unwound for most any reason, and one can guess that things didn’t start out that way. Even religion is in on the scam, pretending some teens to be unwound are “tithes” or “offerings,” presumably to the God Creator, but it never actually said, though the religion seems nominally Christian. Could be a revival of any number of ancient religions that practiced child sacrifice. Nothing new under the sun.

The biggest legal framework still in place with this open season on human life is the age definition. You can only kill teens, not before age 13, and not after 18. And in this way the society can pretend it still values life. And, I’m getting so worked up already, which I why I just couldn’t take anymore of this story for now.

It’s a difficult topic. There are unwanted children. There just are, and what to do with them is tricky. Do other people, not their biological parents have a responsibility towards them? Does society? Unwind takes this question a step further, do legal parents have a responsibility to raise teens to full adulthood? Does society have responsibility towards unwanted teens? They get away with all this in justifying their actions due to the teens’ behavior. Many of the teens marked to be unwound are juvenile delinquents or belligerent in some way. (One would think uncooperative teenagers were a new invention). Eugenics is put into practice by trying to weed out undesirable behaviors from society, but then there’s a requirement that all body parts of the unwinds must be transplanted and/or used on a living human being. It’s just bizarre and totally fitting, for once regard for human life is thrown out the window, everything is permissible, including illogical double think. And most likely the teens are going to find that nobody’s really following the rules. That’s it’s a free-for-all.

This book hit closer to home than the Arc of a Scythe series. Scythe, for right now, seems something truly of fantasy, but Unwind…oh, boy, it’s possible. Heartbreakingly possible. There’s a great part in the book where some of these kids marked to be unwound discuss when they think life begins. Like many, they conclude they just don’t know, but people conveniently pretend not to know things when they don’t want to deal with reality. Life begins at conception. Before conception, there is no life. It’s really not that hard, but in this society, and in ours, too, we’ve fallen so far away from actual science and truth, that it’s easy to think we really just don’t know the answer to some things. But, if we truly don’t know the answer, why not err on the side of caution? Why not err on the side of life, not death? In this society they have in part, they’ve made abortion illegal, but in wanting to stop a war, they’ve made an even bigger error by allowing the mass murder of those in a certain age group. If they were smarter, they would have picked an age group that’s not so volatile. But of course, it’s really about the body part harvesting, and for that to work the best, the young must be used.

It is my opinion that those on the side of life should not compromise with those on the side of death. Pro-death is evil. We shouldn’t compromise with evil. Even to stop a war. War is preferable to a society like this. War is often necessary to fight evil, and it’s something we forget. Time and time again I see those who are supposedly on the side of good compromise with those on the side of evil. I’m sure I’ve done it myself–go along to get along. It is a truly cowardly sin. And society moves more and more away from God instead of towards him.

Someday I hope to come back to this series and see how it plays out. Really like the life topics that Schusterman focuses on in his stuff. It makes one thing, really think about the logic and emotions behind life and death issues and human rights. Do the characters become solidly pro-life, wanting life for all, a chance for all human beings? Some probably do and some do not. Was this truly the only way to stop the Heartland War? Likely not. Likely as it is today, the society is being lied to about what actually happened and how it happened. But, the truth will out.

One additional thing: The religious tithe kid had a party, kind of like a Bar Mitzvah, and this is an idea I had too, for my vaccine story that I was working on awhile ago. In my story those kids, too, were excited to get a one-time vaccine that promised to prevent all sickness in their lives. As reality became stranger than my fiction, I simply stopped writing the story. It’s jaw dropping to me all that has happened in recent years, the trampling of life and liberty, the outright lies from everyone, the continuing silencing of the truth, the rush to coerce people into vaccinating–even against their will–and refusing to look properly at all of the negative consequences of the experiment–and it is still an experiment, not something properly approved. The quickness to forget simple truths, like sunlight and fresh air being the best medicine for respiratory diseases. Every day, I feel like shouting the mantra I created in my story to all the vaccine zealots: The Science is Safe, the Science is Sound, the Science is Settled. Say it enough times and it’s all true, right?

Okay, okay, stepping off the soapbox again. Kudos to the writer, but I just couldn’t finish the story at this time.

Book Review: The Good Son

Jul1

Spoilers ahead.

Like a lot of great thrillers, The Good Son by You-Jeong Jeong starts out with the main character waking up to a mess of some kind, one which he doesn’t understand, and one in which he spends the rest of the book putting the pieces together. Although the story started well, it became apparent far too quickly that Yu Jin was an unreliable narrator, so I couldn’t take any of his reasoning and excuses very seriously.

The mess Yu Jin wakes up to is the murder of his mother–someone has cut her throat and blood is everywhere, especially all over his own person. Throughout this story it is amazing that no one in his Seoul apartment complex seems even aware anything is amiss in his apartment, but that’s kind of how life goes sometimes. For being innocent, Yu Jin sure knows how to tidy up the mess and hide the evidence, and then later on it’s obvious he just doesn’t want to admit to himself what he is, a psychopath who will not only kill people he thinks are in his way, but kill people simply because he gets off on their fear. He also is addicted and triggered by the smell of blood, much like a shark.

Yu Jin is shocked partway through the story to find that he doesn’t have epilepsy but a psychopath tendency. But his shock isn’t real, he’s not like Ba Reum from Mouse who genuinely is surprised and remorseful at the awful person he is. People in general are really good at deluding themselves about themselves and why should psychos be any different? The one thing to admire about him is that he wants to live and to live on his own terms. He does feel a sense of obligation to his family, but not so much as to prevent him from killing them. As to him being a “good” son, he clearly was nothing of the sort, though his adopted brother might have been.

I enjoyed the read, but it’s limited in scope and Yu Jin’s is not as interesting as other fictional psychos like Ripley in The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith. Although Ripley is referenced on the cover of this book, The Good Son cannot hold a candle to that chilling masterpiece. And Yu Jin has few of the amusing and exasperating gamma thoughts and behaviors of Raskolnikov from Crime and Punishment. And the religious aspect does not ring home at all, it’s just there, but offers no food for thought unlike Mouse and C&P. So, although I made it through The Good Son, I found it to be just ok, but not holding its own against better stories of the same genre or similar plots. Maybe it’s better in Korean.

Probably the most thoughtful aspect of the book, was Yu Jin’s family, and how delusional they were about him and about what they could do for him. Clearly, he should have been under care of some kind a long time ago and kept away from society. Yes, Yu Jin maybe had no life, or at least not the life he wanted, but neither did his mother. Her sudden adoption of his friend is her grabbing what she sees as a life line. The adopted brother is someone Yu Jin views in a better light than is warranted. I think it could have to do with Yu Jin’s desire to be out in the world and that his brother goes out in the world all the time. His mother does not; his aunt does not. But, with almost all of the other characters, Yu Jin makes a number of assumptions that are either lies he’s telling both the readers and himself, or are simply flat out wrong. Even at the end of the book, it’s obvious he really doesn’t know, he’s just assuming and imagining things to be a certain way, and it’s more pitiful than chilling.

Better, more thrilling stories of this nature are: The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith, Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, Atonement by Ian McEwan, and the Korean drama Mouse starring Lee Seung Gi.