It’s WWW Wednesday again! This round-up is hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words. Here are my answers to the three “W’s”.
What are you currently reading?
I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the first seven books in the Liturgical Mystery series, and now I’m happy to finally get back to it. “The Organist Wore Pumps” is the eighth time organist/choir director Hayden Konig gets to investigate a crime – when he’s not trying to write hard-boiled detective fiction in the manner of Raymond Chandler. Oh, and he’s also the town’s chief of police. It all works out with a cast of characters every bit as lovable and eccentric as those in Mitford.
What did you recently finish reading?
I said that Kira Davis could exhort anyone, challenge anyone and convince anyone to take up arms in defense of ideas. Her book “Drawing Lines: Why Conservatives Must Begin to Battle Fiercely in the Arena of Ideas” proved me right. Check out my full review of her book.
The Gentleman Farmers read like a cosy, but without a murder! So I suppose it wasn’t a real cozy after all. The heroine, Maggie Kingsbury, is the narrator of the tale. Actually, the book is presented as her diary or journal – she’s continually saying she’ll burn the manuscript after she says something embarrassing about a family member. The novel begins in the “Old World” – upstate New York of recent years, beset by falling home prices, rising crime, and worsening quality of life. Maggie recounts how she’s spent her life in her hometown, which is turning into a slum. After being mugged, Maggie’s sister Molly and her husband, Maggie’s friend Kevin, set off for the “New World” – a gentleman’s farm outside Asheville, N.C. The second half of the book focuses on how the three, with Molly and Kevin’s children, set up on their 10-acre “family compound” with hens, sheep, and goats. Everything that can go wrong does – and then, Maggie is accused of being a Nazi, because she defends a monument of Robert E. Lee. How the sisters and Kevin become true “Gentlemen Farmers” will captivate and charm you.
Robert Velarde imagined an ill man, lying in a hospital bed, suddenly seeing and having conversations with C.S. Lewis. The story borrows elements from Dicken’s Christmas Carol, as Lewis serves the protagonist as his Spirit of the Past. Lewis takes Clerk through scenes from his life, into scenes from his imagination – Narnia, Purgatory, and even Hell. All throughout he talks with Clerk, an atheist, and presents to Clerk his beliefs in the Christian faith. A beautiful work of apologetics – one any Christian could lend or give to an atheist or agnostic friend.
What do you think you’ll read next?
Long ago I read Dante’s Inferno. Then I put started Purgatory and put it down at the seventh canto. I figured Lent is a good time to finish it.
Notes from Aunt Gem 