Blog: Mel's Muse
Showing posts categorised as 'Book Reviews'
Thank You Father: For Your Gifts
Have you ever thought about what led you into a certain career? Or whether you've wished you'd taken a different route?
My longing, as a teenager, was to become an actress, but my parents thought otherwise. My father wanted me to go to university, an aspiration my mother shot down, telling...
Book Club Discussion: The Screwtape Letters By C.s.lewis
Click here for the List of Questions
Suggested by a member of my Book Club, despite the fact that most of us had read it many years ago, The Screwtape Letters proved to have lost none of its appeal. Apart from one lady, that is, who abandoned it on page thirty,...
Book Club Questions: The Screwtape Letters By C.s.lewis
The questions below are those I raised for the Book Club I lead. Click here for the discussion we had subsequently. Quotes from the book are in bold italics.
CHURCH: Chapter II
One of our greatest allies at present is Church itself. Screwtape goes on to...
Book Club Discussion: I Am I Am I Am By Maggie O'farrell
We were nearly a full-house when my Book Club met, last night, to discuss our latest read, Maggie O'Farrell's memoirs, I AM I AM I AM: Seventeen Brushes With Death. We all thought it beautifully written, though there were those who found the theme somewhat negative, and others who...
In Her Words By Patricia St John - My Book Club Discussion
Although slightly reduced in number when my Book Club met this week, there was no less lively conversation and laughter. Especially when they discovered I'd bought Orange Club biscuits! The bottom line, though, was that we loved this book! A light, easy read, it nevertheless had plenty...
Book Club Discussion: The Storyteller By Jodi Picoult & An Elegant Solution By Anne Atkins
Talk about being a lousy leader!
'We might find Jodi Picoult's The Storyteller a lighter summer read, rather than the one I first suggested,' I wrote to my Book Club.
That email was closely followed by another saying, 'Oh, no! Perhaps not. Some of the reviews say it is...
What's Wrong With Human Rights? By David Cross - Book Club Summary
Quotes from the book are in italics.
Never, before, have I made so many highlights in a book! As my Book Club members said when we met yesterday evening, this was certainly a narrative that opened up debate, on a subject not often discussed. With so much material to...
The Making Of Us By Sheridan Voysey - Book Review
DISCOVER WHO YOU CAN BECOME
I love Sheridan's lyrical style of writing - so inviting, so personal, so picturesque. Right from the first page, I found myself enthralled, as if I were meeting someone whom I knew, instantly, was going to become a friend. Likewise, when grappling with sorrow...
Catching Contentment By Liz Carter - Book Club Discussion
I first heard of Liz Carter's book, Catching Contentment, when I read, somewhere, that she had suffered a lifelong illness. Instantly, that resonated with me. Having undergone a similar experience, myself, I felt a closeness with Liz that belied the fact that we had never met, nor communicated...
Eleanor Oliphant Is Absolutely Fine - Book Club Review
Have you ever been aware of others talking about you behind your back? Perhaps when you've been standing alone, catching the flickering glances of a nearby group? Knowing, without doubt, that the whispered exchanges in some way refer to you?
So how did it feel? Especially if,...
Catching Contentment - A Guest Blog
I lay on a trolley in A and E, my breathing coming in rapid gasps. My oxygen sats were too low and the pain clamped me in a vice grip, leaving me crying out. 'It's a pneumococcal infection in both lungs,' the consultant said, and admitted me for intensive...
Book Club: Sensible Shoes - Whose Do You Walk In? Who Are You?
Who are you? Whose shoes do you walk in? Is this a question you've ever ask? No. I don't mean do you ask it of other people. That's not British! Downright rude, in fact. So - who are you? Is this something...
In The Days Of Rain - Book Club Verdict 'a Rivetting Read'
THRILLER OR HORROR STORY?
If reading In the Days of Rain by Rebecca Stott didn't bring tears to your eyes, hearing the testimony of two members of my Book Club would certainly do so! Brought up in the Exclusive Brethren, they tell a tale of trauma of unimaginable scale: the...
Archbishop A Novel By Michele Guinness - Book Club Discussion Of Media Hysteria
MEDIA HYSTERIA & PUBLIC EXPECTATION
One of the things my Book Club loved about this book, was the way humour was used to hammer home the truths we all need to know. With the enormous pressure upon her, newly elected Archbishop Vicky is all too aware of how little time...
Archbishop By Michele Guinness: Book Club Discussion On Personal Discipleship & Service
Personal Discipleship & Service
(Quotes from the book - with permission from Michele Guinness, below - are in italics)
There were a number of salient points in Michele Guinness's book when it came to personal discipleship in these troubled times, and we all agreed with Archbishop Vicky that it is only...
Archbishop By Michele Guinness: Book Club Discussion On What Constitutes Church?
WHAT CONSTITUTES CHURCH?
(Quotes from the book are in italics)
With some members of our Readers' Group being Street Pastors and School Pastors, and all of us attending churches involved in outreach, the issue of whether church is a building or a people was one that resonated. Faced with...
Archbishop: A Novel By Michele Guinness
Another superb choice of fiction - so my Readers' Group and I enthused when we met yesterday evening to discuss it. One or two of us confessed to having found the first chapter somewhat overwhelming: a plethora of names, unknown characters and big words. But with that behind...
A Better Story: God, Sex & Human Flourishing By Glynn Harrison: A Must Read For Everyone
Before I start, I want to say that I have nothing against anyone who is genetically predisposed to the LGBT spectrum. I have personally known people in homosexual relationships, and always found them to be delightful. I also have a family member who is transgender, whom I love...
Mel's Online Book Club: The Art Of Hearing Heartbeats By Jan-philipp Sendker
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER:
The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philipp Sendker was, we all agreed, the best book we'd ever read. A beautifully and evocatively written love story, it was woven throughout with profundity and truisms: a tapestry of an unknown lifestyle, embroidered with recognisable threads.
MYSTERYSet in Burma, the story is...
Mel's Online Book Club: When We Can't, God Can By Catherine Campbell
When We Can't, God Can by Catherine Campbell was the book under discussion when we met for Book Club last night. Having met Catherine on several occasions at Christian Resources Together conferences at Swanwick, I was not surprised to see how well her lovely, caring personality came across in...
Mel's Online Book Club: Remember Me? By Lesley Pearse
I suppose I could say it was an attitude of quid pro quo that prompted me to suggest Remember Me? by Lesley Pearse as my choice for Book Club this month. After all, the honour of having a multi-million-selling author attend the book launch for my novel, Chosen? is...
Fire Destroys The Royal Clarence Hotel In Exeter
Shock, horror, I've just heard on the BBC News that there's been a fire in Exeter's Cathedral Yard and that it's spread into the Royal Clarence Hotel. Because my novels in the Evie Adams' series are set here, I have copies of the books in the hotel. Here...
So You're Planning A Book Launch. What About Pre Launch Promotion?
In my last blog post, So you're Planning a Book Launch. Do you Know What You're Doing? we considered some of the forward planning that's necessary. Now, with mine so recently behind me, I'll continue to share my experiences. We've looked at Venue, Timing, and Ease of...
A Book Club Thriller - The Jazz Files
I suggested we read The Jazz Files by Fiona Veitch Smith for our January meeting of the book club I lead, partly because I’d seen the film, Sufragette, starring Carey Mulligan and Helena Bonham Carter, and greatly enjoyed it. Fiona’s book, the first in the Poppy Denby investigates series, is...
Time To Shine - A Story Of Gaslighting?
Set in Exeter, and written in the style of Jodi Picoult, this is a gentle mystery drama with a difference, solved not by a Detective but by a Counsellor, and with a psychological twist at the end.
A beautifully written and thoughtful book centred on relationships which will strike a chord...
Book Club Discussion Summary: Naturally Supernatural By Wendy Mann
A good deal of laughter accompanied our Readers’ Group discussion last week. The book we had been reading, which I had suggested some two months earlier, was titled Naturally Supernatural, and was written by Wendy Mann. With a new senior minister joining us, in the meantime, we felt sure -...
Mel's Online Book Club Discussion: The Fight By Luke Wordley
I had the pleasure of meeting with author, Luke Wordley, and received a signed copy of his book. In choosing to read The Fight for Book Club, we felt we were moving outside our comfort zone. It was with some surprise, therefore, that all our members enjoyed reading it. Some...
Mel's Online Book Club Discussion: The Light Between Oceans By M. L. Stedman
The Light Between Oceans is, I discovered when I’d finished reading it for Book Club, a debut novel. I wish I had known that when I began – but more of that later. For various reasons we were a somewhat depleted group when we met to discuss the book, and...
Creative Writing: Book Launch & Signing For Time To Shine
Not the best of photographs, but this is me telling my audience, at my Book Launch, yesterday, about my creative writing journey. My love of books began at the age of five, when my father used to read my favourite bedtime story, Oscar Wilde's The Selfish Giant from the leather-bound...
Time To Shine - Another Excerpt From My New Psycological Mystery
Josh was still in his pjs, lying on his bed playing some computer game or other on his cell phone when Carl went to tell him the good news. The boy seemed strangely lethargic. Hardly surprising, Carl supposed, given the state of the room - a stinking fug of yesterday's...
Mel's Online Book Club: Questions For: Faith In The Fog: Believing In What You Cannot See By Jeff Lucas
FAITH IN THE FOG: by Jeff Lucas
NB: Page numbers below relate to Kindle pages
Click here for Discussion Summary of Faith in the Fog 1. Time Trapped. 31-46 · Do we wish we could go back in time as the disciples went back to Galilee to fish? If so why? Isn’t our past shame washed...
Click here for Discussion Summary of Faith in the Fog 1. Time Trapped. 31-46 · Do we wish we could go back in time as the disciples went back to Galilee to fish? If so why? Isn’t our past shame washed...
Mel's Online Book Club: Discussion Summary Of Faith In The Fog: Believing In What You Cannot See By Jeff Lucas
Having prayed for absent book club members, particularly one, who is back in hospital on a second course of chemo, we started the evening with a general overview of Jeff Lucas’ book, Faith in the Fog. Without exception the group professed to having enjoyed it, though one person found his self-deprecation...
Mel's Online Book Club: Little Coffee Shop Of Kabul: A Debut Novel By Deborah Rodriguez
FRIENDSHIP: One of the joys of a good book club has to be in the friendship that develops between members, and the freedom that this gives them to speak their minds. And so it was that our discussion, yesterday evening, spiralled off in all directions, covering politics, faith v...
Mel's Online Book Club: Questions & Discussion Summary Of Simply Christian, By Tom Wright: Chapters 1-2
THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS & DISCUSSION SUMMARY ARE PROVIDED FOR MEL'S ONLINE BOOK CLUB and may be reproduced – see below. Please leave your comments so that further discussion may be promoted.
More than a dozen of us gathered to discuss Tom Wright's book, Simply Christian. Most of us had read at least...
Mel's Online Book Club: The Generation Game By Sophie Duffy
Titles are important to me. As an author I find it necessary to choose a title I can work to: one that defines the theme of the book I’m writing. As a reader, I look to see how those themes unfold.
When one of the members of my real-time Book Club suggested that...Mel's Online Book Club: Love Wins By Rob Bell - Part One
A daring choice for my real-time book club, given the controversy that surrounds it, Love Wins, by author, Rob Bell, attracted rather more people than usual to the discussion on Thursday evening. We'd teamed the book with Michael Wittmer's Christ Alone: An Evangelical Response... - half the group reading one title,...
Mel's Online Book Club: Room By Emma Donoghue
What could have been better, on an icy evening last week, than meeting with my Book Club in the home of friends, with a roaring fire, and a great book to discuss? We'd been reading Emma Donoghue's novel, Room, and without exception we agreed that we had thoroughly enjoyed the...
Online Book Club: Discussion Summary - Life Of Pi By Yann Martel
One of the great things about a Book Club, as I've said before, is that almost always there are aspects of the book we've read that strike people in different ways. So while all of us who met last Thursday confessed to feeling disappointed by the denouement of Life of...
Online Book Club: Book Reviews & Questions - Life Of Pi By Yann Martel
BOOK REVIEW
At times profound, at others humorous, the novel, Life of Pi, is the story of an Indian boy who, because he is named after a French swimming pool (Piscine) and doesn't like the nicknames which result, shortens his name to the irrational mathematical number Pi - 3.14... Pi...
Edgy Christian Fiction: Books For Summer Reading
If you're anything like me, a book will be essential packing for your summer hols, the perfect partner for a picnic lunch, a bonus for the beach and a relaxing read for bedtime. So here are four book reviews for sensational summer reads, all with a Christian world view that...
Online Book Club Discussion Summary: A Time To Live By George Pitcher
Are you in favour of assisted dying? Would you like British law to be amended to allow euthanasia? Or is the risk of abuse to the elderly, disabled and infirm too great a concern?
Most of my real-time Book Club members admitted, when we met on 28th July, 2011, that they'd...
How To Be A Writer Of Christian Fiction Books
Are you an established writer or aspiring author who is also a Christian? Is there a novel you want to write (or have written) for which you are unable to find a publisher? Do you enjoy reading mainstream fiction but find that Christian fiction books leave you cold? How does...
Book Club Discussion Summary: Suite Francaise
Suite Française
by Irène Némirovsky
by Irène Némirovsky
Born in Kiev in 1903, Irène Némirovsky, was a Jewess who, with her family, fled the Russian Revolution. She settled in France, married a Catholic, and became a best selling author. Her novel, Suite Française is a keenly observed portrayal of French manners and...
God On Mute - The Problem Of Unanswered Prayers: Mel's Online Book Club
As book club questions were included in the book, I did not compile any for my real-time reading group, who met last week.
A book on unanswered prayer is never going to be an exhilarating read, but God On Mute, by Pete Greig, surpassed expectation for all but two of...
A Painful Post Mortem: Review
No matter how long you've been an author, nor how many books you've written and had published, it is always very humbling to receive a positive review of your work from someone who is a stranger to you. The process of creative writing opens you up in a manner which...
Mel's Online Book Club: Born On A Blue Day
The choice of book for my real-time Readers' Group / Book Club was, on this occasion, prompted by a non-member whose young grandson has been diagnosed as autistic. Born on a Blue Day, by Daniel Tammet, is a remarkable book in many ways - not least because the author is...
Characters & Point Of View: It's All In The Mind
My husband, who is a keen cook, has a copy of one of Nigel Slater's books, Simple Suppers. The recipes produce good, nutritious meals. I have to confess, however, to a slightly queasiness when it comes to watching the celebrity chef on TV. Something, I think, to do with what...
Online Book Club: Everybody's Normal Till You Get To Know Them - Part One
APOLOGIES! My admin/editing box keeps ditching quotation marks, dashes and apostrophes. This cannot be rectified until the New Year, and as I am having to reinsert them manually, in the meantime, I hope you will excuse any omissions.
Everybody's normal till you get to know them at Daves house. This was...
Mel's Online Book Club: The Catcher In The Rye: Summary Discussion
Those of you who follow Mels Online Book Club will know that for the real time Readers Group that I lead, I usually compile a list of questions as a prompt. As a result, I have become adept at doing the one thing I was brought up never to do:...
The Torn Veil By Gulshan Esther: Online Book Club Questions & Discussion Summary
QUESTIONS
What strikes me, immediately, about the author is the sincerity
and commitment she shows to her Islamic faith. Are the rituals she
conforms to so very different to our own when seen through the eyes
of a non-believer?
She makes no complaint about her disability but has complete
faith that she will be healed. Can...
Plain Truth By Jodi Picoult: Online Book Club Discussion
This Online Book Club discussion is intended to be just
what it says it is, as well as a resource for real-time
Readers’ Groups. Whether you’ve read the book, or not,
you may have very different views to those expressed here, or you
may agree with them. Please leave your comments at the end...
Return Of The Prodigal Son - Rembrandt Painting Inspires Author Henri Nouwen: Online Book Club Discussion
Without exception, members of my real-time Readers' Group found this an AMAZING book, and couldn't believe how much they got out of it. To read the Questions that inspired their Discussion, which follows, go to: UV READERS' GROUP & ONLINE BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS: The Return Of The Prodigal Son...
Uv Readers' Group & Online Book Club: The Reluctant Fundamentalist - Discussion Summary
My UV Readers’ Group met last Thursday, 21st January, to discuss The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid and, as always, we had plenty to say! First and foremost that we had found the book an enjoyable and compelling read, with the sinister elements evident from the start and building to a climactic conclusion.
A LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIPThe...
The Reluctant Fundamentalist Discussion Questions - Mel's Online Book Club
Hi! I’m really excited about this new Online Book Club, which is starting today, and hope that you will be, too. The beauty of being a member of a readers’ group is that it encourages you to read books you might not, otherwise, have picked up.
But reading can be a solitary pursuit. Half...
The Shack By William Young: Uv Readers' Group Discussion Summary
Is The Shack A True Story?
This was one of the issues raised when twenty-one of us met on Thursday to share our impressions of William Young's debut novel. Many of us found ourselves thinking of Madeleine McCann, the four year old who disappeared in Portugal whilst holidaying with her parents...
Creative Writing As A Means Of Illustrating Compulsive And Obsessive Behaviour
I hope you’re not going to lose patience with me, but I’m so impressed with Friedman’s Fables that, yet again, I’m going to apply one of them to a real-life situation, in what I call a ‘combi-blog’. Because it addresses not only a real life relationship problem but is also of relevance to writing fiction.
DO...Issues Of Trust Between A Mother And Her Child
“Can it ever be right for a mother to expose her child in the name of literature?” I asked on an online forum. It was a question which has provoked an impassioned response. But it was, itself, a response – my answer – to a recent news story which has spread itself across the...
BBC Radio Devon Interview
Listen to me chatting to Dave Fitzgerald about my latest release, Chosen, on BBC local radio.
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