Books for Monday

The munchkins watching Shaun the Sheep on Netflix. Really, a non-talking series about claymation sheep shouldn't be this funny. (It's by the Wallace and Gromit guy.)

I've been reading "duty" books lately. You know, the sort of thing you read to kick your brain into shape, and not so much for fun.

The lineup:

For Women Only



The Politically Incorrect Wife



The Christian Woman's Guide to Childbirth



The first two were to get myself back to being nice to my poor husband. He puts up with so much from me, and once this baby comes, he'll have to put up with so much more. So I've been working on that, and he seems to think I'm being nicer, so I guess that means it's working.

The last one is a refresher course on labor, breathing exercises, and so on. It's kind of like watching a TV show that you've seen at least twice before, though. This is my third, and my first two labors were pretty much the same (except for the first one, because I didn't know what was happening, ha ha.)

Anyway, my brain has been very tired after all that, so I asked Mom for a fun book. She gave me Byzantium, by Stephen Lawhead.



I'm about halfway through, and it's amazing. It's about this young, idealistic monk in Ireland ("Eire") who gets picked to go on a pilgrimage to Byzantium, aka Constantinople. Along the way he gets kidnapped by vikings and sold into slavery. The vikings are hilariously awesome. I'm only to the middle, but so far he's made it to Byzantium and is now doing secret spy work for the Emperor himself.

This book is far and away better than the other Lawhead I've read. Admittedly, I haven't read his Pendragon cycle (because I think Mary Stewart has pretty much ruined me on all other Arthurian legend retellings), but I read his Song of Albion trilogy a few times, along with Dream Thief and ... I'm sure there's been others. Anyway, Byzantium puts them all to shame. I think about it all the time and can't wait to jump back in and find out what peril our hero is in in THIS chapter.

I think what I like most is that the monk's Christianity is so genuine. He prays all the time, and has doubts, and tells his viking friends about Jesu and how the Romans murdered him, and how Jesu came back to life after first rescuing all the slaves in Hel. And it doesn't feel clumsy or preachy. I want to write like that, and just be honest about it. It's great to see a Christian author who can actually articulate Christianity while telling a good story.

Otherwise, still sitting on my nest, waiting for the new chick to hatch. My brain is going into shutdown mode, so I think I'm probably only a week or two out at this point.