Erin Darlyn

Women Rising is heartbreaking, infuriating, inspiring and healing all at once. Meghan's writing is captivating and I could easily have read the entire book in one sitting had I had the time. Whilst sharing her own story, she also highlights the stories of other women who have been oppressed and abused by different systems of power - primarily that of patriarchy - and people in positions of power across cultures. I really appreciated her dedication to learning and listening, her ability to admit where she had gone wrong herself and her vulnerability as she shared her own struggles. This book will break your heart but it is well worth reading, and it encourages my heart greatly to see that there are men reading it and reviewing it as well.

Reading Ladder to the Light was so refreshing for me. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about the author's perspectives and came away with a lot of inspiration to carry with me on my own path. The book really started to resonate once I reached chapter 5 and it was then (and in the few chapters following) that so many of the things that have been on my own heart lately started to come together in really beautiful ways. Thought provoking, poignant and full of wisdom; I will carry some of the words in this book with me for the rest of my life.

This quote was one of my favorites:

“Without kinship, a nation is a nation in name only. It is a random collection of isolated people, all competing with one another, bound together by rules that often favor the few over the many. Consequently, the foundation for community is inherently unstable. The nation is always susceptible to struggle and injustice. It lacks a spiritual core.Kinship provides that core because kinship means not conformity but relationship - deep, spiritual relationship. In the Native American context, this means every person's right to be who they are and believe how they wish. It also means they are part of an intimate family relationship, grounded in sharing, cooperation and mutual respect. It means being a nation without boundaries or hierarchies. it means being willing to take less so others may have more - not because it is the law, but because it is love.”

Thank you for sharing your stories and wisdom with us, Elder Charleston. I am grateful.

This is such a valuable book and I am so glad I read it. I highly recommend it for anyone who either wants to learn more about the historical origins of the idea of “biblical womanhood” or who is reexamining what they may have been taught about it. It is well written (from the perspective of a historian / professor who knows her stuff), well-cited and thoroughly thought-provoking.

This book is best suited to someone who has not yet been diagnosed with ADHD and has not yet done much, if any, research on what it looks like in women but is curious about whether they could have it.

It is a very basic introduction to the topic and the information provided never dives much below surface level.

I did not find the workbook sections to be useful, and the sections on strategies are super basic. If you are an adult with ADHD you probably already do most of the things they suggest naturally and they only provide a brief paragraph to introduce each of them before moving on to the next.

Not my favorite resource by far, but I could see myself recommending it to someone who is wondering if it's possible that they could have ADHD but has not yet decided to seek assessment.

4.5 stars

I really liked this book. After reading two other books that were very basic, introductory level books on neurodivergence (one of which heavily pathologized it and the other of which was not very useful), this book felt like a breath of fresh air. The author approaches neurodiversity from a positive perspective and highlights both her own story and the stories of other neurodivergent women throughout the book as she discusses ADHD, ASD, SPD and other neurodivergences. I really enjoyed reading about her interviews with different mental health professionals who shared their insight and work, and some of her own ideas resonated as well.

This is not an in-depth book about every “disorder,” nor is it a psychiatric how-to manual for living, but I did find it to be an enjoyable, uplifting read that helped me to feel seen, understood and less alone as an entrepreneur with a recent diagnosis and as a person with an unconventional vision for a healthier world. I also came away with a long list of resources, books and ideas to pursue next in my own research.

There are a few (6) minor profanities scattered throughout, which may be off-putting to some readers, and she does use the outdated term “Asperger's” in the book (Asperger's is a diagnostic term that was removed from the DSM-V in 2013 and has some problematic ties). The book might not resonate with some people who are more severely disabled by their diagnosis(es) or with people whose life experience is drastically different from the author's.

I have such mixed feelings about this book.

While there was some good information in it and the exercises / journaling prompts were useful, much of it was just not what I was looking for.

The authors' voice sometimes comes across as condescending and the book really leans more toward an approach that pathologizes ADHD, which is neither particularly useful nor up to date. Books that take this approach can often leave the person with ADHD feeling terrible about themselves rather than empowering them to understand the unique way their brain works so they can work with that and thrive as the powerhouse creatives they often are!

The book is more reflective than instructive in that much of the benefit you will get from reading it will be found in actually completing the workbook sections. There is not much strategy provided.

I found the information therein to be very “light.” If you're looking for a book that includes strategies for improving executive functioning, learning how to thrive with your ADHD, or appreciate the more positive neurodiversity approach to ADHD, you will probably not like this book.

If you have recently been diagnosed with ADHD as an adult and think that some prompted self reflection about how ADHD could have been manifesting in different aspects of your life could be useful for you, you might find some value in it. I do recommend, however, that you also read other books alongside this one that focus more on a positive neurodiversity message and on strategies for improving executive functioning.

One quote I did like:

“As psychologist Abraham Maslow is reported to have said, ‘One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.' Personal growth doesn't emerge from a comfortable space; creation is messy, and discomfort accompanies everything worth birthing. When you remember this, you will be erecting the internal scaffolding on which to build future confidence and successes.”

Rating: 2 stars of 5

I wanted to like Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood but I ended up having two main issues with it.

First: it reads like a book report about a bunch of other authors' books and repeats a lot of the same information found in other books in this genre. Second: whilst other authors??? ideas presented therein are well laid out and plausible, Aimee???s own thoughts and conclusions are sometimes insupportable. There are instances when she uses a certain text to try to support a claim she makes that the text doesn???t actually seem to support. The ideas presented that have the most merit are either cited or quoted as being someone else's work.

I will say that this book is well cited, which I very much appreciated. However, there is so much in this book that is not the author's work that I found myself feeling like I should just read the cited authors' works instead; their ideas made much more sense and seemed much more valid than Aimee's did.

Somewhere around the middle of the book, I stopped on a random page and counted the sentences so I could have a sample to share of just how prevalent other authors' work is in this book. On said sample page, I counted 11 sentences. Six of them were cited (i.e. not the authors' original ideas), six of them were direct quotes (again, not the author's original ideas; there was a little bit of overlap between cited and directly quoted sentences), and two of them were neither cited nor direct quotes. So two of the 11 sentences were the author's own words, and they did not add much to the conversation. This was not unusual throughout the rest of the book. It was a pretty typical sample page.

Unfortunately, I would not recommend this book as one of the better ones on this topic. So many people love it that I may come back and give it another chance in the future. However, right now, I recommend reading The Making of Biblical Womanhood by Beth Allison Barr, and perhaps Women Rising by Meghan Tschanz, instead.

If you want to skip this one and go straight to her source material, Bauckham's Gospel Women and James' The Gospel of Ruth and Finding God in the Margins were some of the oft-cited works that seemed worth reading.

I loved Fibershed and found it so inspiring. There is so much useful research in this book. It really shines a light on how unsustainable our current clothing industry is, and how recently this change has happened, whilst also encouraging the reader to think differently. It also offers examples of people who are making a difference in their own local communities.

I made the switch to natural fibers a few years ago and started making more of my own clothes with linen and cotton fabrics. I began learning to knit and to spin yarn and sourced some local, raw alpaca fleeces that I have been gradually transforming into wearable items. I have a few things that I have died with natural materials thus far - some pink linen dyed with avocado (I will likely make a dress with it) and some gray linen died with rosemary and tea that I am sewing into an apron now. This book made me want to expand on this practice and focus on having fewer items in my wardrobe, but an overall wardrobe comprised of heirloom-quality, well made pieces that support my local fiber shed as much as possible (without harming the ecology) and that tell a story of connection. It has been a dream of mine for years to grow enough flax one year to process, weave, and turn into a dress. Reading Fibershed has encouraged me in this and shown me that it is possible and there are people doing it! I should say, though, that we don't all have to go to this extreme to make a positive change, and the author does make that clear.

Some people will find the idea of sourcing a wardrobe from their own local fibershed difficult, either because of where they live or because most clothing these days is made overseas. I would encourage such readers to think of their fibershed, then, as being a larger area than the one the author was able to focus on in her experiment. She was living in an agricultural region in an agricultural, multicultural state with a lot of craftspeople and farmers. If you do not, think about expanding that radius for your own experiment. Even if you limited yourself only to items made and produced in your own country, you would still be sourcing from a fibershed much more local than one overseas!

I found myself reading portions of this book aloud to my husband, who has since said that he wants to read the book himself next, and I already sent a copy to a relative who has recently become interested in transitioning their wardrobe to natural fibers. Highly recommend!

My husband bought me this set of Psalms commentaries (this is the first volume of three) for my birthday this year and I was so excited to receive them. I had added them to my book wish-list after having listened to a series of Old and New Testament lectures Yale offers for free on their YouTube channel. I wanted to read a commentary that was written from a more scholarly and historical point of view rather than primarily theological.

This series includes both a new translation of the psalms as well as commentary on the text. Professor Dahood used the Ugaritic texts to inform the translation by working with said texts to help bring context for certain words and phrases that translators have disagreed about or not had much information on in past translations. The result is an interesting, fresh (though still familiar for the avid Psalms reader) translation that I thoroughly enjoyed reading.

The commentary sections were insightful, though a bit over my head at times. Multiple languages were used throughout the notes. With this in mind, I think that the commentary sections would be best appreciated by someone who knows the various biblical languages, has done translation work, and will thus be able to understand the full context of the notes. There is much of value for the lay reader as well, but you might, as I did, feel a bit lost at times and have to pick through the more scholarly language to find the parts that make the most sense to you.

All in all, I thought it was a worthy work and I look forward to reading the next two volumes.

Mary Oliver is my favorite poet. I have not yet read all of her works, but every volume I have read has included many poems and lines that have deeply resonated. The way she writes about nature is so beautiful.

I really enjoyed Blue Horses. Some of my favorite poems within it were I Don???t Want to Be Demure or Respectable, Blueberries, Such Silence, Watering the Stones, On Not Mowing the Lawn, and What Gorgeous Thing.

This book is a helpful resource for people who are experiencing abuse or who think it is possible that they are but are not quite ready to call it abuse. It deals primarily with spiritual abuse that often manifests itself in faith communities, but is also applicable to other types of abuse that can occur outside of religious organizations (physical, sexual, verbal, emotional, etc.).

Dr. Mullen shares his own story of his family???s healing journey after experiencing spiritual abuse as he breaks down some of the tactics used by people in positions of power to abuse others. He describes common red flags, language that should serve as a warning that something might not be right, and gives suggestions for handling such situations whilst also keeping yourself and your loved ones safe.

I found the book to be well-written and accurate. I also related to some of the author???s story about the spiritual abuse his family endured and found his recommendations helpful. Further, there is a lot of great information here that people can use to help ensure that their faith communities are safe spaces for everyone and that they are aware of the steps they can take to be sure they are not perpetuating harm.

Here are a few quotes that I underlined in my copy:

- ???Remember, knowledge is the foundation for reclaiming the power that has been stolen from you.???

- ???Many have asked me how I protect myself from vicarious trauma or from becoming overly despairing and cynical. My answer: I look for and cultivate beauty.???

- ???Abuse is a community concern. Therefore, the question must be asked of each of us: In what ways am I perpetuating an abusive culture through my silence or tacit endorsement of those who are in the wrong????

- ???Our response reveals whose voice we honor more. Consider these words from Judith Herman: ???It is very tempting to take the side of the perpetrator. All the perpetrator asks is that the bystander do nothing. He appeals to the universal desire to see, hear, and speak no evil. The victim, on the contrary, asks the bystander to share the burden of pain. The victim demands action, engagement, and remembering.??????

- ???Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim.??? - Elie Wiesel

The end of the book has a lengthy list of resources for people who have experienced or are experiencing various kinds of abuse so they can find the help they need. This includes resources for people who are not being abused that can be referred to in order to help create safe spaces for people in their communities.

I do recommend this book.

If you are experiencing abuse, there are people who are ready and willing to help you. With just those few seconds of courage it takes to make a call or send a message, you can connect with people who are ready to listen and provide assistance so you can also begin your own healing process.

If you live in the United States and are being physically abused by someone in your home, you can call the National Domestic Abuse Hotline 24/7 toll-free at 800-799-7233. If speaking aloud is dangerous for you, you can also text START to 88788.

Re-reading Little House in the Big Woods this year brought back so many memories from my childhood. I used to read late at night when I was a kid, long after my parents had put us all to bed. It???s one of the reasons why I wear glasses now - I would spend hours reading by the light from the Jack-and-Jill bathroom between my room and my brothers??? room.

I loved reading this story again as an adult and found myself so intrigued by all of the ways the Ingalls family did things differently than we do in western society now. As someone who dreams of farming, enjoys gardening and growing food, and who loves to spend time in the kitchen processing and preserving a harvest, it was so fascinating to read about how Pa would smoke the meat they were putting up for winter or how the family got together to process their maple syrup for the year. It made me grateful for the convenience afforded to me today, but also made me yearn for a simpler way of living that involves a deeper connection to the land, a more grounded sense of place and a more holistic way of fostering community. I do look forward to reading the rest of the series again.

There are a couple of references in the book that are racist (primarily in song lyrics), which is why I did not give the story a full 5 star review. I would recommend having healthy conversations about this with your young ones who might read this book.

Dr. Randy Woodley is a Cherokee teacher, historian, farmer and writer who has written several books in which he shows us how Indigenous values holistically relate to place-based ecology, earth stewardship and Christian faiths. Indigenous Theology and the Western Worldview is written as a series of three lectures, each followed by a question and answer style interview.

This was a particularly timely read for me, as I found that many of the things that have been on my heart for the past few years were things that he brought up throughout the book. His wisdom expanded my paradigm and made me think deeply about this land???s history, the history of the people who live on it, and how Christian faiths can intersect with a more conscious, healing worldview. The history of Christianity on Turtle Island is not pretty. It is messy, filled with blatant disregard for the teachings of its sacred writings, and is deeply linked to a system that is neither sustainable nor holistic. Dr. Randy shows us that there is a better way - a way that can bring healing both to our society and our planet; but it will take intentional work and humility, and that work must involve all of us.

I loved the way Dr. Woodley described his approach to teaching in the preface: ???I feel that, when teaching or presenting, it is paramount to hear all the other voices in the room, not just my own.??? This is a mark of wisdom. I also really appreciated that when asked questions that would have made it easy for him to broad-brush large groups of people in his answers, he acknowledged that he cannot speak for the whole of the Indigenous peoples, but that he can speak for himself.

In the third lecture, Dr. Randy shares ten values that comprise what he calls ???the harmony way??? - a principle rooted in both Indigenous and scriptural values. I enjoyed seeing everything he had been teaching and all of the stories he had shared really come together in this section.

Here are a handful of the quotes that I underlined or annotated in my copy:

???North America came to be by means of land theft, armed removal and relocation, forced breakup of families, the outlawing of Indigenous religion, bureaucratic policies of extermination, assimilation and racism, rape of the land - in other words, terrorism. Methods and policies may have changed over time, but intent did not.??? ???If you live in the Americas or another colonized country, you are a direct beneficiary of this genocide and theft. Consider your forebearers, and ask what effect this has or should have on your own spirituality??? ???Peoples, including the church, live on stolen land. And initial relationships on the land were based on violence, a violence that still distorts those relationships.??? ???All of creation is sacred, and there is a problem with one???s worldview when one is considered sacred and not the other.??? ???The way of life demonstrated by Western peoples leads to alienation from the earth, hostility toward others, and estrangement from all of creation. It creates a false bubble?????? ??????this is how you know you have shalom - how are the least of these doing???? ???Love includes respect for the other person???s dignity.??? ???My Kiowa mother said it this way: ???Before the White man came, we knew who God was. We knew God was the Creator. We knew God was powerful. We knew God was loving. We knew God was sacred. We didn???t quite know how much God loved us, because we didn???t know the story of Jesus.??? Then she looked at me and said, ???But we were this close??? (holding her fingers apart an inch). ???But when the missionaries came and gave us their theology, that made the gap as wide as the Grand Canyon.?????? ???We need to lament together because that is part of becoming a community.???

The book is thought-provoking, inspiring and beautifully written. It is definitely one that I want to pick up and read again. I highly recommend it. In fact, I think it is absolutely necessary for people who occupy stolen land on Turtle Island and who choose to call themselves Christians to read it. It allows Truth to illuminate a worldview based on a fictional narrative that has been passed down through generations of believers and it is well past time to shine Light on the lies that have made the oppression of Indigenous peoples and the destruction of our planet possible. Truth brings freedom, including the freedom to heal.

I must say, I read Wuthering Heights before I read Jane Eyre and I absolutely hated it; then I watched a terrible screen adaptation of Jane Eyre that made me wonder how anyone in the world could possibly ever like this story (after seeing a different adaptation and reading the book, I can now conclude that that particular adaptation was just especially poorly done). For these reasons, Jane Eyre actually sat on my shelf for quite a while before I finally gave in and read it. It is my mother-in-law's favorite classic, so I figured it must at least have some redeeming qualities and I eventually acquiesced and began reading it. Having now finished it, I can say that I am glad I did, and that I actually thoroughly enjoyed it! I will likely even read it again at some point - what a happy surprise - and am already thinking about which Bronte book I should try next.

Charlotte's writing is so beautifully descriptive and engaging and her world-building so engrossing that you can picture every element of the story so vividly. Her characters come alive on the page. I found myself thinking the first few chapters about Jane's childhood reminded me of the first few chapters of Dickens' David Copperfield. I couldn't help but like Jane, just as I couldn't help but like David. Rochester has his issues, of course, but is also a well written, well developed, complex character and the story itself is a good one. I would definitely recommend it for someone who wants to get lost in a good book for a while!

There are a couple of words / ideas that have not “aged well” present in the book, and there is a significant age difference between the male and female leads that might be disturbing for some. Trigger warnings would include narcissism and spiritual abuse.

How to Walk Away is the fictional story of a woman???s journey of recovery after a tragic accident changes her life completely.

This was the second book I have read by this author and I did enjoy it, though I must say I liked The Bodyguard better.

It was interesting to read a novel written in this particular setting and I could tell that the author did her research and consulted with medical professionals who helped inform her timeline and descriptions of things. I appreciated that, as it made the story feel more realistic than some novels I have read in the past. She did a great job creating an interesting story within a more limited group of settings than many novels have.

Seeing the characters each go through their own journeys of healing was also interesting. There are likeable characters here, despicable characters, and characters you want to root for. The narrative never became boring to me and the ending was satisfying.

I routinely take a star off of my ratings for the presence of language in a book (particularly if it is strong language, as it is just not my thing), so do note that without that, my rating would have been 4 stars of 5.

A delightful, cheerful story with endearing characters. I laughed a few times and found myself smiling at the banter quite often. I took a star off for the language (not my thing), but otherwise loved it.

Bird by Bird started off really well for me. The language Anne uses is engaging and descriptive. She uses narrative to teach and her stories made me want to keep reading. I was thoroughly enjoying the book at first, and appreciated some of the golden nuggets scattered throughout.

One of the passages I especially loved was this:

??????for some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die. They are full of all the things that you don???t get in real life - wonderful, lyrical language, for instance, right off the bat. And quality of attention: we may notice amazing details during the course of a day but we rarely let ourselves stop and really pay attention. An author makes you notice, makes you pay attention, and this is a great gift. My gratitude for good writing is unbounded; I???m grateful for it the way I???m grateful for the ocean.???

Later, though, it started to feel more muddy and I started feeling like I was having to slog through it. It lost some interest for me and started to sound more jaded and troubled. I found myself feeling like I had to force myself to keep reading. Though I did finish it, I will admit that I read through the last chapters more hurriedly than I had the first ones.

I routinely take a star off of my ratings for the presence of strong language in books (it's just not my thing), so do note that without that, my rating for this book would have been 3 stars.

My husband and I were both raised in environments where purity culture was prevalent. The resources on marriage and dating that were available to us when we were dating, engaged, and in our early married years were the resources that Sheila and her co-authors critique in The Great Sex Rescue.

Alarmingly, many of the most popular books on dating and marriage that are published by faith-based publishing houses contain really problematic ideas that can promote harm, prevent healing and even perpetuate abuse within intimate relationships. Just as concerning is the fact that these are the very books that are sold in church bookstores and recommended to people who are considering marriage or working through things together as a married couple. (I know that???s how we ended up with them when we were going to premarital counseling and they were being recommended to us!) These teachings are the ones being taught to married couples in church settings. I spent my teenage and early adult years hearing pastors spread the harmful ideas from those books in pulpits.

I am grateful that I married a good and wise man who saw through the lies those books were telling and that I never bought into them myself (I realize just how privileged I am to be able to say that), but I have also learned from Sheila???s book about just how much of an impact those kinds of teachings can have on marital relationships, even when we don???t believe the untruths. The harm that is being done to marriages within faith-based settings by books like those mentioned in this one is, frankly, chilling and abhorrent.

Throughout the book, Sheila and her co-authors discuss the results of a large survey (over 20,000 participants) with some very interesting results. They break down which types of teachings, language and ideas found in the critiqued books leave room for harm and abuse in relationships and discuss how they were able to observe the effects of those teachings on relationships via the survey results and interviews they conducted as part of their research. The data presented throughout the book is compelling.

There is also a heavy focus on truth-telling and re-framing narratives to help readers understand how to reject harmful teachings and promote healthy relationships instead.

My husband and I read this book together, had many really great discussions about the information presented therein, and would both highly recommend it to anyone who is either married or considering marriage. We also both agree that this book should be required reading for anyone in a position of leadership within a faith-based setting. It is definitely worth picking up a copy.

Morgan has become one of my favorite poetic authors this year. I first read her All Along You Were Blooming, then picked up a copy of How Far You Have Come after I loved the other so much.

This volume is beautiful. It is a collection of place-based poetry interspersed with reflective narrative sections, and the whole book is filled with Morgan???s beautiful illustrations. As a native Californian, I especially loved reading the California section, but I also found myself dog-earing pages all throughout the book so I could revisit my favorite poems later on.

Here are a couple of stanzas that stood out to me as I read:

???Invite joy to meet your sorrow. Let in hope for tomorrow. Bridge the fragments of who you are, and learn to see beauty in your scars.??? ???You will desire to go beyond the limits to get there faster. But moving at a careful pace requires courage in this race, as if to say time does not define me, I do not answer to the tick of the clock and will not give in to its alluring tongue. In my own speed, with my own limits, I am still becoming.??? ???Come back down to the beat of your heart. Come back to the joy of color. Come back home to believing hope still runs in your veins. You???re finding your way in the wind, but you can always come back to Light again.???

Highly recommend, and while you???re at it, pick up All Along You Were Blooming too. I liked that one even better, to the point that I wanted to buy an extra two copies so I could turn the pages into a collection of framed art prints for my walls. I still might do just that! =)

Rating: 2 stars of 5

Unmentionable: The Victorian Lady???s Guide to Sex, Marriage and Manners, is a hilarious commentary on how women were viewed, treated and expected to behave during the Victorian period. It???s written as a sort of satire and pokes fun at the ridiculousness of the antiquated ideas that were prevalent amongst the source materials the author used.

The book focuses largely on advertisements, books and other published materials from the era. At times, these are laughably absurd and at other times, infuriating. The most amusing samples, perhaps, are some of those written by male physicians of the time, who apparently had no clue what they were talking about when it came to female physiology or psychology. One of the ideas a male doctor put forth in one of the latter chapters had me laughing so hard I was crying as I was trying to read the passage aloud to my husband.

Whilst entertaining, there were a few things I did not like about the book. There are some inaccuracies throughout. If you are looking for a comprehensive, historically accurate read, I would not recommend this book as your best option. Something by Ruth Goodman, perhaps, would be better. Her book, How to Be a Victorian, is good.

The irreverent tone in which the book is written is occasionally off-putting in the beginning but the sarcasm becomes quite grating as the book goes on. Whilst funny at first, it really got old after awhile.

There are some sections that can be quite triggering. I would recommend skipping the chapter on diet altogether if you would find irreverent discussions of weight and weight loss troubling. The way that chapter is presented is appalling, and it isn???t entirely the fault of the source material. The author contributes to it as well.

Overall, it was an amusing, though not altogether enjoyable, read. I wouldn???t not recommend it, but I also would not purchase any copies to give away and I will not be keeping my copy in my library.

This is the first of Shauna's books that I have read and it was completely different from what I was expecting in the best of ways.

I was expecting something similar to most of the other Christian books that are available - a lot of ‘how to be a “better” Christian' with a bit of Scripture and a few personal stories thrown in. Instead, I found myself reading what felt like a series of handwritten letters sent over time by a dear friend who has moved far away but with whom I now keep in touch via correspondence. Part memoir and part reflection and encouragement, Shauna has a gift for putting words together in beautiful ways and is not afraid to share her heart. There were many times when I looked up from the book and said to my husband, “She writes the way I think and is saying some of the things that I have written in my own journal entries. She speaks my language!” There aren't many authors I feel that way about. Ann Voskamp is one; Morgan Harper Nichols another. Now Shauna is part of that group for me.

Chapter 40, especially, felt like it was written to my very soul and gave me hope that there are people who come out the other side of seasons like the one I am in right now with their faith intact. It encouraged me to know that there are people out there who have felt (and feel) the same disillusionment with the church that I have been experiencing, who have been forged by fire as they have questioned and unlearned and deeply considered walking away, but who have chosen to stay and rebuild. There is something so healing in just knowing that I am not alone and that this season of demolition can lead not just to the death of something but to new life.

Thank you, Shauna. I loved it.

A lovely book. A bit repetitious at times but beautifully written.

Simply the best embroidery book I have read. Highly recommend.

This was a re-read. I first read it when it was originally published and enjoyed it. I am in a different line of work now and upon reading it again, found much inspiration and motivation within.

The initial premise is good but the book quickly becomes repetitive and there are several inaccuracies that I found distracting. For example, at one point, the author asserts that there was a point in Christ???s life when He ???realized and accepted that He was the Son of God,??? which has no scriptural basis and with which I take issue. She also seems to forget that Jesus is God in some of her suppositions in an apparent effort to make His ???hidden years??? more relatable.

The prologue and chapter 1 are the best parts of this book and the inspirational ideas and analogies presented therein (icebergs and winter-bare trees that reveal infrastructure) are not original to the author. I???d say skip this one or read it with your discernment hat on and be ready to fact-check a few things with your Bible, lexicon, and perhaps Blue Letter Bible on hand.