Erin Darlyn

I especially love Romans and Hebrews in this version.

This is the best book on knitting that I have read. The chapters on designing various types of garments are outstanding.

I read up to chapter 11, then read reviews and summaries of the book before reading the ending and moving this to my ???did not finish??? shelf.

(Note: I had to create a ???did not finish??? shelf just for this book. I am not the sort to perpetually start reading books only to toss them aside unfinished.)

I could see what the author was doing and appreciated that he accomplished his goal so well but I just have no interest in spending more hours of my life continuing to read the rest of the book.

The descriptive scenes of the environment are beautifully cinematic in their composition and there is a description of an iron man on an iron monster (a tractor driven by a man who has become little more than a replaceable cog in a wheel) that is so stunningly written that I dog-eared the page so I could easily find it again.

Aside from those two things of note, however, the book has no redeeming qualities. Not every story needs to have a happy ending or to be uplifting or positive or hopeful to be a good one (this one has none of those qualities), but when it is also not in the least bit enjoyable to read, I have a hard time justifying spending time I can never regain on continuing to read it.

Not one of the characters introduced thus far is at all likable or endearing. Their dialogue is so excessively riddled with profanity that I counted over 80 occurrances before I stopped numbering them (and remember, I only read chapters 1-10). The ending is not at all satisfying and is actually quite strange; perhaps even a little disturbing.

All in all, this was just not the book for me. There are others that I think far more worthy of the descriptors commonly bestowed upon masterful works, and I could not be happier (or more relieved) to put this book away knowing I shall never finish it so I can move on to another (much better) classic.

Thought-provoking and worth the read. I subtracted one star solely because of the unnecessary profanity within; it would have otherwise been a 4-star rating.

A heart-wrenching and poignant collection of accounts.

I would give a copy of this book to every believer if I could. Well worth the read.

I enjoy Lysa???s books and on its own, this one is fine. However, it is mostly repeated stories and illustrations from her other recent books.

Excruciating and poorly edited.

An excellent book for beginning gardeners who are just getting started with growing food and are eager to build a happy, healthy garden. I???ll be recommending this book to my students, as gardening is part of the programs I teach and many of my students are just starting their first garden when we begin class.

This book had such promise and started out so well and then fell so flat.

The premise of the book is the story of Ozella and her ancestors, as told to the author in Ozella's quilt booth at a vendor's market. It's the story we want to hear when we pick up the book and the author tells us she has now heard the story. Just when we think we are going to hear the story as Ozella told it, which would have been what gave this book strength and potency, we veer off instead into what the authors made of the different little pieces of the story instead of hearing the actual story as it was told.

This weakened the book and left me as the reader feeling as if the story was still being kept hidden. There was a lot of conjecture and research presented instead and whilst it was interesting at times and I did learn some things that were fascinating, I still found myself feeling like what I really wanted was to hear Ozella's story retold from that moment when Jacqueline was sitting at her feet surrounded by quilts for three hours. If the authors had done that and then presented their research, this book would have been much more satisfying and impactful to read. Instead, it felt like the story was kept secret with just little pieces of it exposed here and there.

It had potential but didn't deliver.

This is one of the books I will be purchasing copies of to hand out to friends who have not read it yet. It is written to be very easy to read for those who are just beginning their learning journey. You will come away with a long list of other books, essays, documentaries and organizations to check out as you continue. I definitely recommend it.

Content Note: There is one instance of the use of the f-word in the book. It is used in the context of a quote and is on page 65.

Rating: 4 stars of 5

Mary Oliver is one of my very favorite poets. Her work is beautiful and I love the way she paints pictures of the natural world with words. Reading her poetry always leaves me in a state of content reflection.

House of Light is a collection of poems largely centered around the theme of animals, though other elements of nature are represented as well. This volume includes her poem, ???The Summer Day,??? which features perhaps her most famous line of poetry:

???Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life????

I have read other Mary Oliver collections that I loved more than this one (hence the four stars rather than five), but I did thoroughly enjoy reading it and would recommend it to other readers.

Beautiful reflections, as always.

If you are looking for a book of beautiful compositions about brokenness, this is not it.

I bought several books about grief after I lost my father in November of 2020. I read the first few pages of each to decide which to begin with and this was the only one that resonated with me. The others seemed to assume that I was feeling a certain way or to imply that I should be feeling a certain way.

This one didn???t do that and was the only one that really captured with words the grief I was experiencing and sat with me in it.

We all grieve differently. This was the book that helped me most. I highly recommend it for others with hurting hearts and it will be the book I now give to others who face deep loss.

Mary Oliver is my favorite poet and this collection of poems from her different works is a delight that I will revisit again and again.

I would like to share one of the dog-eared poems in my copy (that I dog-eared poems in this book at all says something, because I am one of those peculiar sorts who like to keep books in pristine condition). It is titled, “Invitation.”

“Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy

and very important day
for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles

for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,

or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender?
Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air

as they strive
melodiously
not for your sake
and not for mine

and not for the sake of winning
but for sheer delight and gratitude -
believe us, they say, it is a serious thing

just to be alive
on this fresh morning
in this broken world.
I beg of you,

do not walk by
without pausing
to attend to this
rather ridiculous performance.

It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.”

There were some interesting nuggets scattered throughout, but overall, this came across as the spiritualization of some really unhealthy coping mechanisms. It???s not a book I would either read again or recommend to someone who is grieving.

This book made me weep. It is well-researched, poignant, thought-provoking, gut-wrenching and eye-opening, and I commend Ms. Wilkerson for completing the monumental task of writing it. I learned a lot. Every American needs to read it.

4.5 stars

A quick, easy read packed with practical time management advice. My favorite time management book thus far. I???ve already handed it off to someone else who now wants to read it and it made it onto my buy-extra-copies-to-give-away list.

The only reason I took off half a star was because you have to download the worksheets online and to do so, you have to provide your name, email address, phone number, number of employees and annual income / revenue. I understand that authors want to capture leads, but having to answer excessively invasive questions to download worksheets that could have been printed in the book was a big turnoff for me.

An excellent read. I subtracted a star solely due to the profanity used in a couple of the quotes throughout. Otherwise, it would have been a 5-star book.