March Book Reviews

I read less than I usually do but six out of the seven were five-star books, so I would say it was a good reading month overall. My favorite two are in the photo above. Here are my March reads in order of completion.

Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan ★★★★★ (audiobook)
Oh my, this book was something else. It was fascinating to watch Susannah recount the months she lost touch with reality as her brain was fighting a mystery illness. Using her own memory (much of which is absent during the worst month of her illness), medical records, her parents' journals, and interviews with her family, friends, and medical staff that treated her, Cahalan uses her journalistic skills  to uncover what happened to her. Her myriad of strange symptoms (including hallucinations, erratic and violent behaviors, and even catatonic episodes) could have easily put her away in a state hospital but her family refused to believe she was having a mental breakdown; they knew there was more to it and they were right. Her symptoms were because (what one doctor finally explained after a long string of lab tests and cognitive function exams) "her brain is on fire." The audiobook was well done and the story itself left me on the edge of my seat and then once I was done, I youtube'd a whole bunch of videos of Cahalan because I was still so curious about her harrowing experience.


Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate ★★★★☆ (audiobook)
Roughly based on real experiences of children who were torn from their families to be sold off to affluent families under the maniacal hand of Georgia Tann, this is a heartbreaking novel of siblings ripped apart from their parents and their dark experience at the Tennessee Children's Home Society, a holding place for "orphans" (most of whom weren't orphans at all) would live until adopted by actresses, state officials, socialites, and other rich couples Georgia Tann deemed adequate (for her grubby hands to make money, that is). The novel is told in alternating chapters of Rill, the oldest of five who struggles through this whole nightmare that started in 1939, to the present-day story of Avery, a successful lawyer who is slowly uncovering a family secret about her grandmother. I was much more interested in Rill's story than Avery's (which was predictable and a bit annoying). Warning: There are a few scenes that are heart-wrenching since they involve young kids.


Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi ★★★★★ (audiobook)

A sweeping saga that starts in 18th century Ghana with two half-sisters and their vastly different circumstances and travels on towards their descendants in the modern day. Along the way, the reader meets characters with heartbreaking stories of slavery and racism as well as hopeful stories of family ties and forgiveness. One sister's descendants stay in Ghana, where centuries of feuding between the Fante and Asante tribes lead to bloodshed as well as  British colonization  threatening their identity and culture. And then the other sister ends up on a slave ship towards America, so her lineage experiences the horrific slavery of the South, the horrendous Fugitive Slave Act that "returned" many free African Americans from the North to slave owners in the South,  the exploitation of African Americans after the Civil War where the smallest legal infraction would result in paying off your sentence in the grueling and dangerous mining jobs that killed many and left countless others with destroyed lungs, and the bleakness of dope houses of Jazz-age Harlem. There is so much pain and sadness amongst the stories, some of which were truly difficult to listen to because of the abuse and betrayal. Specifically, a warning of abusive  themes in both Esi and Willie's stories (both were really hard to get through for me). Also, there is A LOT of sex scenes, many of which are not overly detailed (except the two I mentioned), so be forewarned if that makes you uncomfortable. It makes sense that these scenes are added since they transition the story from one descendent to the other (there wouldn't be a following descendent without sex, after all ), but I wanted to just give that warning since I typically like to know beforehand if there is a lot of sensual scenes in a book I am about to read (and try to avoid such books). The overall content, history, and exquisite writing made it a unique reading experience I won't forget. Learning more about the heart-wrenching experiences of Africans in Ghana as well as African Americans here in the U.S. gave my heart so much heaviness that I had to process with my husband and pray through, but it was also so encouraging to see the strength, importance of family, and hope woven through the centuries of stories. This is an important book and though it ripped my heart apart, I am so glad I listened. The audiobook was exceptionally done (the accents!!).

12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You by Tony Reinke ★★★★★

This is a practical, challenging, and thought-provoking book about how technology has been affecting us personally, our spiritual lives, and our interpersonal relationships. From uncovering ways that our phone's distractions lure us, to craving immediate approval and rooting our identity in the amount of likes or comments we get on social media platforms, to losing our literacy as our brains learn to skim rather than actually read thoughtfully, to loneliness amidst our hundreds of online "friends" because our fake online persona doesn't match up with who we really are, to losing meaning and our place in time. Some chapters were more applicable for me  than others, but the whole book was a worthwhile read as it pushed me to self-critique my own phone usage and prayerfully decide what changes to make here on out. My husband and I read this together and we have vastly different phone usage (I am definitely more into the whole social media thing than he is), so we were challenged by different themes, but overall found it to be a very helpful book. We both came away with a renewed desire to decrease distractions, limiting our dependency on our phones and fostering changes to better allow our phones to help rather than hinder us and our relationships as well as carving out phone-free time. Reinke doesn't demonize smartphones; he is fully aware they can be useful and necessary at times. But he also doesn't skirt around the potential dangers they pose, either. He doesn't condemn those who use smartphones, but rather challenges himself and others to be more aware of how our phones are potentially changing us and how we can fight against being negatively impacted by technology. I journaled every chapter and am looking forward to returning to a lot of the themes and thoughts I wrote down as I continually strive to be more smartphone-smart in terms of the time and mental space I allow for social media. A few things I added into my life last year have really helped (taking Social Media Sabbath on Sundays where I am completely offline, giving myself a "curfew" on social media where I cannot get on before noon and get off at 9pm so that I am not tempted to look at my phone in the mornings when I could rather be doing a devotional and so at night my mind is not focused on the busyness of the social media world). But now I have new things to ponder and try out to help with the distractions that my phone definitely poses on me. 

Christy by Catherine Marshall ★★★★★ (audiobook)
A Christian fiction classic loosely based on the author's mother's experience as a young teacher in a remote Smoky Mountain village. In this story, Christy was a fresh-faced nineteen year-old who, after hearing a missionary talk about the struggles of the impoverished, uneducated villagers of Cutter Gap, Tennessee, decided to leave her comforts of a privileged life in exchange for teaching  in a one-room school as well as befriending the residents of this community. Both proved to be vastly more difficult than she imagined and she is stretched beyond her abilities and struggles to understand her faith along the way. I absolutely loved that Marshall wrote an honest character. Christy was prideful and headstrong at times; she also had hard questions about God and Christianity that were asked of her as well as her own questions that were brutally honest about her struggle to understand how a good God could allow horrible things to happen to good people. These parts of the book were vulnerable, honest, and beautiful. The audiobook was awesome because it included a short interview with the author's son, who said that about 90% of the story is based on his grandmother, Lenora Woods. Also, the narrator is Kellie Martin, who played Christy in a TV adaptation (that I now really want to find and watch!). It was a long book but very well worth it!


Hinds' Feet on High Places: An Engaging Visual Journey by Hannah Hurnard (illustrations by Jill DeHaan and Rachel McNaughton)★★★★★
I read this book years ago and was excited to re-read it when it was chosen for our book club. A powerful allegory of the Christian walk, it is based on Psalm 18:33 ("He makes me as surefooted as a deer enabling me to stand on mountain heights") and Habakkuk 3:19 ("The Sovereign Lord is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to tread on the heights"). Full of Christian themes such as surrendering your will to God, accepting with joy what God brings in your life, seeing suffering and pain as conduits for deep work that helps us experience God's comfort and love, humility, and serving others.  Goodness, there is just so much jam-packed in this story, but it flows well without feeling preachy or confusing with all the metaphors. This updated version has the original text but is surrounded by gorgeous artwork as well as journaling space and questions to help process the lessons in the story. If you like The Pilgrim's Progress or other allegorical tales, this one is a must-read!

The Dream of You: Let God of Broken Identities and Live the Life You Were Made For by Jo Saxton ★★★★★
I have really liked the teaching style of Jo Saxton at the past two If:Gathering conferences and was excited to receive her book to read and review. I was not sure what to expect but I ended up loving it. Isn't it awesome how certain books "find" you at the right time? I was struggling with my own worth and identity after feeling like I kept making mistakes and was not measuring up. This book was a great tool in working through that.  It may have a light, airy title but it does deep work. Saxton uses Biblical stories, solid Bible-based truth, and her own experiences to dig into why many Christian women still struggle with finding their worth and identity in perfectionism, overachievement, and the names and labels others stick onto us that threaten to mute the song of our hearts, rather than finding it in the character and work of Jesus. She exposes the lies that keep us from pursuing the dreams, purposes, and God-shaped personality and abilities God has given us as well as helping readers navigate through the seasons of wilderness and valleys when it seems like God is a million miles away. Her wisdom is encouraging, her practical advice is helpful for processing the things God is working in hearts as they read this book. She is funny, honest, encouraging, and relatable.

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from Blogging for Books in exchange for an honest review, which I have provided here.

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Currently Reading:

Braving Sorrow Together:The Transformative Power of Faith and Community When Life is Hard by Ashleigh Slater

Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte

Calm My Anxious Heart by Linda Dillow

Streams in the Desert: 366 Daily Devotional Reading by L. B. Cowman