My reading journal - March 2008

The Battle for Vast Dominion - George Bryan Povlika - A fun seafaring adventure series similar to Patrick O'Brien's Master and Commander series. Even though this is marketed as "Christian fiction", it's well-written and worth reading. Unlike most Christian fiction which is concerned with prairie widows and cheesy conversion scenes, theology is tied with the main character, a seminary student thrust into a swashbuckling adventure, in an intelligent way.

Par for the Course - Ray Blackston - Nothing heavy, a breezy character-driven comedy. Unlike his earlier books which point out the foibles of Christian singles' groups, this has more of a golf theme, as a driving course instructor in Charleston, SC, gets mixed up with a woman, with politics, and the intersection of these two themes. The author's voice is like a southern gentleman's version of Nick Hornby, but I'm hoping his next novel takes place in the spooky strange town of Savannah, GA.

The St. Louis Baseball Reader - A collection of essays, newspaper articles, and first-person accounts gathered over the years of the St. Louis Cardinals and St. Louis Browns. I find reading about old-time baseball to be fascinating, and the accounts of baseball greats like Stan Musial, Satchel Paige, and Bob Gibson are quite illuminating.

The Magician's Nephew - C.S. Lewis - A charming beginning to the Narnia series, not as interesting as some of the later books, but the descriptions of the birth and growing of Narnia are imaginative.