I have to confess, I often judge a book by its cover. And from the moment I opened the mailer with my most recent book to review for Bethany House, it called to me, and I couldn’t put it down for the next few days. The sepia photo on the cover of Traveler’s Rest by Ann Tatlock bespeaks nostalgia, deep contemplation, and a hint of sorrow, tinged with bittersweet happiness. And so the book itself went.

The novel follows Jane Morrow, a young woman engaged to a National Guardsman who comes back from Iraq a quadriplegic, as she navigates the waters of life post-injury. The soldier, Seth, is predictably angry and can’t see the point of living anymore. His family is stoic and prepared to do all that needs to be done to take care of him. Jane is loyal and ready to face the road of marriage she sees ahead of her. But of course everything changes, or there would be no novel!

I was driven to choose this book for review because not many books have been written yet about this war, and I was intrigued to see how Tatlock would handle it. Honestly, the war is only a bit player in the book at most–a foregone conclusion that’s just part of life as we know it–which I guess is pretty true to how it is in real life for many of us. There were a few mentions of some of the animosity toward the soldiers, but Jane of course is supportive of the troops. That was about the extent of the discussion of the war, which might have disappointed me had other elements not grabbed me.

The characters were what really sucked me in. As she spent time at the hospital with Seth, Jane met some wonderful people, and her burgeoning relationships with them kept bringing me back. The kind-hearted retired doctor, the intelligent young blind man, the scientist friend who we keep up with through emails, all of them brought out bits and pieces of the story in different ways. However, I was disappointed that a few of these characters seemed to disappear by the time we got to the all together pat epilogue.

As with any major life episode, faith came to bear in Jane’s decision. Tatlock never really explained why Jane was not a believer, though she clearly states that Seth was. And through a somewhat unbelievable dream-vision, all of Jane’s uncertainty melted away and brought her into the ranks of the faithful. I was surprised that the faith element was not talked about in more detail, though maybe that is a good move for Christian that will help move it off its niche bookshelf and more into the realm of mainstream fiction. Instead, the focus was on Jane’s decision of whether or not to go ahead with her marriage to Seth. And I think that’s the crux of what fascinated me about  Traveler’s Rest: I have NO idea what decision I might make were I in Jane’s shoes, nor did I necessarily have an opinion of what the “right” decision would be, so I was fascinated to see what she would choose. Unfortunately, I found the denouement to be a bit of a cop-out. I would have liked it to be a bit more raw, as it would be in real life. (Though, I must admit, the ending was what I had secretly hoped for from the moment I met the character named John Paul.)

I was surprised at points by the poeticism of Tatlock’s writing. Sentences like, “No one seemed aware at all of the song rolling out of the belfry, though the bells went on stubbornly ringing, their notes drifting down like absolution over the dusk-shrouded city” seemed almost out of place among the rest of the more pedestrian plot-driven pages, but they were a nice addition that would lead me to give others of Tatlock’s books a whirl. Despite a few somewhat unbelievable stretches that were necessary to moving the plot forward, the book flowed nicely from start to finish and left me feeling pretty content.

I like reading books that make me think about how I would handle certain situations, and this was definitely one. Have you read any books lately that made you think?

Oh, how I wish you could hear this song echoing through the open space in my church, when the musicians stop playing and just the voices in harmony ring out, over and over again, and then stop, lingering on the last note before it fades, leaving behind the sweetness of the words. But ponder them anyway, and imagine it.

hold on to these things but don’t hold them so tightly ‘cause what you hold so tightly you no longer hold for Me but for you

~troy bronsink

words for your Wednesday.

Andy and I went backpacking last weekend. He was an Eagle Scout, so he’s camped and hiked lots and lots of times. We’ve been a few times together, and we have a pretty good routine down as far as getting the trip organized goes. He’s responsible for planning the route, picking the campsites, and getting us there, and I’m responsible for the food. (Though, what else is new? ;-))

The first time we went I was pretty nervous about this and stuck to a “safe” list of bapckpacking foods that I had found on the internet or something. Since then, though, I’ve gotten a bit more creative and had some fun planning our meals. Backpacking food needs to be in light containers with easy open packaging, no fuss when it comes to preparation, and shelf-stable. I tend to think of foods that would be good for kids to eat, because those usually fit all the requirements.

For dinners, we carry a small stove-like thing called a JetBoil. It has an insulated canister that boils water very quickly, and also has an attachment that allows you to place a pot or pan over its propane flame. It’s light and compact and works really well, so we try to come up with as many meals as possible that require only water. Lunches are more casual, and in fact some days we just nibble when we’re hungry rather than stopping to eat an official lunch.

Here’s what we carried last time:

• Knorr Butter and Herb pasta pacakge with no-drain chicken breast chunks in a pouch for Friday dinner (2 of each, though we only ate one)
• A freeze-dried (just add water) beef and potato stew for Saturday dinner
• Peanut Butter and Pretzel M&M's for dessert
• 6 Cliff bars in assorted flavors
• Cranberry Ginger instant oatmeal
• Berry-flavored apple sauce
• Ice cream sandwich flavored shelf-stable pudding cups
• Wheat and cheese packaged snack crackers
• 2 quart-sized bags of home-mixed trail mix
• Beef jerky
• 4 blueberry bagels spread with crunchy peanut butter for optional lunches (the bagels are sturdy enough to not get weird or soggy from the peanut butter)
• Freeze-dried "fruit that crunches" that I impulse bought at Publix
• All-fruit "fruit rollups" from the organic kids' section at Kroger
• An extra pouch of ready-to-eat tuna left over from another camping trip (just in case)

We actually brought a fair amount of this back home with us, but you always want to have too much food, rather than not enough. You can tell I like to include “treats”–that makes it a lot more fun to me! Chocolate is a good addition to any trail-eaten meal.

And beef jerky isn’t something I’d ever think about eating on a regular basis, but I sure do enjoy it out in the woods. The freeze-dried dinners, which you can buy at any outdoors store, are a great, easy cleanup option, that are also pretty tasty and hardy. Next time, I might just stick with two of those rather than trying to make a camp dinner out of real dinner ingredients.

We also brought along an assortment of teabags and instant coffees for in the morning. I never sleep well in the wilderness, and this past time it was actually a little chilly overnight, so that hot cup of caffeinated goodness is a pleasure in the morning. My favorite mixture is a package of hot chocolate mix stirred in with a couple of tubes of instant coffee–instant mocha!

The best and most fun lesson I learned this time was to use the bulk bins at Whole Foods or somewhere similar to get ingredients for trail mix. That way, you can buy small amounts of lots of different things, and not spend very much on each element because it’s charged by weight! This is much better than having to buy a whole big bag of, say, almonds at a regular grocery store when you really only need a handful.

So there you have it: food for the trail. Have you ever been backpacking? What kinds of food do you eat while camping?

Not every week is a red letter week when it comes to coupons. In fact, more weeks than not are just pretty ho-hum, and I go do the grocery shopping and spend a reasonable amount by shopping sales and generic brands, rather than by using a dramatic coupon on every item. This week was one of those. Andy and I were backpacking this past weekend, so I wasn’t able to spend any time getting my list organized and my coupons in order. I ended up being more rushed than I had anticipated on Monday afternoon when I finally got around to it, and I felt pretty frazzled and unorganized at the store. In fact, I bought 2 bags of baby carrots at $1.00 each because I thought I was using a $0.50/2 store coupon, but since I just found that coupon in my coupon bin, I’m guessing it didn’t get used!! Haha. That’s how it goes sometimes. And we still had food to eat this week, so that’s what matters.

I did purchase the required 5 items in Kroger’s current mega event in order to get the $5.00 savings but (GASP!) I only actually used a coupon on one of the items. I decided they were all at or under my buy price anyway and I was just going to do it. I did, however find a nice surprise on the manager’s clearance shelf!

Have you ever come across this shelf? At my Kroger, it’s tucked back by an emergency exit at the end of the “frozen novelties” aisle, just past all the milk. It’s a random mishmosh of things, many of which are strange brands or damaged items (hairspray that has leaked, anyone?). But every now and then you can find a treasure like this. (I’ve also found expensive brands of healthy/organic granola bars and cereals back there.) The tag on these says “Was $2.99,” but you can see they’re marked down to $0.75. There’s nothing discernibly wrong with them, and the expiration date isn’t until January 2013 (that’s always the first thing I check on clearance items, in case a short sell-by date is the reason for the markdown). My guess is they overbought, or brought in a new brand and needed more space on the shelf. So, I snatched them up! How cool would it have been if I had also had a coupon for these oh well.

Unfortunately I realized as I was looking at my receipt later that one of them got rung up at its full price. Boo. I guess I wasn’t really paying attention as the cashier was checking me out. But if I got the 2 of these, sans coupons, for $1.87 each, that’s still a pretty significant savings.

Are there any sections of the store where you tend to find good deals? Have you found any treasures on the clearance shelf lately?

My church has these groups called missional community groups that are made up of people from the same geographical neighborhood who are interested in doing things together in order to serve their immediate community. The groups are pretty autonomous, and each one has its own projects and agendas (which is the point), but every once in awhile the church trickles down some curriculum that they’d like each group to discuss. Recently we were given a handout on the topic of the person of peace (which is probably a whole post in its own right) that included an exercise to draw what you picture the kingdom of God looking like.

Normally I hate drawing prompts. I would just as soon tell you in words, and in fact could probably do a much more detailed job in that manner! (This is why I’m a blogger.) But I had fun with this thought exercise. Here’s what I drew:

Everyone is happy (even the sun, apparently!) and gets along, and there are no more tears. (That’s always been one of my favorite verses in the Bible about the kingdom: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes.”) There’s a table full of really good food that I’m sure gets replenished frequently, and there is music and singing all the time. There are infinite books and nice places to read them. And God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are up there hanging out with us.

Now, obviously, this is not literal, nor is it theologically correct. But it was fun to think about some of the nice things in this world that I imagine would only be magnified in the next. I have no idea what the infinite kingdom of God will be like, and I honestly don’t think about it that much. But perhaps the most beautiful part of all of it to me is in thinking about how we can bring this kingdom about here. Because the Bible tells us that’s our call. Sure, there are parts of eternity that simply can’t be fulfilled on this broken earth with broken people leading the charge. But the calls to love, give, and serve radically can happen now. I can do it. You can do it. And that small piece of heaven is the real representation of God’s kingdom.

How do you picture the kingdom of God?