Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Check out these new titles...

When Burpo made it through an emergency apendectomy, his family was overjoyed at this miraculous survival. What they weren't expecting, though, was the story that emerged in the months that followed--a story as beautiful as it was extraordinary, detailing their little boy's trip to heaven and back.
Colton, not yet four years old, told his parents he left his body during the surgery--and authenticated that claim by describing exactly what his parents were doing in another part of the hospital while he was being operated on. He talked of visiting heaven and relayed stories told to him by people he met there whom he had never met in life, sharing events that happened even before he was born. He also astonished his parents with descriptions and obscure details about heaven that matched the Bible exactly, though he has not yet learned to read.

Pat Conroy, the beloved American storyteller, is a voracious reader. Starting as a childhood passion that bloomed into a lifelong companion, reading has been Conroy's portal to the world, both to the farthest corners of the globe and to the deepest chambers of the human soul. His interests range widely, from Milton to Tolkien, Philip Roth to Thucydides, encompassing poetry, history, philosophy, and any mesmerizing tale of time creating a vast reservoir of playful turns of phrase, dazzling flashes of description, and snippets of delightful sound, all just for his love of language. But for Conroy reading is not simple a pleasure to be enjoyed in off hours or a source of inspiration for his own writing. It would hardly be an exaggeraton to claim that reading may have saved his life-and if not his life, then surely his sanity.
In My Reading Life, Conroy revisits a life of reading through an array of wonderful and often surprising anecdotes: sharing the pleasures of local library's vast cache with his mother when he was a boy, recounting his decade-long relationship with the English teacher who pointed him onto the path of letters, and describing a profoundly influential period he spent in Paris, as well as reflecting on other people, places, and experiences. His story is a moving and personal one, girded by wisdom and an undeniable honesty. Anyone who not only enjoys the pleasures of reading but also believes in the power of books to shape a life will find here the greatest defense of that credo.

Don't forget these......
Anatomy of Strength Training, by Pat Manocchia
Assault with a Deadly Glue Gun, by Lois Winston
Elfland, by Freda Warrington
Inconceivable, by Carolyn Savage
Kay Thompson From Funny Face to Eloise, by Sam Irvin
Known and Unkown, by Donald Rumsfeld
Moonwalking With Einstein, by Joshua Foer
Power Down, by Ben Coes
Switch, by Chip Heath
Three Stages of Amazement, by Carol Edgarian
Tick Tock, by James Patterson
Tiger's Wife, by Tea Obreht
Unplanned, by Abby Johnson
Weird Sisters, by Eleanor Brown
The Write Start, by Jennifer Hallissy
7 Wonders That Will Change Your Life, by Glenn Beck

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