What I've been reading (November 2015)

It's a short list this month, folks, but the books that I did read packed a punch. First, I finished:

Shadows on the Rock by Willa Cather.  This novel, creating a year in the life of 17th century French settlers in Quebec City, was the first selection in Well-Read Mom's The Year of the Worker.  I tell you:  I would not have picked this out to read if I hadn't been pushed to do so by the reading group, but I am so glad I did.  It's quiet fortitude reminded me of last year's first book in The Year of the Spouse: Hannah Coulter.  Solid, charitable, and admirable characters and evocative writing, beautifully washed in a reverence for Catholicism, encouraged me to select another Cather novel to read.  (I was especially taken by the story of the recluse Jeanne Le Ber and how she lived behind the high altar of her church, with her bed pillow just inches from the Blessed Sacrament on the other side of a partition.)  An autumn read, for sure.

Forming Intentional Disciples: The Path to Knowing and Following Jesus by Sherry A. Weddell  This pick from my Spiritual Reading Plan was chock full of the bad news (the true state of mostly lay discipleship in the Roman Catholic church) and the good news (how to change things).  I was struck by so many figures (around 70% of people who join the church via RCIA leave after a year!), stories (someone looking for the horns on a Catholic's head!), and what we can do to drop our nets.  Honestly, I am still digesting this one, and if you're at all interested in the state of discipleship in Catholic churches, this book will be enlightening.




That's it for this month.  The only book I abandoned was All the Light We Cannot See, and I only abandoned it because I had to prioritize these two books.  I will try it again: don't fret!  Linking up, as always, with Modern Mrs. Darcy's Quick Lit.  Click over to see what all sorts of people are reading.

What are you reading?  Have you read either of these books?