Book Reviews

Not The Way It's Supposed To Be: A Breviary of Sin

Cornelius Plantinga Jr.

In our world, the human predicament is that things are not the way they're supposed to be, as God created and intended. Our society seems to have watered down the idea of sin and its consequences to become merely a mediocre problem of personal misdemeanors. But sin is a reality that has horrific consequences that effect us personally and as a society. The summary (not a review) gives a chapter by chapter overview of Plantinga's book. If we are to understand the gospel and grace, we need a proper view of sin.

Hope Against Hope

Nadezhda Mandelstam

If you want to love a people you have to learn to weep over their tragedies. This book takes us into the heart of the Soviet tragedy through the life and struggles of Osip Mandelstam and his wife. They were hounded by the authorities until he was eventually taken to the gula

If you want insight in to the terror of despotism and totalitarianism this book will give it. The fear of life under Stalin is palpable.

Conversations with an Executioner

Kazimierz Moczarski

An incredible 255 day long interview with the German Officer who liquidated the Jewish Ghetto in Warsaw at the end of the Second World War.

This book will give you insight in to this Nazi mind through the eyes of the Polish interviewer who was in prison with him. Imprisoned by the Communists Kazimierz Moczarski, who had been head of the propaganda department of the Polish Underground, found himself in the same cell as SS General Jurgen Stroop. The General, unrepentant until the end, gives insight into his own thinking and ideas, how he became a Nazi and what motivated him to do what he did.

The Unquiet Ghost - Russians Remember Stalin

Adam Hochschild

"Over 20 Million people died during Stalin's quarter-Century Reign of terror. Only with the advent of glasnost could Russians openly confront their memories of that time. In 1991... Adam Hochschild spent nearly six months in Russia talking to gulag survivors, retired concentration camp guards, and countless others." -from the back cover.

Our memory is very short-lived. In our learning communities, we used to talk about the shadows of the past but now few young people have an active memory of the reality of their recent history. So now their recent history is a dark room into which they have few guides to take them. This book is one of several that give insight into the dark places of Russian history.

Cafe Europe - Life after Communism

Slavenka Drakulic by Marsh Moyle

A series of observations from around Central Europe after the fall of the Iron Curtain. It captures the mood of Europe at that time and more importantly the cultural insights so helpful when trying to understand and be enriched by people of another culture.

Borderland - A Journey Through the History of Ukraine

Anna Reid

Tells the history of Ukraine through a travelogue. A fascinating set of cultural insights and well-written - A good introduction.

Borders are hard to define. Now we have GPS and other devices of exact measurements. But it was not always so. "Ukraine" means borderland. It is on the edge of Russia and Europe. Is it Europe? Now we would say yes but when travel was harder borders were thick. To cross them took days. So it is with culture. From the culture of Europe to the culture of Russian Asia the border is called Ukraine.

Ukraine - A History

Orest Subtelny

A comprehensive history of Ukraine - 700+ pages

Originally written in 1988 and updated in 2000

Natasha's Dance - A Cultural History of Russia

Orland Figes

If knowledge comes by the pound this book will supply lots of it. Over 700 pages of insight into the history and culture or Russia.

The Chapter: In search of the Russian Soul is well worth the read.

Black Earth - A Journey Through Russia after the Fall

Andrew Meier

This book is a rich insight for those who want to feel the struggles, contradictions and joys of Russian life. It reads easily.

Explores Russians five corners - Moscow, Chechnya, Norisk, Sakhalin and St. Petersburg. Extraordinary insight into post-Soviet Russia. Meier was a Moscow correspondent for TIME from 1996-2001.

Pushkin's Children - Writings on Russia and Russians

Tolstaya Tatyana

This book gives an insight into Russia at two levels. The subject matter discusses the real struggles and issues of daily life and give insight into the reality of Russia today. The authors own approach gives insight into the Russian soul.

"Twenty Articles address the politics, culture and literature of Russia. Passionate, opinionated , and wickedly clever, these essays use ample material from daily life to underline Tolstaya's ideas and observations. They move in one unique voice from Soviet Women, Classical Russian cooking, and the bliss of snow to the effect of Pushkin on Russian's writers". - From the back cover.

Necessary Lies - Poland

Eva Stachniak

This novel is a great introduction to the moral dilemmas of Life in Central and Eastern Europe.

It captures the mood and tensions of relationships in Communist and post-communist Poland although the cultural insights are valid more widely. It covers issues of communication, assumptions, expectations, and the clash of value systems.

Wroclaw was a German city that became Polish at the end of the Second World War. How does a country change nationality? What are the issues and implications? What effect does it have on the people involved? What happens to the historical memory of a city whose people who are moved out in a matter of weeks and whose place is taken by people from another country.

If you were not there this book will help you understand those who were.

Pub: Simon and Pierre Fiction. A member of the Dundurn Group.

In the Memory of the Forest

Charles T. Powers

A book that takes you deep in to the transition of Poland from Communism to what followed.

The story takes place in a village east of Warsaw. It gives insight in to the suspicion and ambiguities of dealing with the questions of history. The book raises the question of what happened to the Jewish population, issues of power under communism and how it should be addressed. It shows the complications of corruption, the Roman Catholic Church and Polish identity.

That an American journalist could touch and describe the Polish psyche so deeply in his first novel, is amazing.

The Divine Conspiracy

Dallas Willard

This covers some of the basics aspects of reality. How do we see how thing are?

Total Truth

Nancy Pearcey

From the front cover: Is religion a private matter only - personally comforting but publicly irrelevant? Nancy Pearcey makes a passionate case that Christianity is not just religious truth but the truth about total reality. It is total truth.

Whose World

A.N. Triton

This now out-of-print book is an excellent starting place for people who want to think about the place of the Christian in Society.

Chapters:

Does the Material World Matter
Other Views
Material progress and Politics
Are Christian Morals for everyone?
The Christian and Culture
Aims in Education
Science and Technology
Marriage and Money
The Gospel and Society

Out of print but not out of sight. You will find it if you look hard enough on the web.

When People Throw Stones - A leaders guide to Fielding Personal Criticism

Blaine Allen