Fresh from the Bookshelf: The Journal by Beth Harlow (a review)

  It's the year 1861 and southern girl named Mary gives her war bound fiance a blank journal to record his thoughts while he's away from her. Little did they know that this small book would pass from Rebel to Yankee hands multiple times touching each life as it does. 

The Journal by Beth Harlow is a sweet easy to read book documenting the lives of soldiers during the Civil War in first person narration. Each soldier who picks up the journal writes another entry--some are able to read all the entries of the men that held the journal before. All are touched by the journey this small book makes.

The Journal covers the full expanse of the war, from the initial battle at Bull Run to the final surrender of General Johnston to General Sherman. Each soldier shares another experience of life during the Civil War. 

The major secondary theme of the book is that of each person's relation ship with God. Each soldier writing in the journal is in a different place in his relationship with the God--and yet they all seem to draw strength from the previous entries by the other men. From a sinner who claims he's too far gone to save, to the doctor who turned his back on God when his wife ran away with his boy--to finally the Jew who comes to know Jesus the Messiah under the guidance of the journal and a Bible. They all share the same belief that regardless of what is going on in this war--God is still God.

I think that this book in it's clear language and simple style would be a good asset to a study of the Civil War....ESPECIALLY for any Christian homeschooling family. There is clear and understandable descriptions of the some of the major campaigns that would be good to tie in. I think that it's easy enough for a middle grade student to read and understand and the older student or adult would appreciate the message.

The main con I have is that it's TOO simple and short. I felt like it could have been a bit more meaty. I also felt it didn't really show the depth of emotions or trauma of the war. It was a bit...shallow? I actually felt the journal entries towards the end were much better written than the ones at the beginning. It seemed more realistic towards the end. At the same time, the books length (62 pages) could easily mimic that of a REAL journal as it wouldn't have been very long itself.

If you are hoping for a well plotted out journey from one side of the war to the other with deep insight into the lives of the men who had contact with the book....you will be disappointed with The Journal. 

I didn't love it, but I did feel like it was still a good read.



Thanks for stopping by! I hope you will check out some of my other Book Reviews! Let me know if you read the books I've reviewed and what your thoughts were on them!

Fresh from the Bookshelf: The Gospel According to Les Miserables (Book Review)

"Few stories have captured readers hearts like Les Miserables. Popular as a book, musical and movie, the themes contrast complicated characters and themes. Though audiences have enjoyed the timeless story, the Christian themes are often missed...." 

So reads the back cover of The Gospel According to Les Miserables: 30 Devotions to Inspire Faith by Selena Sarns. 

I adore Les Miserables. I've read the thick epic (it's LONNNNG) and have seen it performed LIVE as a musical (amazing!) as well as watching it in movie form...once as a drama with Liam Neeson (excellent!) as Jean Valjean and the most recent movie musical with Hugh Jackman (brilliantly put together--the movie, not [just] the man. LOL). When I saw this book in the list for book reviews, I thought it would be something I would enjoy.

The Gospel According to Les Miserables: 30 Devotions to Inspire Faith

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from BookSneeze as part of their book review bloggers program. All opinions expressed are my own and I was not required to write a positive review. 

I chose to read and review this book because not only am I incredibly familiar with this timeless classic but I was intrigued to see how the author would connect the characters and events to the Bible and gospel lessons. 

This is a very simple devotional--easy for a teenager or adult to incorporate into their daily devotional/bible study time. Each day is just 2 pages long. Every day's reading begins with an applicable scripture and then makes a connection to either a character, setting or event from the story. There are connections to each of the primary characters (Valjean, Javert, Fantine, ect) as well as historical or plot connections. The simplistic nature of the devotionals allows for a lot of added study for the reader...or just easy and quick passages for meditation.

An example from the book is as follows...

***

Day/Reading 21 "The Greatest Sacrifice" (p.65-66)

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

John 15:13

 The passage then begins by discussing the event from the book to go with this (when Eponine takes a bullet meant for the man she loves Marius and dies for him) and then makes the gospel connection to that of Jesus Christ and how He willingly shed His blood for mankind.

***

That should give you an idea of how each section is laid out.

Now, just as I found the simplicity of the devotional to be a good thing, it was also a con. When I got the book I was hoping for more than just a tidbit for each day. I felt each devotional could have been more meaty.

Another thing which I didn't like was that there seemed to be repetition among the readings. There really wasn't a branching out to analyze more than maybe one aspect of each character or event...and then it seemed to re-work the same theme for one or two more devotionals later in the book. Or it took the same events and just matched them to something else rather then pick new events/characters. So it felt repetitive, even some of the wording was the same.

All-in-all I would give The Gospel According to Les Miserables: 30 Devotions to Inspire Faith 2 out of 5 stars because I think the author could really have made this book into an in-depth devotional with 30 completely different applications rather than the "easy reader" it was.

However---if you want more of a guide/overview rather than something that really makes you dig in to study, then you would most like find this book very useful.

Book Review~ Noah Webster: Father of the Dictionary

I had the pleasure this week of reading the book Noah Webster: Father of the Dictionary by Isabel Proudfit for a book review. This simple fictionalized biography captures the idea of a poor farmboy rising from his humble birth to influence the development of America, at a time when the country was just endeavoring to stand on its own. While the great leaders focused on creating laws and government for the brand new emerging United States, Noah Webster provided schoolbooks to the future leaders of the great American nation.

Noah Webster Father of the Dictionary

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from Bradford Press as part of the BookCrash book review bloggers program. All opinions expressed are my own and I was not required to write a positive review. 

Let me start off by saying I love history. Biographies and autobiographies are my friends. I have learned much of what I know of history by going this route. I chose this book because it looked exactly like the type of book I would have chosen to read in school. I read countless fictionalized biographies when I was in elementary school and adored them.

The book is written at a level that upper elementary and middle school aged children could easily read. If I handed it to my 2^nd grader, I think that even he could wade through most of the words successfully. I think it would be an excellent read-aloud book for elementary age students and a great addition to a US History curriculum as it focuses on someone who lived at the birth of America.

I think that if someone needed a crash course lesson on Noah Webster, this would be a very good book. Each chapter is fairly short and addresses a certain stage or event in his life. When the book opens, Noah Webster is thirteen years old. You learn his backstory as he reminisces on growing up, and when his mother reflects back to his birth. There is a good portion of the book dedicated to the events and influences that led the poor farmboy Noah Webster into the academic world.

Throughout the book you get bits and pieces of what was going on in history at each stage of Noah’s life. There is mention of the colonists’ grievances, the Boston Tea Party, the Continental Convention and even the “Shot heard around the World” as the Revolutionary War began.

It is this aspect that makes this book a great book for young students as they learn not just about a man, but about how his life was influenced by what was going on in the world around him. By making the connections, students will be able to remember that Noah Webster was alive at the time of the Revolutionary War, that he was a friend to Benjamin Franklin and was able to write books on early American History because he was living it. That is something far more valuable they will be able to remember more then just birth and death dates.

I loved how the author included actual pages and stories from the original books written by Noah Webster. That gives the reader and idea on what a lesson book would have been like for the early colonial children—and all those who used it as it was printed and purchased and traveled across the nation. I laughed at some of the little stories because they were so different from what our children are used to now. But that really adds an option for discussion from this book too. It would be easy to create a simple discussion paper to go with this book for teachers—whether in a classroom or at home—could use as a supplement of the book.

Really my only issue with the book is that there wasn’t any conclusion. It just ended with:

The garden never saw him again. The following day he caught cold, and by Friday he was very ill with a fever. Two days later he died peacefully during the evening. If he had lived another five months, he would have reached his eight-fifth birthday. (Proudfit p.219)

I feel like there should have been one or two more paragraphs to capture a final summary of what he had accomplished including his total number of books he authored—maybe even how long they were used before being replaced with a new curriculum. However--by ending the book without that information, it allows the reader to go find out this information for his or herself.

The only other drawback is that this is a fictionalized biography---so things have been added in to make it flow as a story, allowing for easy reading. I think that if you studied it with children you would need to make sure they understand this aspect. Perhaps even discuss the benefit of writing books in that form.

As you have probably guessed I highly recommend this book. It is an excellent resource and I plan on incorporating it into our own US History curriculum this year—especially since it will be focused on early American history and many of the characters we will learn about are mentioned in this book too. I am happy to have this book in my collection now—and I know I will never look at Webster’s Dictionary the same way again.