We are lovers of books and lovers of wine. And so we've come together to meet once a month. We talk, we laugh, we eat and we drink. Our meetings are an opportunity to connect with like-minded people who concurrently stretch our views of the world.
*UPDATED* Julie's pick for April is "The Atonement Child" by Francine Rivers.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Dynah Carey knew where her life was headed. Engaged to a wonderful man,
the daughter of doting parents, a faithful child of God, she has it all.
Then the unthinkable happens: Dynah’s perfect life is irrevocably
changed by a rape that results in an unwanted pregnancy.
Her family is
torn apart and her seemingly rock-solid faith is pushed to the limits as
she faces the most momentous choice of her life: to embrace or to end
the life within her. This is ultimately a tale of three women, as
Dynah’s plight forces both her mother and her grandmother to face the
choices they made. Written with balance and compassion, The Atonement Child brings a new perspective to the most controversial topic of our times.
*****
The Atonement Child
faces the tough and divisive issues of abortion through the story of
three women in the same family. In preparation for this book, Francine
Rivers spoke with numerous women of all points of view on abortion,
painstakingly bringing the experiences, pains, and hearts of the women
to this book. The Atonement Child looks at the medical and social
dilemma of abortion and the consequences that are shared by society. The
theme is that abortion is not just a woman's problem. The Christian
community must have more compassion and take a less confrontational
approach to women who have experienced an abortion.
The Atonement
Child centers around three women, Dynah Carey, a rape victim faced with a
momentous decision, and her mother, Hannah Carey, and grandmother, Eve
Daniels, both of whom have had abortions.
As horrible as the rape
experience is, it is minimal compared to the trauma everyone experiences
when it is discovered that Dynah is pregnant from the assault. A
student on a Christian campus, she faces the Dean and the rigid rules of
the college. Engaged to a pastoral student with a brilliant scholastic
record, she comes face to face with his dreams for their future.
Abandoned, she seeks solace from her family and learns love is not
always unconditional even from those who espouse the Christian faith.
Standing on her own, she comes face to face with God and learns what
true love means.
The story addresses the tremendous inner
struggles of those who have had abortions and those who are facing them.
It is a story of how victims are often victimized and those who need
love the most are often forgotten in the fight to save the child. It is a
story of women in crisis andthe realities of what it means to face
abortion.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Francine Rivers began her literary career at the University of
Nevada, Reno, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in
English and Journalism. From 1976 to 1985, she had a successful writing
career in the general market and her books were awarded or nominated for
numerous awards and prizes. Although raised in a religious home,
Francine did not truly encounter Christ until later in life, when she
was already a wife, mother of three, and an established romance
novelist. Shortly after becoming a born-again Christian in 1986,
Francine wrote Redeeming Love as her statement of faith. First
published by Bantam Books, and then re-released by Multnomah Publishers
in the mid- 1990s, this retelling of the biblical story of Gomer and
Hosea set during the time of the California Gold Rush is now considered a
classic work of Christian fiction and continues to be one of the
Christian Booksellers Association’s top-selling titles; it has held a
spot on the Christian bestseller list for nearly a decade.
Since Redeeming Love, Francine has published more than 20
novels with Christian themes – all bestsellers- and she has continued to
win both industry acclaim and reader loyalty around the globe. Her
Christian novels have been awarded or nominated for numerous awards
including the RITA Award, the Christy Award, the ECPA Gold Medallion,
and the Holt Medallion in Honor of Outstanding Literary Talent. In
1997, after winning her third RITA award for Inspirational Fiction,
Francine was inducted into the Romance Writers’ of America Hall of Fame.
In 2007, the feature-length film version of her novel The Last Sin Eater was released in theaters by Fox Faith. In March 2010, Francine officially became a New York Times bestselling author, when Her Mother’s Hope debuted at #12 on the hardcover fiction bestsellers lists. The sequel, Her Daughter’s Dream,
debuted at #12 on the same list just 6 months later, in September,
2010. Francine’s novels have been translated into nearly thirty
different languages and she enjoys best-seller status in many foreign
countries including Germany, The Netherlands, and South Africa.
Francine’s dog, Sarge
Francine and her husband Rick live in Northern California and enjoy
the time spent with their three grown children and every opportunity to
spoil their five grandchildren. She uses her writing to draw closer to
the Lord, and that through her work she might worship and praise Jesus
for all He has done and is doing in her life.
Liz has announced her first book pick! In May 2016, we'll be reading: Grandma Gatewood's Walk by Ben Montgomery.
She explained: My current favorite book is so popular the library is ordering seventeen
(17!) more copies to fill the wait list. Wow! So that will have to wait
until my next round pick. I ultimately decided to decline my third
choice in favor of my fourth choice because I haven't read this one:
Grandma Gatewood's Walk by Ben Montgomery. Unfortunately, as I mentioned, it still has a small wait list.
PS, this was hard for a first timer!
ABOUT THE BOOK
Winner of the 2014 National Outdoor Book Awards for History/Biography
Emma Gatewood told her family she was going on a walk and left her
small Ohio hometown with a change of clothes and less than two hundred
dollars. The next anybody heard from her, this genteel, farm-reared,
67-year-old great-grandmother had walked 800 miles along the 2,050-mile
Appalachian Trail. And in September 1955, having survived a rattlesnake
strike, two hurricanes, and a run-in with gangsters from Harlem, she
stood atop Maine’s Mount Katahdin. There she sang the first verse of
“America, the Beautiful” and proclaimed, “I said I’ll do it, and I’ve
done it.”
Grandma
Gatewood, as the reporters called her, became the first woman to hike
the entire Appalachian Trail alone, as well as the first person—man or
woman—to walk it twice and three times. Gatewood became a hiking
celebrity and appeared on TV and in the pages of Sports Illustrated. The
public attention she brought to the little-known footpath was
unprecedented. Her vocal criticism of the lousy, difficult stretches led
to bolstered maintenance, and very likely saved the trail from
extinction.
Author
Ben Montgomery was given unprecedented access to Gatewood’s own
diaries, trail journals, and correspondence, and interviewed surviving
family members and those she met along her hike, all to answer the
question so many asked: Why did she do it? The story of Grandma
Gatewood will inspire readers of all ages by illustrating the full power
of human spirit and determination. Even those who know of Gatewood
don’t know the full story—a story of triumph from pain, rebellion from
brutality, hope from suffering.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ben Montgomery is an enterprise reporter for the Tampa Bay Times and founder of the narrative journalism website Gangrey.com.
Montgomery
grew up in Oklahoma and studied journalism at Arkansas Tech University,
where he played defensive back for the football team, the Wonder Boys.
He worked for the Courier in Russellville, Ark., the Standard-Times in
San Angelo, Texas, the Times Herald-Record in New York's Hudson River
Valley and the Tampa Tribune before joining the Times in 2006.
In
2010, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in local reporting and
won the Dart Award and Casey Medal for a series called "For Their Own
Good," about abuse at Florida's oldest reform school. He lives in Tampa
with his wife, Jennifer, and three children.
