shelfreflectionofficial's reviews
801 reviews

This is my fifth B.A. Paris book now, so I’ve kinda got her style of books figured out now. They are slow burn domestic-type thrillers.

With the exception of The Prisoner (which is probably my favorite and has more action than the others), most of her books make you start to wonder if the book is worth finishing.

There is usually some mundane daily routine stuff where it feels like nothing is really happening. You don’t really connect all that much to the characters because you’re kinda in this limbo where you’re not really sure what you’re trying to figure out or where the story is even going to go.

But then Paris usually throws in some twists/revelations at the end that draw all the threads together and turn all the mundane into meaningful details. Turns out most of it matters.

The Guest followed this pattern to a T. But unfortunately, I’m not entirely sure if the ending was worth it like it was for The Therapist or The Breakdown.


The main premise is that a long-time friend from Paris (Laure) shows up at Gabriel and Iris’s house in the London area citing marital problems and asking if she can stay there for a bit…. the guest.

She overstays her welcome— like so hard… even I wanted to punch her in the face— and Pierre (her husband and also their friend) isn’t communicating with them. They have no idea what is going on other than Pierre has admitted to having a child with someone else and now wanting to be in that child’s life. Laure has given him an ultimatum- me or the kid.

Things only get weirder when Laure seems to have developed some sort of crush or relationship with the (young) landscaper friend who has been working for Gabriel and their neighbor.

Then a body is found. And another one.

This one is quite the tangled up domestic mess.



When the ‘bomb’ was dropped in the epilogue (not the other bomb), I was like ‘Oh that’s pretty crazy, but also, that actually is crazy.’

I didn’t see it coming but at the same time it felt quite out of left field. While there is pointing back to ‘clues’ we had read about, I wouldn’t really say it’s one that the reader can really figure out. You may guess the right person, but there’s no way to know exactly what happened until it’s all laid out.

The upside is that the book is a really quick read as hers tend to be. So if you’re on the fence about reading it, it is at least a low time commitment book. I wouldn’t call it a must read, but if you tend to like B.A. Paris’s books normally, you’ll probably feel at home with this one.


I’m not sure if I will read her future books or not. Maybe if I’m in the mood for a slow-burn with a twist reveal, but I may have had my fill. Although, I might go back and read Behind Closed Doors because I’ve heard that one is really good.

If you have never read Paris before, maybe start with The Prisoner or The Therapist.

She is not an author I can universally recommend because her books are hit and miss for me, but at least they’re pretty clean!



Now for a few MAJOR SPOILER COMMENTS so keep scrolling if you don't want to know!!

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Okay, so what the ‘big reveal’ tells us is that Iris is the person Pierre had a child with. Beth is Pierre’s, not Gabriel’s. And what makes it so messed up is that Pierre was on his honeymoon and Iris was on their first anniversary trip when they had sex! And they had already met as friends!

Who decides to go for a naked swim?! By themselves?! On their honeymoon/anniversary?! Nobody. That’s who. And even if they did, who would see someone else and then immediately have a sexual desire for them and act on it?!

Furthermore, how could it have zero impact on their friendship as a couple? It makes no sense. Unless both of them are sociopaths.

And beyond that… there’s no way she would have any idea that she was actually pregnant that night. She didn’t even have a pregnancy test. She just ‘knew’ she was pregnant and told Gabriel she took a test before they left. And then they told Pierre and Laure that they were a month pregnant. Without actually knowing FOR SURE that she was! There is no way to know you are pregnant at conception. That’s crazy pants.

And ALSO how could she really keep Beth away from them for 20 years? They were such good friends they had keys to each other’s houses, but Pierre never sees pictures or videos of Beth? Ever? He never wondered before now?

And all of this is just the ‘source’ of the conflict. It’s like two paragraphs in the whole book. But all the killing Iris does as a result of such a crazy/stupid encounter is just… out there.

To be honest, I’ve never really been a fan of the unreliable narrator trope. Sure, it makes for a big surprise, but I don’t like the bait and switch of how you perceive and relate to the main character being turned on its head. The first one of these I read was Gone Girl and when that was revealed, I was like sick to my stomach.

I guess I just don’t like being lied to, especially by someone I’m supposed to be empathetic towards.

Besides, when I’m reading a whodunnit, it feels like cheating to just be like- oh and I’ve been misleading you this whole time so you were never going to figure out the clues because you trusted that when I said I took a bath and when I said I went to lunch with my friend Jade, you would have no reason to question it. Gotcha!

That’s not the kind of twist I get excited about. Especially for the reason that it was in this book.

I didn’t like it in Gone Girl, and I didn’t like it here.

And ANOTHER thing. Gabriel’s secret. How could he keep that even from Iris? It’s not even about her OR him. It’s about other people’s lives. I would immediately tell my spouse and have them help me figure out what to do. It’s clearly causing major issues in their marriage.

I think it’s stupid that he didn’t just tell her. There was nothing to be afraid of. There were worse things that could (and did) happen by keeping it in. Speculation is usually worse than the truth. If you can’t tell your spouse every thing, there is a problem.

And ANOTHER thing. When Gabriel and Iris get home and Beth asks them what happened, clearly distressed by the sound of the explosion, Gabriel says- “It’s Joseph. He blew himself up.” 

Just like that. I get Gabriel is in shock… but it felt very random to just say that someone blew themselves up. ‘Sorry Beth, I know you became really close friends with him and all, but he’s like totally blown up right now, so your friendship is over. Want some dinner?’

So. Yeah. I had a few issues with this one. I don’t like mysteries as much when it all just boils down to domestic dysfunction. For some reason a serial killer is more appealing to read about than a fornicator. 


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SPOILERS OVER!


[Content Advisory: 0 f-words and 2 s-words] 

**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

I think a blurb on the back of the book sums the tone of this book up well:

“apologetic integrity cloaked in irreverent honesty. It reads like the Screwtape Letters baptized in the blood of Captain Jack Sparrow. This is a rare jewel that will make you laugh as hard as it will make you think.”


I’ve had this book on my shelf for almost a year but I finally got to it and I’m glad I did!

I really wasn’t sure what to expect with such a unique title. Is it possible to talk about the Trinity with humor? Well I guess there is modalism, Patrick…

And I was definitely intrigued to get all the answers I’ve ever needed in just a short 150 pages.


Lyonhart does not seek to necessarily prove anything as much as propose that the rationale of the Trinity makes as much sense as our existence. Then he carries this same logic through a series of other common objections to God/Christianity.

While philosophy is not for everyone, the formatting of this book is a brilliant way to keep the reader engaged and understanding (mostly) what he’s talking about.

The entire book is a dialogue between three characters— Vlad, Idi, and Mira— in a pub. Idi is questioning his faith and wants to throw in the towel because everything is meaningless. Vlad needs him to preach at the university in the morning so he makes a bet that if he can answer his questions then Idi has to follow through with his commitment. Mira is the barkeep who joins in and becomes the unofficial referee.

By using a dialogue format, it gives us small chunks at a time with someone else doing the questioning and being devil’s advocate for us, making us feel like we’re getting a full and honest explanation.

If you really don’t like philosophical musings, you probably won’t find this book particularly enjoyable, but if you are even a little interested, I’d give it a try. With the exception of chapter 4, I think you’d be surprised what you can understand. Or at the very least able follow his general logic.

For the very philosophical readers, the end notes provide extra information for your brain to grasp. Some were helpful to me and others I just accepted that I wasn’t going to get without more training in philosophical methods and histories and that’s okay!


There is wit and humor with the bantering of the friends. Some of it feels forced or over the top, but at the same time, I’m not too mature to enjoy a good pun or ‘your mom’ joke. Be forewarned, though, that irreverent is the appropriate term; there’s some allusion to improperness (some are movie quotes) and a couple uses of the word ‘bloody’ (as used in British slang).



I’ll give you the bare bones of his argument (partly for my own recollection later when I want to remember what this book was about), but I will offer the disclaimer that it is possible I’m explaining this poorly or incorrectly— sorry J.D. if I’m slaughtering your proposition— so the only way you will know is by reading the book…

Idi’s issue with the Trinity is that it doesn’t make sense. It is a contradiction. The Trinity can’t be both three and one.

So Vlad begins the discussion with the origins of the universe, giving us three possible options:

- Becoming: the universe (or the cause of the universe) is infinite, past and future, and has always existed; each cause continually causing the cause, etc; temporal

- Being: something that isn’t ‘becoming’ (changing) but simply ‘is’; an eternal creator created an eternal universe; outside of time (atemporal)

- Both: (see below)

While there are many other theories about the origins of the universe, they all basically fall into these three categories.

“It’s literally either A, non-A, or Both. Logically.”

The problem with just Becoming is that an infinite regression doesn’t make sense to our finite minds:

“If the universe had always existed, an infinite amount of time would have to have occurred before this moment. History would never have reached this point.”

The problem with just Being is that it’s outside of time and we are clearly in time:

“it never begins or stops doing anything because that would require time, and so whatever it is doing it is just stuck doing eternally.”

We know we, and the universe, aren’t eternal so this can’t be the right theory either. We also know that we are doing and thinking things that happen in time, we are Becoming.

“So our universe of time cannot be eternal but must have been created. And whatever created our universe cannot stretch infinitely back but must be an eternal Being that is outside of time. And this timeless Being cannot be our universe itself, because we are clearly in time, so that would defy our mental lens of time. Thus, a timeless Being beyond our universe must have created our universe of time.”

But Being can’t “give birth” to Becoming because as soon as it starts to do something, it’s doing so in time.

“The third option is ‘Both’ of them. Both Being and Becoming teaming up to create the universe; an eternal Being that is also one with Becoming and so can begin to create in time. Something that is 100 percent Being, 100 percent Becoming, and 100 percent Both. Three and one… It would be outside of time and yet could create in time.”

A seeming contradiction, or paradox.

All three of these options for the origins of the universe “defy human understanding” yet we know one of them happened because we are here to talk about it.

Thus, it’s just as rational to believe in the seeming contradiction of the Trinity. The mystery of the universe is the same as the mystery of the Trinity.

“You cannot deny the Trinity for not making sense any more than you can deny your own existence.”



He then goes on to show how Jesus— the Son— is like the Becoming (temporal and transcendent), the Father is like the Being (atemporal and eternal), and the Spirit is the Both, somehow connecting the temporal to the atemporal, connecting our bodies with our souls.

We can look to verses like John 1:1-3 “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God…All things were made through him”

and John 14:6 “I am the Way the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Being and Becoming. No one can come to the Being without the Becoming.

When he talks about the Spirit, the unifying of them all, we get a conversation about a bearpig so you’re just going to have to read that one for yourself.

“the Spirit precedes from Both into one union.”



Much of the rest of the book is spent addressing all the objections or ‘But what about that…’ devil’s advocate questions.

There’s also a chapter spent on using this same logic to answer Idi’s other grievances like: the Incarnation, free will, the soul, the problem of evil, other religions, theology only being anthropology, meaninglessness, lack of diversity, and lack of female representation in the Trinity.



There were a few things that were missing from the book, but I believe they were not included intentionally in order to maintain the premise and structure of the book.

For example, when talking about other religions, for me the most logical place to go is the historic person of Jesus, his death and resurrection. The C.S. Lewis Trilemma of Liar, Lunatic, or Lord. And Jesus can’t both be God and not be God so other major religions at their heart cannot all be true.

There was also no discussion of the Bible which is our source of Truth. But I understand this omission as Lyonhart was intending to stay in the philosophical, logic realm to defend his points.

So this book definitely has value but there are other things that need to be considered for a more wholistic look at the faith of Christianity and its doctrines.



J.D. Lyonhart is a professor at Lincoln Christian University and also co-hosts a podcast called Spiritually Incorrect which, from first impressions, seems to be conversations that combine spirituality, science, culture, and philosophy to ponder life’s questions.

Theologically, I don’t think I disagreed with anything presented in this book, but I’m not necessarily going to blanket endorse everything you might find on his channel. You’ll have to use your own discernment.


The one thing that I disagree with from this book was this statement:

“I just mean that if you wanted to start a religion in the middle East two thousand years ago, there was simply no way anyone was going to listen if Jesus was female. Now, Jesus radically elevated the status and treatment of women, but he was only able to do that and have others follow suit because he was a man. So is God literally male, or was that just the most effective way to communicate to a male-dominated culture?”

I agree that God is not gendered, but I think God coming in the form of man, Jesus, was an intentional choice by God who is not bound by ‘cultural limits’— after all, he is not just male in the Bible times, Jesus is eternally Jesus, resurrected in bodily form as a man. Plus it fits with the other language used throughout the Bible about male headship in the home and the church, as well as the church in general being the bride of Christ. I think there is intentionality there that we shouldn’t just write off as ‘well Jesus wouldn’t have been listened to if he was a woman so God had to be a man.’ I think that gives culture too much power over God’s ability to act and work.

But that’s just one thing and not something Lyonhart hit hard or long in the book.


Last few comments:

The chapter titles were great and the ending threw me for a loop. Probably because I was dealing with my kid’s potty training accident when I was reading it and so I had to go back and make sure I read it right. It was a nice little wrap-up.

I liked that though Lyonhart was talking about serious and profound things he didn’t take himself too seriously so it made a complex subject more accessible to the masses who don’t have academic training in philosophy.

I learned that our body replaces 98% of its atoms every 5-7 years. So when we think philosophically about who we are, we have to be more than our physical bodies. There is something outside of our atomic structure that gives us identity…. a soul.

Oh and I like the book title as well.

You can tell every part of the book was creatively intentional and I appreciate this final product that I’m sure took awhile to put together and pare down to accomplish what he set out to do.


Recommendation

Overall, this was a fun brain exercise that made a lot of sense. And I like things that make sense.

I am new to philosophical debates and so I had never considered this form of logic (besides that which I read in the book Why God Makes Sense in a World that Doesn’t which I would also very much recommend) and to apply it to so many different things was really cool to see how it is all woven together.

The Trinity is always a complex topic, but this was a really great way to not necessarily need to ‘prove’ the Trinity’s existence but to acknowledge that its rationale is the same as our very existence.

Even though it was dense at times, it didn’t feel dense because of the dialogue structure and really felt like I was just joining a conversation at a pub with my friends.

To be honest, I was a bit surprised by my enjoyment of this book because I didn’t know what I was getting into reading a theological book by an author I had never heard of.

It’s a short read, depending on how many times you might have to re-read a sentence or two, and is definitely worth the philosophical journey!



Further Reading:

He quotes from a lot of William Lane Craig’s writings on apologetics, time, and the cosmological argument if you want to read up on more of that.

I would also recommend the book I already linked in the review:

Why God Makes Sense in a World that Doesn’t by Gavin Ortlund which focuses on Christianity vs Naturalism and exploring how people aren’t really asking, ‘is Christianity true?’, but ‘is it good?’ But there is a chapter dedicated to the origins of the universe.


**Received a copy from the author in exchange for an honest review**

“Warriors brought the battle to the enemy to keep others safe, and she was warrior. If that involved sacrificing herself, so be it.”

I loved Maldonado’s Nina Guerrera series and this one is no different. This book had a very different feel than book one- A Killer’s Game- but still had the same protagonist and suspense.

While this is second in the series, it could be read as a stand-alone. In the beginning it talks about Vega having to do polygraphs and such as follow-up from her previous mission because her actions required review, but they don’t go into any details.

There would be no spoilers other than that Vega survived the underground bunker maze of Hunger-Games-style fatal puzzles which isn’t really a surprise since she is the face of the series.


The premise of A Forgotten Kill is two-fold: a serial killer that has been operating in the New York boroughs undetected for years, and the violent death of Vega’s father in their home a decade ago.

We find out in the first book that Dani came home one day to find her mother over her father’s stabbed body. All the evidence pointed to her mother, who was mentally unstable, killing her father, who was physically unstable. Dani’s statement helped convict her mother who rather than going to trial was committed to a psyche ward.

But her mother has a moment of lucidity in present day and tells Vega that she didn’t do it. Now that Vega is older with more criminology experience, she decides to look into the case and see if there is any truth to what her mother is telling her.

In order to have access to the case files she agrees to help with a possible serial killer case. Her knowledge of cryptanalysis and puzzles helps her crack it open and takes her and her team on a fast-paced investigation to capture him before he kills again.



I liked the second half better than the first half of the book. At 50% it seemed like things were wrapping up and I was wondering how the last half was going to go to keep me engaged. But the action picked up and the snags in the process extend the chase wrapping up the book quite nicely!

I also like that Maldonado is able to write thrillers where the main character doesn’t have to have a side love story. That’s fine and all, but sometimes it’s nice just to focus on the action and not worry about the romantic side of things. It’s possible something could develop here, there is some groundwork laid that could support that direction, but her character feels full even without that because of her closeness to her family.

Maldonado’s expertise in the criminology field really shines through in her books. Sometimes I found myself questioning- Well why didn’t they just do this? Or wouldn’t this have worked better? and she ends up qualifying those decisions later and setting me straight! She covers her bases, does her research, and creates a realistic investigation and chase that is compelling and engaging!



After reading the first book, I had thought maybe Dani’s siblings would start to play a bigger role in the stories, but they were pretty absent from this book. As the series continues, I’m still hoping for a Vega Sibling Dream Team moment.

I did learn some new things in this book:

- Dogs not only can sniff out drugs, but now they can sniff out electronics! They can detect the chemical compounds used in electronics. So that’s pretty cool!

- I already knew about 3D printing, but I’m discovering more and more uses for it. For example, they needed a person’s fingerprints to open something and they had the fingerprint in the AFIS database so they 3D printed the fingerprint so they could use it. Pretty crazy! And also, a little bit uncomfortable knowing that anyone can have a 3D printer and can gain access to people’s fingerprints…

- You can extract DNA even from clothing years later that has been washed.

- Julian dates- this was the trick that Vega figured out in one of the puzzles and for some reason it took me awhile to understand. I didn’t realize this was still used anywhere. It’s a five digit date beginning with the last two digits of the year followed by the day of the year out of 365 (changes on leap years). The military uses this for ease in subtracting or adding dates together without access to a calendar or spreadsheet.

- I think I heard about the Vigenere square tool when I read the book The Rose Code, but it was used here again and I just think encryption like that is so cool. Here is a website that walks you through it if you want to create your own code!


Recommendation

Maldonado is basically an automatic read for me. She writes great thrillers without all the language and sexual content often found in other books. Her background in criminology is a vast resource for creating her characters and plots.

If you are looking for a book that has a (female) detective and FBI stuff, this is a great option! If you are looking for a book with a serial killer, this is a great option!

The only reason I would not recommend this book would be if the type of serial killer he is a trigger for you or would be too hard to read. Any discussion around the rape/murders is pretty much all third-party and clinical so it’s not too graphic or drawn out, but we do hear some of the killer’s thoughts regarding the women and what triggered him to begin doing what he’s doing.

Overall, this is a great series to start or to go back and read some of Maldonado’s other books!


[Content Advisory: 8 f-words and 19 s-words, the serial killer in this one is a voyeur and rapes his victims on camera before killing them and so there are different descriptions of this as the police are tracking down evidence.]

**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

“whether we call it love, or friendship, or simply having a great conversation, achieving connection—authentic, meaningful connection—is the most important thing in life.”

This is a really insightful book on how we can better communicate with others. Duhigg uses lots of research studies and real life examples from places like Netflix, a jury room, The Big Bang Theory, NASA, and the CIA to show the principles in action.

By looking at typically controversial conversations on topics like gun control, vaccines, and race, we can see how employing these principles really changes the dialogue and allows people who normally disagree to understand each other and bring meaningful connection where we desperately need it.

With the increase of internet use we see a decrease in civil discourse. Everywhere you look you see hatred, people talking past each other, and a complete disregard for people’s humanity, values, and experiences. It’s all about winning, shaming, or forcing belief assimilation by threatening social reputation calamity if you don’t.

I think every human should read this book. We may not be able to change the world, but it will do a lot to make our relationships better and stronger and will help us be people who desire and can put into practice peace and consideration in our conversations in a highly polarized environment.

(Plus it’s just really interesting!)


That’s why Duhigg ultimately wrote this book.

“Why was it that, at times, I had so much trouble hearing what someone was trying to tell me? Why was I so quick to get defensive, or to glide past the emotions people were clearly trying to share? Why, sometimes, did I talk so much and listen so little? Why hadn’t I understood when a friend needed comfort rather than advice? How could I put my kids aside when they so clearly wanted to be with me? Why did I struggle to explain what was inside my own head? These struck me as meaningful questions, worthy of exploration, and I wanted answers.”

Research that studied people over decades of time (that has been replicated in other studies) shows that one of the main factors correlated to a long and happy life is deep connections with family and friends.

How do deep connections happen but in meaningful conversations and communications.


The biggest takeaway from this book is to use these principles to make deeper connections and to see the humanity and hear the experiences of those we disagree with.


“Over the past two decades, a body of research has emerged that sheds light on why some of our conversations go so well, while others are so miserable. These insights can help us hear more clearly and speak more persuasively.”

The principles he talks about in this book are not just for familial relationship or just for the workplace. They can be universally applied. Some of them were new to me and others I’ve read in other books or heard from my own therapist and I can attest that they do make a difference when I use them.

The principles can be broken down into three major areas:

- What’s This Really About? (practical, decision-making conversations)
- How Do We Feel? (emotional conversations)
- Who Are We? (social conversations that involve our identities)

Conversations are fluid so these may overlap in a conversation as you get deeper. But if we aren’t ‘in’ the same conversation as the person we’re talking to, we’re not going to make a connection and we’re not going to get very far before things start to devolve.


It’s no surprise that to communicate well requires listening, asking questions, and talking about our feelings.

“to become a supercommunicator, all we need to do is listen closely to what’s said and unsaid, ask the right questions, recognize and match others’ moods, and make our own feelings easy for others to perceive.”

In this book Duhigg gives some guidelines on what kinds of questions are helpful and what kinds aren’t. For example:

“Questions about facts (“Where do you live?” “What college did you attend?”) are conversational dead-ends. They don’t draw out values or experiences. They don’t invite vulnerability. However, those same inquiries, recast slightly (“What do you like about where you live?” “What was your favorite part of college?”), invite others to share their preferences, beliefs, and values.”

We may hear ‘share our feelings’ and bristle about what that means or looks like, but when you read the examples in the book it’s not so bad and it turns conversations of small-talk (which no one really likes) into conversations that actually move someplace.

I also liked that after each chapter he included a section called ‘A Guide to Using These Ideas’ that reiterated the points he had made earlier and what it would look like in real conversation. There were often graphs to illustrate as well.

The flow of the book was easy to follow and I thought he used a lot of really interesting research studies and case-studies to exemplify each point which keeps those engaged who don’t typically enjoy psycholgoical concepts.



There are aspects of this topic that feel borderline manipulative, especially when we think of negotiations or persuading someone. One example he uses is about vaccinations (which may put some people off). He talks about a doctor who had patients that were anti-vaxxers and he struggled with communicating to them the reasons and data as to why they should vaccinate their children.

He realized it wasn’t necessarily about the facts, but about their mistrust of doctors or their resistance to government control. He found that when he made personal connections and they were able to see him as a father too, not just a doctor, and when he set aside his tendency to think or talk in a way that says ‘I’m smarter than you’, they were more willing to hear his advice.

I get that, but I also feel like knowing someone is figuring out the best way to persuade you also makes you feel distrustful about their motivations. Which is why, though I’m not anti-vax, I opted not to do the Covid vaccine.

They claimed data, but it was still new and long-term data was not available. Not only was the ‘choice’ framed in a way that made it seem like taking the vaccine was the only choice and the absolute right choice, but that anyone who chose not to didn’t care about humanity.

While I’m willing to consider that the vaccine may have helped, I’m not convinced. And the sheer force and condescension that went along with it does not help someone trust but feels rather like manipulation.

I admit that distrust is often hard to overcome and not all persuasion is manipulation or immoral, but I just think that some of these conversations might start to feel that way. Playing to emotions to convince someone to trust you.

So an essential component to all of this is genuine care and concern and desire to know someone, not creating a good communication as a means to an end.



This labeling of groups of people (as above) is another major component of communication. And I think that comes into play most prominently in political discourse.

I think this tactic has been employed by both right and left-wing groups and only keeps people polarized.

“Over the last decade, the number of Americans who say they are “deeply angry” at the other political party has increased sharply, to almost 70 percent of the electorate. Roughly half the nation believes those with differing political beliefs are “immoral,” “lazy,” “dishonest,” and “unintelligent.””

It goes like this: you think that one thing? Then you are this kind of person and all these other things are true about you.

For example: I saw on a book review Facebook group a person shared the book Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier and commented that they thought it was a thought-provoking and alarming book. I read the book and think the same thing, but I knew the comments section would have some dissenters. I was shocked by the things people were saying about the person who shared it. They called the person hateful, demanded they be blocked, that this person was what was wrong with the world and more of the same vitriol. They placed this person in a group called ‘Hateful, evil bigot’ simply because they shared their opinion of a book that happens to contain beliefs they don’t share. They didn’t know anything about this person’s values, emotions, or experiences.

And to offer an example from ‘the other side’: Someone shares that they believe abortion should be a legal right. You will see people commenting that that person is a murderer and that they hate Jesus and don’t believe in the sanctity of human life. That also puts them in a group without any knowledge of that person’s values, emotions, or experiences.

Good communication is not really about proving yourself right, but about seeing the people you’re talking to as human beings with their own values, emotions, and life experiences that we should seek to understand. It diffuses a controversial conversation and helps you see them as the complex and nuanced person they are, not a one-dimensional caricature or stereotype.

“Identity threats typically emerge because we generalize: We lump people into groups (“Lawyers are all dishonest”) or assign them traits they loathe (“Everyone who voted for that guy is a racist”). These generalizations take us—our unique perspectives and complicated identities—out of the conversation. They make us one-dimensional.”

Tribal mentality and in-group, out-group psychology is proven stuff and hard at work in our cultural climate. We can’t help but group and label people, trusting and thinking highly of those who share our beliefs or look like us and mistrusting and looking down on those who do not.


Duhigg shares an experiment people conducted to see if people on both sides of the gun control debate could be in a room and have civil conversation. Long story short- they could! When they shared about vulnerable parts of their lives and heard and saw each other as human beings, even though they didn’t change their minds, they changed HOW they communicated with one another. The other side was no longer ‘evil’ but were good people just like us that wanted good things too. There was just disagreements on how those good things would come to be.

“They think listening means debating, and if you let someone else make a good point, you’re doing something wrong. But listening means letting someone else tell their story and then, even if you don’t agree with them, trying to understand why they feel that way.”


I do think there are some limitations here. In a lot of conversations decisions have to be made and laws need to be written. At some point we have to come to an agreement. We have to determine what is true or right.

If we’re just making connections with people to gain understanding and learn about them, there are no stakes or decisions. But we still have to make decisions about who can own guns or who can get married and not all viewpoints are equal.

This is where I start to have questions. As I read this book I pondered-

What is ‘understanding’?

I would argue that understanding doesn’t require agreement but I think perhaps we operate out of a different definition of understanding than we think. I think a lot of people don’t feel understood unless someone ends up agreeing with them- ‘They must have misunderstood me or I must have said it wrong if they still don’t agree with me, because if they really understood, they would see why I’m right or why this is true.’

What does it look like to come to an understanding when the topics being discussed are identity conversations and the disagreeing parties are approaching the topic with very different worldviews and standards of morality?

How do we move forward in good conversation if we listen to people’s feelings but their feelings are based on lies?

And I think I’m reaching outside the scope of this book, especially since I am trying to look at this information through a biblical lens which is not what the author was attempting to do. But definitely gives you some things to think about.



A couple things that stood out to me because I’ve used them in my own marriage are looping and narratives.

A woman enrolled at Harvard Law school shared that she realized that the purpose of talking about conflict wasn’t about winning but determining “why this fight has emerged and what is fueling it, as well as the stories they are all telling themselves about why this conflict persists.”

‘The stories they are telling themselves’ is such a big but subtle thing. An example from my personal life- My husband looks at the dinner I made and says ‘is this what it usually looks like?’

The story I tell myself, which is rooted in my own insecurities about being a good wife, is that my husband is criticizing the meal I worked hard to make and doesn’t appreciate what I’ve done and thinks it’s a bad meal. That’s the narrative I tell myself and then respond from. Is that going to go well? No.

I have to realize that I’ve created that narrative and need to evaluate if it’s true or reasonable. Turns out, he was not feeling any type of way about me making a good or bad supper but was genuinely wondering what was different about it. The conversation looks a lot different, right?

Paired with this is the importance of looping which is listening and then proving we have listened by repeating back to them what they just told us but in our own words.

This brings clarity and understanding and gets everyone having the same conversation. It also builds trust because the person won’t feel like the ‘listener’ was just trying to come up with their own rebuttal but was genuinely processing what they were hearing so that they are all dealing with the right information and feelings.

If I had used this method with the above example (which I didn’t), it could have looked like this: “What I’m hearing you say is that you don’t like what I made and you’re frustrated that I don’t make you better meals.” Then he can say, “No, I really appreciate that you’ve made supper and it looks good, I just thought it looked different and wondered if there was a different ingredient in it.”

Hopefully looping looks more accurate then this, but even though I wasn’t hearing what he was really saying, by telling him what I heard, he can correct my understanding. Plus I’ve shared my feelings which alerts him that we’ve moved from a practical conversation to one that deals with both feelings and identities and we need to adapt and address those things because the meal isn’t really what the conversation is about.



A Couple Other Takeaways

He offers four things to keep in mind when communicating online and these should pop up every time someone opens up a comment box:
- Overemphasize politeness.
- Underemphasize sarcasm.
- Express more gratitude, deference, greetings, apologies, and hedges.
- Avoid criticism in public forums.


We could also get into a conversation about freedom of speech and tolerance. I can’t help but plug the book “The Coddling of the American Mind” which talks about that very subject on university campuses where people were not allowed to come speak on campus because students thought their beliefs were hateful.

If communication requires being heard then we have to allow for freedom of speech. Diversity in thought is a good thing to have healthy and intelligent debate. If we were all homogeneous in our beliefs it would probably mean we were under Communist rule and not allowed to believe anything different.

Understanding does not require agreement in belief. It requires the ability to be heard; it requires a sense of humility; and it requires a tolerance for another’s differing beliefs.


When conversations start to devolve it is often as a result of one person trying to control it too much by making spoken or unspoken rules about what the other person is allowed to say, feel, do. They tried to control their language and their behavior- ‘don’t use that tone, don’t roll your eyes, don’t walk away, etc.’

“If we focus on controlling the right things in an argument—if we focus on controlling ourselves, our environment, and the conflict itself—fights morph into conversations.”

Self-control and self-awareness are key to good communications.


And lastly, though it’s been said, it bears repeating- ask questions. Good questions. Questions that tap into someone’s values, emotions, or experiences.



Recommendation

I recommend this book for all people. 

It will help you have more meaningful conversations and avoid small-talk. It will help you ‘argue’ with your spouse or siblings better. It will help you diffuse controversial conversations. And it will help you start to see people as complex human beings who desire to be heard and considered rather than ignored and talked over or denied entrance altogether. 

It’s not going to solve all the disagreements, convince people to change their minds, or establish world peace, but it will hopefully change your perspective of conversations and your part in them. 

[I would also recommend this book to authors who write about negotiators because I think it would help flesh out a character study and dialogue options for conversations in the book.]

It’s pretty short so it’s a quick read as well!

“I crave it more than I’ve ever craved anything: the kind of friendship that I once knew so well, not comfortable and contained but something messy and maniacal and real.”


This was my first Stacy Willingham book and it didn’t do much for me. However it seems like this book might deviate from her normal writing so I still plan to at least read A Flicker in the Dark.

The setting of this book was Rutledge College in South Carolina. But it reads like a series of college party scenes rather than anything remotely nostalgic or relatable to me. The characters and setting and events are everything that was absent of my college experience and it was not enjoyable for me to read.

I could maybe still enjoy the book if the suspense at least was there, but it was a slow-burn read told in ‘before’ and ‘after’ chapters giving small teases that manage to keep you interested. But I grew tired of reading about everything that happened when they were drunk or high or hungover.

I will say that the ending twists did save it a bit (I liked the accident, mistake, necessity aspect) but unless this is a scene you find interesting or engaging, I don’t think the twists are worth all that comes before.


Basic Premise

The book begins with the knowledge that we have a dead body— a frat boy pledge named Levi Butler— and a missing girl— a bold, brash, and unpredictable college girl named Lucy.

And that’s how the chapters divide- before and after.

“Levi is dead, Lucy is gone, and someone has to pay.”

Margot’s college experience doesn’t start the way she had planned it. Her best friend, Eliza, dies three weeks before they were supposed to attend Rutledge together.

Freshman year is a blur of grief and depression, but one girl— Lucy— sticks out, elusive and magnetic, the object of a lot of rumors, and a reminder of Eliza. At the end of the year when Lucy invites Margot to live with her and her friends Sloane and Nicole, Lucy jumps at the chance.

“being loved by Eliza was like a sudden hit of adrenaline— a gateway drug, something addicting and freeing that left you craving your next hit the second she stepped away. And if Eliza was adrenaline, that makes Lucy something even more. Something more addicting, more dangerous. Something that I probably shouldn’t be dabbling in— but at the same time, something impossible to refuse.”

But we find out that Lucy might have picked her for a reason. And Sloane and Nicole for that matter.

“nice Nicole and studious Sloane and malleable Margot.”

And so this book asks the question: How far would someone go for friendship and belonging? What happens in a house full of potentially toxic friendships?

“Sloane is trying to tell me that, if I’m not careful, Lucy will… turn me into something I’m not. She’ll twist me and mold me until I’m unrecognizable, transforming in her hands like soft, wet clay. She’ll shape me into whatever she wants me to be. Something useful to best fit her needs, a deliberate instrument of her own design. But here’s the thing Sloane doesn’t know: I want to be changed. That’s all I’ve ever wanted, really: for someone to scoop me up and tell me what I’m supposed to be.”

So where is Lucy and what really happened to Levi?


Comments

I didn’t really find any of the characters likeable. It’s just kinda unimaginable to me that someone could be so malleable and easily manipulated to do whatever someone tells them to do. Or even in this case, willingly being pulled in to something clearly not right.

I don’t find that kind of personality relatable or endearing; I find it annoying. Have your own mind.

I just find it not only hard to believe, but hard to read when someone is so taken in by someone who is clearly a toxic type of person; obsessive friendships are alien to me. And when it’s drawn out for so long and detailed as the primary aspect of the book, it’s exhausting.


I know the college party scene is probably part of a lot of people’s college experiences, but it had nothing to do with mine and reading about it was a bit repulsive. At least if there was something redeeming about it then its place in the book would have purpose and development. But it was just the perfect storm of dysfunction to facilitate more problems, manipulation, and stupidity.


There just wasn’t anything appealing to reading it. As I started it I was wondering if I was going to like it, and as I continued, my engagement level never really went up.


The title of the book comes from this line:

“You’re only young once, and only if you’re lucky.”

I liked the title, but I’m not sure if this is the strongest line. Does it mean you’re only young if you’re lucky? Haha. I think it means that hopefully you don’t die. But I just think it’s a bit clunky of phrasing and they should have picked a different title or tied it in stronger than this.


I did think it was interesting that the house the girls live in that’s right next to the frat house is based on Willingham’s own college experience and housing. The shed and the crawl space were the same, but the rest of the story, people, and relationships were fictional.



Recommendation

Most of my dislikes of this book had to do with the characters and setting. I didn’t have issue with the writing style and I did like the twists. I also appreciated that there weren’t a million f-bombs. 

So I am definitely willing to read another one of her books. From what I can tell they deal with adults which is a better story line for my interests. I think I’m picky about college-related books. (Though I’m not sure I can read All the Dangerous Things because I have a hard time with child abduction/death type of stories)

‘Only If You’re Lucky’ was not for me, but could easily be a hit for others if they don’t have as strong of feelings as I do about the morally ambiguous character types and setting. 

[Content Advisory: 18 f-words and 28 s-words, a lot of drinking, smoking, drugs, and the college party scene; moderate sexual content]

**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

“She had to accept as fact that sometimes revolution demanded darkness in exchange for light.”

The weird thing about this series is that when you finish a book you just feel like none of your questions were answered and not much happened but somehow you still really enjoyed reading it.

And of course it makes you want to continue reading. This may be a series that is better when you can read each book one right after the other instead of waiting in between for the next book.

I liked this one better than These Infinite Threads and more or equal to This Woven Kingdom. It didn’t feel like the ‘transitional’ book the second book felt like. Even as I was thinking back to what had happened already before I started this third book, it seemed like everything I was remembering happened in the first book. Apparently the second book was a little forgettable to me.


So where are we at with this third installment?

Cyrus, who has some sort of deal with the devil (Iblis) has proposed to Alizeh. The agreement being that she would take over his kingdom and kill him so that he would be free of the devil— although Alizeh is on board with the first part, she has not made up her mind about the second part. Because these two have the hots for each other, obvs.

Cyrus knows he cannot have her which is part of the devil’s torture of him.

Alizeh is struggling to figure out what she is supposed to do next.

“She possessed no throne, no army, no plan, and not an ounce of the powerful magic she’d been promised for the part.”

“It was the kind of contradiction she often felt repeated in herself: that she was both useless and powerful; unimportant and essential.”

Kamran has come to Tulan to avenge his grandfather’s death, aka kill Cyrus. He also must prove his ability to be king of Ardunia as he is coming from his kingdom where Zahhak, the defense minister, is trying to usurp the throne. Kamran is unaware of what has been going on between Cyrus and Alizeh. But there is jealousy and confusion here as he processes that Alizeh did not betray him but may have an attachment to Cyrus.

“without fanfare she’d fallen from the heavens into the still waters of his life, and he wondered, uneasily, whether he’d feel the reverberations of her impact forever.”

Kamran travels with a rag-tag band of characters including Hazan (his right-hand man but more so Alizeh’s right hand man because he is Jinn and loyal to his rightful Queen), Deen (the apothecarist), Huda (the gossiping, unrefined, and illegitimate daughter of an elite family), Omid (the orphan boy who tried to kill Alizeh in the first book but because she saved his life he is loyal to and protective of her: “she’s not magical or anything… we just like her a lot”).

In this book Alizeh ends up almost fatally injured and has to be sent to the Diviners for healing. While that is happening Kamran finds out about the marriage proposal and decides he will marry once Alizeh has been made Queen, given the kingdom and disposed of Cyrus. His marriage to Alizeh should unite the two kingdoms and provide Ardunia with all the resources they need to survive.

By this point the love triangle begins to dissolve and a different enemies-to-lovers side plot starts to form.

The devil’s (unknown) plan seems to be progressing unthwarted as the characters make their decisions.



But what about…?

Unless I missed something, we still don’t really know what’s going on with the devil in general or with his deal with Cyrus. We know it has something to do with his father and possibly his brother (Cyrus was the spare, not the heir… just like Prince Harry…) but we still aren’t given that information.

Kamran’s mother is virtually absent from this book. I know she has to be important but she did not come into play here.

Alizeh’s need for water did not come up at all. Also when she was healed it talked about her not feeling the usual pain that the ice in her veins caused but we never find out how it happened or if it stayed that way or why/if it matters.

The mining of magic was mentioned a little bit as we are introduced to the magic crystals that the Diviners have access to. By the end of the book we know that Alizeh plans to go ‘get her magic’ from the mountains so perhaps this will be more prominent in the next book. We still don’t know fully what Alizeh is capable of.

We know that there is prophecy of the Clay and Fire kingdoms being joined together because it was inscribed on Alizeh’s magic book. But the book also is basically absent from the book. I suspect it will also be more prominent as Alizeh seeks to understand her magic and how she is to save her people.

The fireflies weren’t mentioned again. Maybe I’m making too much of them, but they have to be significant somehow down the road.



Where are we going?

The next book should have a wedding, a quest for magic, some more love stuff, and I suspect an urgency for Alizeh to take her throne before the gathering Jinn revolt or before Ardunia and Tulan enter into war.

Hopefully Mafi gives us more information on the devil, Cyrus’s family, Kamran’s mother, and the prophecy.

We will probably also have more interactions with the Diviners. I liked this bit of wisdom we gained from them in this book:

“Life cannot be experienced one emotion at a time. It is a tapestry of sensation, a braided rope of feeling. We must allow for reflection even when we suffer. We must reach for compassion even when we triumph. If you spend your days waiting for your sorrows to end so that you might finally live you will die an impatient man.”

A woven tapestry is the theme of this series in a lot of ways. We have several threads being used by Mafi as she weaves her story and I hope the masterpiece is worth the wait!



Oh and I’d be cool if there were no more spiders the size of a face.



Recommendation

As mentioned earlier, the magic of this book is that somehow it is still very enjoyable even as not much is happening or being explained. I’m looking forward to the next book but wish I didn’t have to wait so long because the story doesn’t feel memorable enough to stay with me for that long.

If you like YA books with magic, I think this series is worth starting, but just know that you’re in it for the long haul. I’m not sure how many books Mafi plans to write in this series, but it feels like at this rate, it will take several more to get to where we need to go and wrap everything up properly.

I’ve said this with the first two books and I’m saying it again here, my overall opinion of this series cannot fully be formed yet because I have to see where Mafi’s going to go with everything and see if it’s worth the investment, if I’m satisfied with explanations, progressions, and ending.

I will continue to have high hopes. This book offered more than the second so I feel like we’re headed in the right direction! I like that Alizeh’s group of friends is getting more space in the books because it adds a layer of engagement for the reader where we’re not just focused on the romantic love of Cyrus and Alizeh but we get the element of friendship and loyalty.


[Content Advisory: 5 f-words, lustful thoughts as in the previous book and a somewhat graphic sex scene (chapter 14) that is actually a dream]

“Even when something beautiful breaks, the making of it still matters.”

I read this one right after The Clinic which was a thriller so it took me a few chapters to stop my brain from trying to figure out who the killer or the victim was because there wasn’t one…

Once I stopped being suspicious of everyone I was able to enjoy it! It’s the reverse of the enemies to lovers trope. Here we have lovers to enemies to fake lovers.

About halfway through I was feeling disappointed by the book because it felt like one long book about sexual tension between two people who should be together but aren’t and we don’t know why and they won’t talk about.

I’ve read two other books by Emily Henry- People We Meet on Vacation and Book Lovers. Both of which won best romance in the Goodreads Award Challenge in their respective years. Apparently Henry is the queen of romance and everybody knows it.

I will say that I liked both of those books better than this one. Both of those felt like like they had more plot or side story happening to move things along, a little more depth. I also think I liked the main characters better in those. The former had weirdness which I liked. The latter had a really good familial component which I liked.


Happy Place eventually got to some meat at the end which left me with a better taste in my mouth than I was at halfway, but I still wish there had been more to the story throughout.

It was basically just a week-long friend-party-bash-rave-celebration time at a house in Maine. Sure the town had its charm and we got to see all the memories of that house that bonded the friends together but I just felt like it was too focused on this tension between the two main characters- Harriet and Wyn- and not enough on anything meaningful.



The basic premise of the book is this:

The background is that Harriet, Cleo, and Sabrina were put together as roommates at their college in Vermont. While they all had different personalities and backgrounds, they became the best of friends and vacationed every summer at Sabrina’s family house in Maine.

They eventually accumulated their significant others (Parth for Sabrina, Kimmy for Cleo, and Wyn for Harriet) to vacation with them.

This year Sabrina finds out her dad is selling the house (because of his seventh wife) so she plans an elaborate ‘last vacation’ week for everyone, ending with an impromptu wedding between her and Parth.

Things get complicated when Harriet arrives and sees Wyn there who wasn’t supposed to be. They had been engaged for a long time but had broken up five months ago, not telling anyone about it. Now they have to pretend to still be together for the week so they don’t ruin it and make Sabrina sadder than she already is or take away from the happiness of their wedding.

The break-up had basically been a four minute phone call and while they both think the other one is happy without them and that breaking up is the best thing, you can tell that they both still want each other.

The book chapters are labeled ‘happy place,’ ‘real life,’ ‘dark place,’ and ‘almost happy place,’ as we sometimes jump back in time to previous memories of Harriet and Wyn’s relationship in college and afterwards(happy place), the dark place being after the break up and real life being the present day celebration week.


I Just Want You to Be Happy

It is titled ‘Happy Place’ for a few reasons. The most overt reason is that this house is their happy place. The place they’ve bonded and shared so many memories as first a group of three but then with their loved ones. It’s an escape from ‘real life’ and a place of freedom and possibility.

The more subtle reason is because in a relationship the other person becomes your happy place, your home, your escape from real life.

In this book both of Harriet’s happy places are fading.

“Our house, this pocket universe where we always belong, no matter what else is happening, we’re safe and happy—that’s going away.”

Life isn’t what it used to be. Relationships have changed. Can she still be happy without her happy places?

Now this is where we finally started to see some depth in the book (unfortunately it was at the end) because now we’re looking at how these characters’ parents’ relationships influenced how they handled their own.

Sabrina’s parents became unhappy with each other and divorced. Her dad multiplied that a few times. Harriet’s parents stayed together but she could tell they were unhappy because they married because of pregnancy and missed out on what their lives could have been. Conflict was avoided but resentment lingered.



I spent a lot of time thinking about this concept of happiness when it comes to relationships and jobs and life in general.

(I’m about to go on a soap box about happiness and relationships in terms of this book because I don’t have much to say about sexual tension and there’s no other alternative; if this does not interest you, scroll past…)

The characters eventually realize that their happy place that week was a mirage because they were hiding all of their feelings and not talking about the hard stuff. To them happiness and sadness couldn’t co-exist.

“I was afraid of ruining this place where they’ve always been happy. I was afraid they would resent me and never say it, afraid they wouldn’t like me… They’d know I wasn’t enough.”

Harriet grew up thinking it was up to her to make everyone happy. She wanted to do what people expected of her, to make them happy, to make them proud of her and be who they wanted her to be instead of making her own choices about her life.

There is truth to this part of the whole topic. That is not a healthy way to live or to build relationships on because it’s not honest and it’s not one person’s job to sustain everyone else- that’s impossible.

We did get to see growth in Harriet’s recognition of this about herself which was good.

But there was also this underlying message of what it means to have happiness in a relationship that I’m not sure I agree with. It’s possible what I’m about to throw down is actually what Henry was getting at and I interpreted it wrong but I don’t know so here are some things…

Harriet looks at a picture of her parents with her baby sister from years ago and thinks they look tired and she can see their dreams dying in their eyes. They looked, “not miserable. Just like it’s not enough. Like he and mom both know there are other universes where they’re more, bigger, happier.”

When talking with Wyn about their break-up she says, “If we’re making each other unhappy, we can’t keep going. I need to know we’re never going to hurt each other like this.”

We can look at the abominably high divorce rate and know that this idea of ‘happiness’ has pervaded what people think is a good relationship. The cultural idea is: the pinnacle of life is to be happy. If you’re not happy you need to do something different, find someone new, move somewhere else, etc. If the other person doesn’t make you happy, end the relationship. Taking care of kids is exhausting and sucking you dry so go ahead and leave them.

But where is the commitment to that? No wonder Harriet never spoke up, she didn’t want Wyn to leave. But you can’t build a relationship that is dependent on the feeling of happiness. There would be no commitment, no trust, and no growth. It would be shallow and fear-driven because in reality, we don’t feel happy all the time.

Hard things happen. There is conflict. There is selfishness. But a relationship (a marriage or with the goal of marriage in mind) is for better or worse, richer or poorer, in sickness or in health. It grows during those times, it doesn’t give up during those times.

Obviously there is space here, especially in dating relationships where if you know it’s not going to work, you end things before you get married. I’m not saying you should marry someone you’re not attracted to and don’t enjoy being with. And of course marriages often end because of abuse or infidelity.

But the idea behind finding your person is not that they make you happy all the time, although they may, but that they are the person you’re going to want to ‘make things work with’ when the feelings fade. You find the person you want to fight for when conflict arises.

The cultural idea of relationships lacks this commitment.

Harriet’s mom tells her: “I’m terrified for you that you’re going to wake up one day and realize you built your life around someone else and there’s no room for you.”

Perhaps I’m interpreting this wrong, but based on what we know of her mom’s past, I read this as a warning that if you get married and sacrifice your dreams, you will regret it and you won’t be the person you were supposed to be.

I think this because I hear and see it all the time. Follow your heart at all costs, it could never lead you astray. You deserve better. You deserve to chase every dream you have. Don’t let others hold you back from your potential. You will be less of a person.

But I don’t see very many messages about sacrificial love. That circumstances don’t dictate happiness. That happiness is not determined by achievements or dreams pursued, or lifestyle met.

Having a marriage. Having a family. Are those inconveniences that keep you from your dreams? Or are those WORTH giving other things up for? Worth sacrificing your dream because you can build new dreams. Worth adapting a dream for the betterment of the family because people are more important than dreams or achievements. Maybe if you really think about it- they ARE the dream. Having a person/s to experience life with, discover the world with.

If you think there’s no room for yourself in a marriage that is based on commitment and sacrifice then your concept of self needs to change. Our identity can’t be in the things we do, the places we go, the dreams we achieve or the things we have because those will inevitably be taken away and then what will you be?

My identity is Christ. Yes, I’m a wife. I’m a mom. I’m a reader. I’m a creative. If I lose any of those things, I will feel loss, but I won’t lose myself because my purpose and my worth is not dependent on them. My worth and purpose is in the unchanging love of Christ. Period. And that gives me freedom to let go of what I think will make me happiest and trust that what the Lord has for me is worth anything I lose, even when it feels impossible. Because I trust him and he is faithful.

And that’s why, to me, a ‘happy place’ is a place of trust, commitment, and faithfulness. That your people will love and stand by you even when they don’t feel like it because they have chosen you and are determined to sacrifice and grow with you. To be one. Where unhappiness doesn’t make you lean out, it makes you lean in. It makes you look at your selfishness and re-evaluate your priorities. It’s a mutual sacrificing, a joint decision to move this way or that. It says, ‘I can let go of this because you’re worth it.’ That sounds safe. That sounds like love.

And now we understand why marriage is a reflection of God’s love for his people. It’s a relationship of faithfulness, trust, and sacrificial love. And we tarnish that image when we view a relationship on a spectrum of happiness and drop it when we feel like it, because there might be something bigger or better.



In terms of jobs— I think Harriet gave a lot of good reasons to change her job. I don’t think we’re required to stay at a job that makes us miserable, and her change made sense in a lot of ways, though I'm not sure only doing pottery is the best move considering her skills.

But for some reason there is an idea that floats around that says you should be excited to go to work everyday. Just jumpin’ outta bed all bubbly to go do something you love. That’s cool if you found that, but if that’s what we’re telling people to go find, we’re setting them up for disappointment and a long resume of short job stints.

There is usually and probably always going to be an element of work that is unpleasant and monotonous. And sometimes we are able to find a new and better job— there is no problem in seeing what’s out there, but we also often have a responsibility to care for and provide for loved ones, and that might mean working a job that doesn’t give you warm fuzzies every morning.

That doesn’t mean you are stagnant and held back and destined to be unhappy. It means you get up every morning for work knowing that you are being faithful to your family and sacrificing for their good because you love them and you get to still come home to them every day and share life together.



I also think that there is this idea that ‘just wanting someone else to be happy’ is a noble thing to claim. Do whatever you want in your life, as long as you’re happy I’m happy. Happy wife happy life. We just want our kids to grow up and be happy.

But while it sounds lovely, we should have better aspirations for people. At least in terms of how the world defines happiness.

Don’t get me wrong. I love happiness. And God is a happy God. Look at all the good things, the fun things, the funny things that he has given us. Happiness is from the Lord.

As Alisa Childers explains in her book Live Your Truth (and Other Lies):

“Biblical happiness doesn’t come from having stuff, feeling good about our circumstances, or even finding romantic fulfillment. Those things feel good, but they can’t bring ultimate happiness. In some cases, they may even distract us from real happiness. True biblical happiness is knowing deep down that no matter our circumstances, we were lost and now we’re found. We have experienced the love of Christ, which always brings encouragement and comfort.”

Chasing cultural happiness sounds like an exhausting life. I hope my kids learn contentment, patience, trust, perseverance, and endurance. I hope above all, not that they’ve secured happiness by the world’s standards but that they’ve clung to the Lord and found that in all the ups and downs, they trust him and live in obedience to Him. Everything else will pass away.

Timothy Keller says, "While other world views lead us to sit in the midst of life's joys, foreseeing the coming sorrows, Christianity empowers its people to sit in the midst of this world's sorrows, tasting the coming joys."



Okay.

Thanks for tuning into tonight’s episode of Brittany’s Soap Box: Happiness Edition. I’ll just leave you with one last quote from Randy Alcorn who wrote an entire book on Happiness:

“If you believe in the God of the Bible, if you've placed your faith in Jesus Christ as your Redeemer, then the following things are true: The price for your happiness has been paid; The basis for your happiness is secure; The resources for your happiness are provided daily; The assurance of your eternal happiness is absolute, providing an objective reason for your happiness today.”



The Funnies

As usual, Henry has good wit and humor and I like her descriptions:

“‘Surprise.’ His gray eyes communicate something more akin to ‘Welcome to hell; I’ll be your host, the devil.’”

“I manage to say something that sounds sort of like ‘oh… good’ and sort of like someone with both stage fright and strep throat has taken a crack at public yodeling.”

And I think my favorite is the part where Harriet tells Wyn she wants to be a potter. He says “A happy potter’s better for this world than a miserable surgeon.” Which I don’t disagree with. But I read it as ‘Harry Potter’ and then I realized they called Harriet Harry and it was just too perfect! I don’t know if it was intentional, but it was excellent.

[Speaking of potters, if the first quote of my review (and pottery related analogies in general) resonate with you, you should read It’s Not Supposed to Be This Way by Lysa Terkeurst.]



Some Randos

I got tired of hearing about that singular lock of hair Wyn had always falling places and doing things. It was like it’s own character, but not sure if we saw any growth there.

I’m not sure if these characters had as much personality as her other books. Kimmy did (probably because she seemed like an Amy Schumer type), maybe Cleo because she was artsy, but the others seemed a little bleh to me. Although as I write that it feels like I’m saying only loud or abnormal people have personalities and that’s not fair. Maybe because those are easier to picture they seem to overshadow the others.

They actually give some good advice on fighting: “There doesn’t need to be a winner and a loser. You just have to care how the other person feels. You have to care more about them than you do about being right.” I’ve been married for almost 13 years and I wish I could say this didn’t just come up recently for me… if I wasn’t right so much it wouldn’t be so hard… ha.

[If you are interested in more information on how to fight better, check out Kim and Penn Holderness’s book Everybody Fights: Why Not Get Better at It?]

In her acknowledgements Henry mentions Brittany Cavallaro, another author. I’ve had her book, A Study in Charlotte, on my TBR so that’s fun that they’re friends!



Recommendation

If you haven’t read Emily Henry before, I don’t think I would start with this one. I think her other books are better.

If you’re already a fan of hers, you'll probably like it.

It wasn’t her strongest book but the ending helped and I do like her writing style. She has a new book coming out this year in April (Funny Story) which I think I will plan to read.

We all have different thresholds for swearing and sexual content, so just be aware of what I listed below to make a decision whether or not this book is a good fit for you.


[Content Advisory: lots of f- and s-words; sexual tension throughout with graphic scenes primarily taking place in Chapter 29 and the end of Chapter 32 if you wish to skip them; two main characters are lesbians; there’s some space dedicated to getting high]

“It wasn’t about simply changing my mind, but about changing my mind and heart. I can’t explain all the mechanics of this radical transformation. I just know that no one can be in the very presence of the living God and remain the same.”


Becket Cook, born in conservative Dallas in a large, wealthy, Catholic family, headed west and ran in some elite circles of Hollywood doing set design and living an unapologetic, gay lifestyle.

This was his attitude as he went to parties and photoshoots and lived his dream life:

“I wanted everyone to be free to be who they were with wild abandon and without shame, completely comfortable in their own skin. And I was furious at those in society who tried to constrain or shame others for being who they were, not least of whom were on the religious right… I wanted to see an end to this kind of intolerance and oppression. I wanted nothing less than full liberation, full inclusion, and full acceptance in the mainstream.”

His book- A Change of Affection— is not an account of ‘fixing’ his gayness. It truly is the story of redemption from a man who wanted nothing to do with God or anything Christian, yet discovered something even he couldn’t deny.

“My motivation for writing this book is not to win a debate. It is not so I could be right and you wrong. More than anything, my hope is that you will come away with a better understanding of this complex issue, from every angle, so you can make informed choices that affect eternity.”


He transparently tells us about his childhood, his coming out, his boyfriends, his career, and his feelings of discontent— there had to be something more in the world. Something that would give him more meaning and purpose than the fleeting relationships that left him empty and alone.

He shares his encounter on the streets of Hollywood with a Christian who answered his questions in a friendly conversation and invited him to church. A service he didn’t particularly want to go to:

“How could I ever consider going into a den of these foes? They think being gay is wrong. They believe who I am is a sin. I’ve felt alienated and marginalized by them my whole life. I couldn’t join that club.”

But he continued to feel compelled to go. So he went. And while he was there, he encountered God.

“Upon my conversion, God gave me a new heart and put his Spirit in me and that transformed what my heart wanted. Now my heart wants to be obedient to God, not conform to the passions of my former ignorance.”

After discovering the realness and power of God, Becket had an insatiable desire to read the Bible and listen to sermons and take in as much information as he could. He even canceled his cable subscription. It was convicting to hear his desire for God’s word because I never had a ‘conversion experience’ like him. I grew up in a Christian home and never walked away.

But my desire to hear from God through the Bible should not fade like it does. His Word is still active, powerful, and relevant. Becket’s story encourages me to pray that God would give me that thirst for his word just like Becket has. There is nothing better to be filling our minds with.

This book does not delve into all the debated Scripture passages surrounding homosexuality, but he does have a section where he answers questions he received a lot after he converted. Like:

- Isn’t unfair that you have to be alone for the rest of your life?
- But aren’t you born gay?
- Didn’t God create you that way?
- Doesn’t God want you to be happy?
- Aren’t we supposed to follow our hearts and be true to ourselves?
- Can you be gay and Christian?
- Are you straight now?

He does a great job answering these honestly, biblically, and with grace.

He knows what it feels like to be on the other side and so he also offers some insights on how we can better interact with our loved ones or others in our church who identify themselves in the LGBTQ family.

His story (and Jackie Hill Perry’s- Gay Girl, Good God) remind us that though it’s important to be able to biblically defend your beliefs and speak truth in love, we cannot discount the power of the Holy Spirit to work in people’s lives outside of our own words and actions. Our prayers are powerful and God can do more than we could ever imagine.

It’s less about winning debates as it is about bringing people to encounter Jesus. Because like Becket said, we can’t be in the presence of the living God without being changed. It’s not our responsibility to change people.


A Matter of Identity

One of the biggest problems with homosexuality today is that it has become attached to identity. Someone’s sexuality or sexual orientation is now considered the most authentic part of themselves, the thing that makes them who they are, even the most important part of themselves. Who are they without it?

This is why the conversation around this topic becomes hostile. Because the LGBTQ community has made their sexuality their identity and core characteristic, when someone says that it is a sin, they feel attacked at a very personal level- they may feel like we are calling them sin.

But I liked how Rosaria Butterfield (who used to be a lesbian) puts it in her book, Five Lies of our Anti-Christian Age:

“You cannot have union with Christ if you have made an identity out of anything else… you do yourself great harm if you insist on holding two forms of self-representation— sexual and spiritual. Both forms of self-representation compete for the same thing: your loyalty, your heart, your sense of self, your faith.”

Our identity should be in Christ, our Creator and Savior whom we are designed to worship.

Both Becket and Rosaria are proof that sexuality does not define us and that the Holy Spirit is powerful enough to change our hearts.

Becket talks about the verse in Ephesians (4:22-23) where Paul tells us to “put off” our old selves for we are “new creations.”

“I would never call myself a gay Christian because the label ‘gay’ is part of my old self, which the apostle Paul told us to get rid of. I don’t identify with that old lifestyle anymore. I am a new creation in Christ.”

He also talks about the biblical story of the rich young ruler (Mark 10) who asked Jesus how to get eternal life. The ruler reported that he followed all the commandments. Jesus told him to go sell all he had, give to the poor, and come follow him. The ruler went away sad. He was unwilling to give up his wealth for Jesus.

The story isn’t saying money is bad. It’s saying that money was his idol. He held it higher and more important than a relationship with Christ. He could not give it up.

If our identity is in anything other than Christ, it becomes an idol. It keeps us from a life devoted to Jesus. Are we willing to die to our sin, to give it up, to take up our cross and follow Him?

“Most are not sure if He is worth the sacrifice that he requires.”


In contrast to the rich young ruler, the man in Matthew 13 found the pearl of great price in a field. He went and sold everything he had to buy that field. Jesus says the kingdom of heaven is like that— its value is worth the cost.

This is a call not just to the sin of homosexuality. It is the call to every single human who puts anything else in God’s place. To follow Christ is to sacrifice and to give up that which we think we need and trust that God is more than enough for us. He satisfies every desire we have. We need nothing but Christ.

“I felt like a new creation. I no longer felt consumed by a desire for men. God’s love was more than enough; I didn’t need or want anyone else.”


Simply Put

“My sin was this, that I looked for pleasure, beauty, and truth not in him but myself and his other creatures, and the search led me instead to pain, confusion, and error.”— Augustine

Becket experienced the same thing as Augustine. But God rescued him from a life of emptiness, pain, confusion, meaninglessness, and selfish pride. The life we all need to be rescued from.

His story of redemption is not a one-off. It’s the open invitation of the gospel. It’s for you and it’s for me.

“The overwhelming wonder of God’s infinite love is this: While I was broken and a failure, God came to rescue me. He came to love me, to redeem me, and to heal me from sin. Where I failed, Christ succeeded on my behalf. Where I distrusted, Christ was faithful. When I proudly resisted, he humbly surrendered. Through his obedience, he bridged the chasm between my darkness and his light.”


Recommendation

What I like about this book is that it’s written like a memoir. There is a place for books that discuss the relevant Scripture passages (like some that I listed below), but there is also a need for books like this that approach the subject from a very personal and transparent angle.

I think it’s a non-threatening book that can act as an introduction into considering the biblical point of view from someone who has seen Christians as the enemy but discovered something that changed his mind.

I think it also presents a humanizing point of view to Christians who are well-versed in Scripture but not in the hearts of those who struggle with same-sex attraction. It is a reminder to love, to be patient, and to pray.

Like Becket has said, it’s a complex topic with a lot of layers and experiences. The Bible is clear, but the way we bring that to people’s attention matters.

I recommend you read Becket’s story. I also recommend that you continue reading on the topic and I’ve provided a list of other books at the end of this review.


Some Other Quotes

“I have come to realize, as the Bible describes, that I deserve nothing, and yet in my brokenness Jesus came to give me everything.”

“Just as God did not create me gay, he also, for example, did not create heterosexuals with the desire to objectify women as sexual objects for selfish pleasure. We see this exemplified throughout society with rampant addiction to pornography. Neither is right simply because it exists. It is a gross misunderstanding to believe that anything that feels natural is righteous.”

“I don’t think we realize as a culture how damaging it is emotionally, not to mention physically (for example STDs) to engage in casual sex. We may think it’s no big deal, but it leads to a lot of unnecessary pain and suffering for both parties involved.”

“If you believe that homosexuality is a sin, you are immediately labeled a bigot or homophobic. It’s not even okay anymore to just agree to disagree… Somewhere in the last decade, ‘I disagree with you’ came to mean, ‘I hate you.’ Tolerance used to mean something along the lines of, ‘I disagree with your view, but I’m willing to tolerate it,’ because it wouldn’t be tolerance otherwise. Now, however, tolerance has been redefined as , ‘If you don’t affirm everything I do, then you are intolerant!’”
(Related to this: The Intolerance of Tolerance by D.A. Carson)

“Although we are not forced to bow down to a golden image, we are pressured to bow down to the great god of Public Opinion.”

“This may sound extreme, but if you aren’t truthful, you are knowingly aiding and abetting them down the path of destruction.”


For a list of further reading on this subject see my original review HERE. 

[Would have been 5 stars if not for all the f-words.]
(Also, in case you need this reminder: Cate Quinn is not Kate Quinn)


“‘Please. Call me. I need to tell you something about when we were kids. I need to tell you before it’s too late.”

That’s the last voicemail Meg has from her sister, Haley, before she sees on the news that Haley committed suicide at a luxury rehab clinic.

But Haley died of heroin injection and Meg knows Haley would never do that. Something is amiss and she is willing to commit herself to the same rehab clinic to find the answers. She doesn’t need a cover because she has her own addiction (to oxycodone) that she needs to kick anyway if she’s going to keep her job taking down the loan sharks at casinos.

A shark among sharks, Meg’s priority is to find out what happened to Haley, but her own trauma and addictions might keep her from getting anywhere helpful.

“You’re not going to like this, Meg. But to solve your sister’s murder, you might need to solve yourself.”



That’s the set-up of this very good thriller and if it wasn’t for all the f-words I would say this would be a definite must-read.

The book gives a bit of a Shutter Island vibe in its setting and characters.

“Someplace in the Pacific Northwest with plenty of rain and cold so they can all feel good and miserable, paying megabucks for the privilege while some shaman channels their auras or something.”

(Okay, a bit different era, but you get the idea)

Meg enters rehab with a bunch of addicts who are willing to lie, steal, and cheat for their addiction. Add to that withdrawal symptoms like hallucinations and the side effects of the treatment methods they undergo, and we’ve got some hard to read, unpredictable and untrustworthy characters.

And Meg isn’t necessarily in her right mind either. To stay in the clinic and investigate she has to take part in the treatment herself— which means unlocking the trauma of her own childhood that Haley alluded to in her call.

Her only confidant is Harry who is waiting for her ‘on the outside,’ wanting her to get better, but also worrying about her safety— trapped in a remote clinic with a killer.

“That’s the problem with you, Meg. You’re not afraid of anything. And you should be.”



I love the setting because the unreliability and eeriness adds to the mystery and makes you second guess what you think you know. Even though I figured out bits and pieces early on, there were some good surprises waiting for me at the end!

It’s one of those books that when you finish you want to re-read to see what you missed.



The book begins with the scene right before Haley’s death: “Haley knew no drug could help her now. This would be the room she would die in.”

Then we alternate between chapters told from Meg’s POV and Cara’s— the newish manager of the clinic.

We also have the director/owner of the clinic who I picture as a cross between the dad on The Prodigal Son TV show and Daniel Hartman on Suits with the voice of Daniel Hartman because I don’t know what a Swiss accent sounds like. He’s got that smooth but sketchy demeanor that is intelligent and slick but you just always feel like they have ulterior motives and that they’re tricking you somehow.

Sure, the characters aren’t super loveable, but I didn’t find Meg and Cara annoying at least. Plus Meg is going through a lot so you give her behavior and attitude a little grace because of her mental state. Of course she’s not going to be cheery and super friendly.

I’m not sure we fully got to know Cara well. Some of her past was hinted at but we don’t really get into it; and even though we’re in her head she still feels like she’s held at arms length from us readers.



The treatment they receive at the clinic is ‘cutting edge’ which can also be read: fictional (well mostly… you can google it). So it’s a bit out there but it didn’t distract me from the story, I think it enhanced it. I don’t need books to be medically realistic all the time and in this case it was integral to the whole plot so it made sense to me that Quinn wrote things the way she did.


I read this book on the kindle app which means I was not very aware of the page amount as I read. Some reviewers have commented that it’s too long of a read, but when I looked on Goodreads and saw it was 448 pages, I will say it didn’t feel that long to me when I read it! The short chapters really helped.



I thought it was really cool that the author, Cate Quinn, shares in the author’s note and in this article about her own experience with her alcohol addiction and attending rehab where the idea of this book emerged.

She was afraid that she wouldn’t be able to write a book without alcohol. This was her first book sober which is a feat and a very good one at that! It adds authenticity to the rehab experience she depicts and the physical and emotional feelings of withdrawal she felt to some degree herself as well as the trauma that induced her addiction to begin with.

“I entered rehab broken, using alcohol as my armour. When I left, I wasn’t alone and afraid any more. I had taken my first steps towards asking other people for help when I needed it.” (Cate Quinn)

I think it will probably be hard for some people to read if they have/had their own addiction journey, but at the same time, maybe it will inspire readers with addictions to acknowledge that they have one and that there is help and hope to overcome it!



I would definitely recommend this book, but again, there are over 100 f-words so that makes it hard to recommend to some. Maybe some day the kindle app will develop a feature to give the option to censor swear words for those of us who care about that!


[Content Advisory: 112 f-words, 24 s-words; trigger warnings for drug addiction and rehab; no sex scenes but Meg keeps seeing a lady in lingerie]

**Received an ARC via NetGalley**

“How would we design the justice system if we did not know our lot in life and thus did not know whether we were more likely to be a crime victim or a criminal defendant?”


‘The American justice system is corrupt’ is a politically charged and unhelpful statement. But I’ve heard it like a broken record lately.

This book has done what nothing else has been able to do thus far: tell me specific ways the justice system is unfair, biased, or unjust.

Martens has both decades of law experience— as a federal prosecutor AND a criminal defense attorney— and a seminary degree. This puts him in a unique and extremely helpful position to help Christians (or non-believers for that matter) see the ways the justice system has failed (from firsthand experience in a courtroom) and help us think critically about how our criminal justice system functions in light of biblical justice.

Martens’s main thesis is that a justice system should be aligned with biblical justice in that it functions to love ALL neighbors— both the victims and the accused.

His writing is loving, fair, clear, and does not attempt to take sides on any recent politically charged and public case. I appreciated this because it increased my ability to trust his motive in writing in the book and the research he used to make his points.

He seems to have a very astute mind for the nation’s varying perspectives of the justice system and how conversations tend to go when talking about it— whether that’s in ignorance of what actually happens in the courtroom, popular crime and incarceration statistics, only looking at either the inputs or the outputs of the system, or just touting political talking points.

But none of this will accomplish much if we don’t understand “the design and operation of the features, procedures, actors, and laws that make up the system.”



The first part of the book shows us what the Bible says about justice and what God has ordained government’s role to be. Then it outlines five main pillars of biblical justice: accuracy, due process, impartiality, accountability, and proportionality.

“The core of biblical justice is accuracy, due process is the means to accuracy, impartiality protects accuracy, accountability punishes inaccuracy, and proportionality ensures accuracy about severity.”

He shows how the Bible requires sufficient evidence that shows what truly happened; that the process this happens through is designed to find truth and an opportunity for the accused to be heard; that verdicts are given out fairly across different races, genders, or social classes, not giving special treatment to ‘favored’ groups; that those in charge of rendering verdicts and moving the process along should not receive immunity if they fail to act morally and according to the law; and that the punishment fits and tells the truth about the severity of the crime.

The second part of the book takes those principles and then uses them to analyze various parts of our legal system such as: plea bargains, jury selection, judges, assistance of counsel, witnesses, exculpatory evidence, sentencing, and the death penalty.

Along the way Martens gives us the history of our legal system in general but also of various laws and procedures— why they were enacted and analyzes whether or not they are doing what they were intended to do.



Right up front he addresses the common objection to talking about criminal justice— that it distracts from the gospel.

The term ‘social justice’ can mean a lot of things right now (and I would highly recommend you read Confronting Injustice without Compromising Truth to delve more into what it should mean), and often promotes its principles as higher than or equal to the gospel in many ways.

Martens helpfully defines what he means when he says it: “When I use the term ‘social justice,’ I mean nothing more than justice in the structuring of a society. I am referring to the design of a society in a way that treats all its members justly. A society is a group of people who live together in some ordered way.”

So then, should we make social justice/criminal justice a priority?

Martens answers:

“Christ’s salvific work includes our sanctification… what is sanctification if not Christ’s conforming us to live justly in this world.”

“the answer to injustice mislabeled as ‘social justice’ is not to abandon the pursuit of social justice altogether. True social justice belongs to the church. A real social justice— accomplished imperfectly now through our sanctification and perfectly in the end through our glorification in the new earth— is a crucial pose of the gospel.”

I find Thaddeus Williams’ distinction in CIWCT (above) helpful: “Justice is not the first thing. The gospel is. But that does not make justice optional to the Christian life… Instead of saying social justice is the gospel or in the gospel, it is more helpful to say social justice is from the gospel.”

Bottom line: God is just. And God is loving. Therefore we should care about justice and loving all his image bearers. If we are Christ-followers, neither of those things are optional; they are vital and will require sacrifice to strive for.



I think that might be the most poignant thing I take away from this book. Martens is aware that people tend to relate to one neighbor more than another—either the victim or the accused. This ‘bias’ then influences how we view and vote for things in the legal system.

A helpful analogy he used: If your two kids want to split the last piece of pie, you let one of them cut it in half and the other one gets to choose their piece first. The first kid makes a fair cut of the pie because they don’t know which piece they’ll be getting.

The same should be true of the legal system.

“If we most fear being a crime victim and think it unlikely that we could be criminally accused, we may well favor “victim’s rights,” resent procedural protections for criminal defendants that make convictions more difficult and support harsh sentences for those convicted. By contrast, if we most fear false conviction we may hold the opposite views.”

I was convicted that I subconsciously (or overtly) tend to think the accused is guilty and wave off certain issues because ‘they’re probably guilty anyway.’ That is not loving my neighbor and that is not promoting biblical justice.

As I read through the various procedures Martens details, I was pretty shocked by what is legal and how that affects the accused— and indirectly the victim if innocent people are being convicted and the actual perpetrators are going free. If I were accused, I can’t imagine having to face those disadvantages; I would feel pretty helpless!

The burden of proving guilt is on the prosecutor. The system should be built in a way that actually finds out the truth and convicts accurately, sentences proportionately, and is held accountable for their procedures. If we can do that, then we can trust that the guilty will be caught. We shouldn’t give prosecutors undue advantages that thwart that process.

“Identical treatment is not required of offender and victim, but equal regard for the good of them both (impartiality) is a key element of biblical justice.”

The hard reality is that that might mean some guilty go free if the prosecutor can’t gather enough compelling evidence or witnesses. But this book has softened my heart on this issue and I believe that is better than falsely convicting an innocent person which would be two injustices— wrongly punishing an innocent AND still allowing the guilty person to go free.

“But we are not without hope… Wrongdoers will not escape the arm of the Lord even if their time on this earth passes without giving an account.”

 

Martens states that the error rate of falsely convicted is about 2% given the information we have, but the rate is most likely higher.

“A conservative estimate is that at least 1 percent of the United States prison population, meaning approximately 20,000 people, is incarcerated as the result of wrongful convictions.”

“If you’re inclined to think that 1 to 2 percent is a low error rate, ask yourselves this: Would you willingly enter a room of one hundred people if you knew that one or two of them would be randomly shot and killed? Would you send your children into that room?”

I am one of the ones that is inclined to think 1-2% is low. But he’s right, that if I were to put myself in those shoes, I wouldn’t be okay with that risk. So what percentage of error is acceptable? He doesn’t say and I’m not sure we can put a number on it.

The idea is that if we can do better, we should.

And I believe there has to be a way. The problems he lists do not seem impossible to adjust.

[Goodreads didn't give me enough space to talk about them so see my list on my original post HERE]


The death penalty gets its own little blurb here as it’s a contested topic and one Martens admitted he changed his mind on. I appreciate the way Martens handled his answer to the question of whether capital punishment is just. He acknowledges that the Bible authorizes it and sometimes commands it.

“The biblical record is overwhelming in its affirmation of the death penalty as a just punishment for certain crimes.”

But he says,

“In a justice system that injects race into jury selections in trials before elected judges who run on ‘tough on crime’ campaign platforms with defendants represented by overworked and underfunded defense teams while the prosecution conceals exculpatory evidence without consequence, I am unwilling to wager another man’s life.”

And though I believe the death penalty is a valid deterrent and a just punishment in some cases, I can’t really argue with Martens here.

He gives a lot of statistics on the disproportionate application of the death penalty, particularly on black people.

“Most murders are intra-racial… In the most recent year for which data is available, 91% of Black murder victims were killed by Blacks, while 81% of White murder victims were killed by Whites… Thus were race not playing a role we would expect to see most of the Black defendants sentenced to death to be in cases where they murdered a fellow Black personal. In fact, the statistics show precisely the opposite.”

I don’t really understand how our justice system would still be operating with racial prejudice when it comes to applying the death penalty, but apparently the statistics show that. And if that is the case, then I think I would have to agree that until some changes are made to due process to actually find out the truth about who is guilty and who is innocent and then applying sentencing with a blind eye to race or social class, then I’m not sure I can defend the death penalty either.


What Am I Supposed to Do?

One of my critiques of a lot of these kinds of books is the that they spend the entire book criticizing ‘the system’ and showing how corrupt or unjust it is and then offer nothing constructive. We just sit there with all the pieces they shattered, unsure what to do with them.

That’s not helpful.

Martens doesn’t give answers in the form of policy changes we all need to request of our state governments, though part of me wishes he had.

“There is no one-size-fits-all approach for all cultures, histories, localities, and generations— not even for all Christians… we have 3144 criminal justice systems— one for each county in the US, each with its distinct features, priorities, strengths, and weaknesses.”

But he doesn’t leave us empty-handed.

He gives us four exhortations:

- Think differently: view both the victim and the accused as your neighbor and an image-bearer of God; be careful of the labels you use and the jokes you make; want what is best for all people

- Speak differently: have better, more informed discussions about the actual issues instead of the political talking points; teach your children to love kindness, justice, and truth by the way you talk about others

- Work differently: for those who work in relation to the legal system, advocate for just laws or quit if your job forces you to act immorally

- Vote differently: criminal justice should be have high moral priority when considering who to vote for; be involved in the election of your county’s district attorney (pg 348 has a list of questions you may ask at a townhall; as a juror your vote is powerful so judge the case morally and with love for what is best for the defendant

“Each and every one of us can, starting even today, think differently about justice, speak differently in our sphere of influence, work differently if need be, and vote differently when the opportunity presents itself.”

It may not be the specific answers we wish we had, but Martens does give us more than most without piling on guilt.


Recommendation

This is a must-read book.

Especially if you have any sort of influence in the legal system from policing, to legislature, to trial participation to prison management. Go ahead and buy one for your district attorney, your judges, your senators, your representatives, your police chief.

Martens isn’t writing for a political agenda. He is writing for truth and justice and deals with facts and figures, laws and cases. It will shock you, it will anger you, and it will enlighten you.

As someone who knows both the law as it is in real life (not just in Suits or Law and Order) and the Bible, Martens is an excellent source to glean knowledge from as we look at how we can better love our neighbor through our criminal justice system.

Hopefully we are never at trial, but if we were, we would want a fair one and one that didn’t back us in a corner to plead guilty to something we didn’t do.

This is definitely a book I’ll reference and recommend when it comes to discussions of criminal justice.



Further Reading:

He attends church with Mark Dever and Jonathan Leeman and quoted one of Leeman’s books that I also found to be a really helpful book:

How the Nations Rage by Jonathan Leeman

Their church is in the heart of D.C. and their congregation is a diverse piece of the political pie. This book helps us view politics rightly in the church and how to view and engage with brothers and sisters in Christ who disagree with our political values. It was fair, balanced, practical, and helpful.

Another relevant book is Kevin DeYoung’s book:

What is the Mission of the Church by Kevin DeYoung

This engages more with the tension of pursuing social justice without compromising the priority of the gospel. What is the church’s role? It is important to note that there is a difference between the individual and the church specifically. This book made sense to me though I’m sure there are people who will disagree with it.

I’m sure there are many books that tell the stories of innocent people on death row but here are a couple to start with:

Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson

I Shall Not Die by Billy Neal Moore


**I received a copy of this book via Crossway in exchange for an honest review**