Book picks similar to
A Harold Bell Wright Trilogy: The Shepherd of the Hills, The Calling of Dan Matthews, and God and the Groceryman by Harold Bell Wright
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literary-fiction
novels
ozarks
Eden Lake
Jane Roper - 2011
Thirty years later, their marriage is long over and the camp has become a pricey playground for entitled suburbanites. When tragedy strikes, the Perryweiss children have to decide what role Eden Lake, and all that it stands for, will play in their lives. Abe, the eldest and heir apparent, has never been able to commit to a career-or a relationship. Jude, entangled with a married man, must confront her turbulent relationship with her past. Eric, the youngest, who has never strayed far from Eden Lake, stands at the precipice of a new life. Idealism and infidelity, childhood memories and the hard truths of adulthood collide and coalesce in the summer of 1998 at Camp Eden Lake. Praise for EDEN LAKE
"EDEN LAKE is an unusually accomplished debut novel about love and loss and the absurdities of summer camp. Jane Roper writes with quiet authority and sly humor about a large and intriguing cast of characters."
- Tom Perrotta, bestselling author of Election, Joe College and Little Children"As a kid I lasted one week at summer camp, but at EDEN LAKE I overcame my phobia. This is due to the quirky, warm, funny, quixotic crew you'll meet in these pages, and the compassionate yet sharply observed story of a family assembling and reassembling itself after a father's death. I'll be revisiting EDEN LAKE many times."
- Jenna Blum, bestselling author of Those Who Save Us and The Stormchasers"Anyone who's ever experienced the sweet tumult of summer camp is hereby ordered to read EDEN LAKE immediately. In fact, even if you've never been to camp, this book should go on your must-read list. Jane Roper has written a wise, sexy novel that fearlessly probes the particulars of desire and loss. It's a sheer delight - as irresistible as a smore."
- Steve Almond, author of, My Life in Heavy Metal, Candyfreak, and Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life
North Korean Memoirs
Mark D. Treston - 2004
An American idealist defects to North Korea in the 1970's only to discover the true horrors of this Stalinist state. What happens next would shock even those familiar with authoritarian regimes. The author, an American Foreign Service worker in china, meets a man by the name of "David". David entrusts the author with his diary and makes the author promise him that the diary will be shown to the world as "evidence of what North Korea is really like". Following this encounter, the author never sees David again.The author discovers that within the pages of this diary lies an incredible story of defection, survival, and an eventual escape by the man he knows only as "David". After staying up and reading the entire diary, the author is convinced that David's story must be told to the world.The diary details David's life from his fairly comfortable upbringings, through his rebellious youth, and into his extraordinary decision to defect to North Korea. At first, David enjoys an elevated status in North Korea as a "hero" and a "patriot" of the socialist cause.During two decades as an English professor at the most prestigious North Korean University, David experiences love, seduction, betrayal, and violence.
The Mountain
Elvi Rhodes - 1995
READERS ARE LOVING THE MOUNTAIN!
"Really enjoyed this book. Right from the start, it gripped your interest. Couldn't wait for times to get back to reading it!" - 5 STARS"Couldn't put this book down." - 5 STARS"Excellent story enjoyed reading it the twists and turns of the main characters keeping you entertained and wanting more thank you " - 5 STARS"Another brilliant book by this author based in Yorkshire again. Family saga at its best. Will definitely read more by this author" - 5 STARS****************************************************PASSIONS IGNITE AMIDST THE HARSH AND RUGGED HILLS OF YORKSHIRE...When Jake Tempest hears of jobs going building the new railway lines, he is drawn to Whernside in the Yorkshire countryside, and the mountain through which a tunnel is being carved.Beth Seymour is the one thing that lightens his harsh new life - but she has a husband and is trapped in an increasingly loveless marriage.As the construction of the railway progresses in the shadow of the mountain, complex passions play out...
Manalive
G.K. Chesterton - 1912
Innocent Smith, a bubbly, high-spirited gentleman who literally falls into their midst. Later accused of murder and denounced for philandering everywhere he goes, Smith prompts his newfound acquaintances to recognize an important idea in most unexpected ways.
Kitchen Boy
Sanford Phippen - 1996
KITCHEN BOY is the story of Andy Harrison, a working-class Maine boy, who spends every July and August working for the summer people and tourists on the Maine Coast, while dreaming of his own escape from Downeast. That escape proves at once dramatic and very humorous.The novel also is the story of a small, exclusive summer hotel and its eccentric and unforgettable female proprietors who help their young kitchen boy grow up. Through the course of six summers from 1959 to 1964, the "Kennedy years," Andy has many adventures, his loss of innocence paralleling that of his country.Stephen King on KITCHEN BOY: "If you love Maine, you will love this book." Carolyn Chute on KITCHEN BOY: "KITCHEN BOY is great. It is THICK and FLESHY and full of splendor. Sandy Phippen is a wonderful writer, one of the world's masters at character and voice." Janwillem van de Wetering on KITCHEN BOY: "To know Maine one has to live here but to really know Maine one has to meet with the sly and splendid work of Sanford Phippen."John A. Williams on KITCHEN BOY: “KITCHEN BOY is a reflective, often funny and always perceptive analysis of Maine and the people who think they have escape to it, and of the ‘Mainiacs’ who serve them. Both, in fact, have been captured forever by Sanford Phippen’s internal camera, registering drudgery, sadness, joy and, in the end, the quiet triumph of the human spirit through learning and growing into understanding.”Leo Connellan on KITCHEN BOY: “Phippen, like Erskin Caldwell and Will Rodgers, has his ear and humor universal, for people everywhere. KITCHEN BOY is that summer-people book we’ve yearned for: ‘the folk’ working for the foolish rich who take advantage of the poor, but Phippen breaks us up in the way his ‘disadvantaged’ take advantage, win our hearts, carry on, never change. Phippen has us splitting our sides laughing if we’re not crying. KITCHEN BOY IS A MUST READ!”
God Still Speaks: Are We Listening?
A.W. Tozer - 2014
W. Tozer was a man who knew the voice of God. He shared this experience with every true child of God. With all those who are called by the grace of God to share in the mystical union that is possible with Him through His Son Jesus. Tozer fought against much dryness and formality in his day. Considered a mighty man of God by most Evangelicals today, he was unconventional in his approach to spirituality and had no qualms about consulting everyone from Catholic Saints to German Protestant mystics for inspiration on how to experience God more fully. Here are two writings by Tozer that touch on the heart of this goal. Revelation is Not Enough and The Speaking Voice. Also included is a bonus chapter The Menace of the Religious Movie. This is meat to sink your spiritual teeth into. Tozer's writings will show you the way to satisfy your spiritual hunger.
Depth Charge
Jason Heaton - 2021
The tragedy sets in motion a dangerous quest for truth that pulls Tusker into a sinister plot spanning 75 years, from World War II Ceylon to modern day Sri Lanka. Along the way, he matches wits with a psychopathic mercenary, discovers a long lost ship with an explosive secret, and falls for a beautiful marine biologist who is at least as strong as he is. In the end, Tusker finds that the truth may lie at the bottom of the sea, with only one way back to the surface. Depth Charge is an old school thriller in the tradition of Fleming, Maclean, and Cussler, with an eye for detail, cunning villains, and narrow escapes. The story is full of wartime secrets, the intersection of religion and politics, and the arcane world of deep technical diving. It takes readers from the smoky halls of 1940s London to the volatile, seductive heat of Sri Lanka and sixty fathoms under the Indian Ocean.
The Noticer: Sometimes, All a Person Needs Is a Little Perspective
Andy Andrews - 2009
Consider even the simplest action you take, for your lives matter beyond measure…and they matter forever.”Jones speaks to that part in everyone that is yearning to understand why things happen and what we can do about it.Like The Traveler’s Gift, The Noticer is a unique narrative is a blend of fiction, allegory, and inspiration. Gifted storyteller Andy Andrews helps us see how becoming a “noticer” just might change a person’s life forever.
Crooked Lines
Holly Michael - 2014
Two cultures. Two souls seek hope and a future.On the shores of Lake Michigan, Rebecca Meyer seeks escape. Guilt-ridden over her little sister’s death, she sets her heart on India, a symbol of peace.Across the ocean in South India, Sagai Raj leaves his tranquil hill station home and impoverished family to answer a higher calling. Pushing through diverse cultural and religious milieus, he labors toward his goals, while wrong turns and bad choices block Rebecca from hers.Traveling similar paths and bridged across oceans through a priest, the two desire peace and their divine destiny. But vows and blind obedience at all costs must be weighed…And buried memories, unearthed.Crooked Lines, a beautifully crafted debut novel, threads the lives of two determined souls from different continents and cultures. Compelling characters struggle with spirituality through despair and deceptions in search of truth.
The Maid's Version
Daniel Woodrell - 2013
Her husband is mostly absent, and, in 1929, her scandalous, beloved younger sister is one of the 42 killed in an explosion at the local dance hall. Who is to blame? Mobsters from St. Louis? The embittered local gypsies? The preacher who railed against the loose morals of the waltzing couples? Or could it have been a colossal accident? Alma thinks she knows the answer—and that its roots lie in a dangerous love affair. Her dogged pursuit of justice makes her an outcast and causes a long-standing rift with her own son. By telling her story to her grandson, she finally gains some solace—and peace for her sister. He is advised to "Tell it. Go on and tell it"—tell the story of his family's struggles, suspicions, secrets, and triumphs.
Damascus
Christos Tsiolkas - 2019
They bugger children in front of their mothers and violate men in front of their wives. The temple priests flay us openly in the streets. We are hunted everywhere and we are hunted by everyone ...We are despised, yet we grow. We are tortured and crucified and yet we flourish. We are hated and still we multiply. Why is that? You have to wonder, how is it that we not only survive but we grow stronger?'Christos Tsiolkas' stunning new novel Damascus is a work of soaring ambition and achievement, of immense power and epic scope, taking as its subject nothing less than events surrounding the birth and establishment of the Christian church. Based around the gospels and letters of St Paul, and focusing on characters one and two generations on from the death of Christ, as well as Paul (Saul) himself, Damascus nevertheless explores the themes that have always obsessed Tsiolkas as a writer: class, religion, masculinity, patriarchy, colonisation, exile; the ways in which nations, societies, communities, families and individuals are united and divided - it's all here, the contemporary and urgent questions, perennial concerns made vivid and visceral. In Damascus, Tsiolkas has written a masterpiece of imagination and transformation: an historical novel of immense power and an unflinching dissection of doubt and faith, tyranny and revolution, and cruelty and sacrifice.
Becoming Reverend: A diary
Matt Woodcock - 2016
Obviously. Matt Woodcock's frank, funny real-life diaries reveal what it was like for him to train as a vicar while struggling against all odds to become a father. In them he lays bare his joys and struggles as he attempts to reconcile his calling as a vicar with his life as a party-loving journalist, footie-freak and incorrigible extrovert. Becoming Reverend is a compelling and original account of how faith can work in the midst of a messy life, combining family, fertility, faith and friendship with the story of a divine - but unlikely - calling.
The Book of Strange New Things
Michel Faber - 2014
Peter becomes immersed in the mysteries of an astonishing new environment, overseen by an enigmatic corporation known only as USIC. His work introduces him to a seemingly friendly native population struggling with a dangerous illness and hungry for Peter's teachings—his Bible is their "book of strange new things." But Peter is rattled when Bea's letters from home become increasingly desperate: typhoons and earthquakes are devastating whole countries, and governments are crumbling. Bea's faith, once the guiding light of their lives, begins to falter. Suddenly, a separation measured by an otherworldly distance, and defined both by one newly discovered world and another in a state of collapse, is threatened by an ever-widening gulf that is much less quantifiable. While Peter is reconciling the needs of his congregation with the desires of his strange employer, Bea is struggling for survival. Their trials lay bare a profound meditation on faith, love tested beyond endurance, and our responsibility to those closest to us. Marked by the same bravura storytelling and precise language that made The Crimson Petal and the White such an international success, The Book of Strange New Things is extraordinary, mesmerizing, and replete with emotional complexity and genuine pathos.
Out of Egypt
Anne Rice - 2005
As they travel, the boy tries to unlock the secret of his birth and comprehend his terrifying power to work miracles. Anne Rice's dazzling, kaleidoscopic novel, based on the gospels and the most respected New Testament scholarship, summons up the voice, the presence, and the words of Jesus, allowing him to tell his own story as he struggles to grasp the holy purpose of his life.INCLUDES A NEW INTRODUCTION AND A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR