Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed

Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves, and so I chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told. 

- Cheryl Strayed in "Wild"  

Yes, I know this is the first book in Oprah's Book Club 2.0 but thankfully I had already put the book on my library request list before Oprah's big announcement based on again a Twitter recommendation. I follow a bunch of book lovers on Twitter, but very different kinds of readers, so I have an eclectic wish list on Amazon of books I saw on Twitter.

This book was a stretch for me based on the subtitle - "Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail" by Cheryl Strayed. I am not an outdoorsy type of person. I have not camped since I was last forced to as a child, though I do have fond memories of camping with my family when I was young. I have occasionally hiked but I never with a backpack and never where I might have to actually use the woods as my bathroom. This book has all that, in vivid, engrossing detail. Lengthy passages of fauna and trails crossed by wild animals and restorative showers at base camps along the way.

But this book has more - it has the back story so beautifully interwoven that you can't stop reading. I found myself horrified by Cheryl's choices and understanding them all at the same time. I loved watching her adventure from the safety of my patio chair, though her writing was so perfectly paced that I often found myself breathing fast and then relaxing into the days of hiking. This is the story of a real person, this is her story, but she feels full in my mind after reading "Wild". I was broken by the end in the most delicious way, tears on the edges of my eyes.

Most of this book was a peak into a world that entices me but honestly, I know I will never encounter.   It was fascinating reading about a different world, different norms, a wholly foreign place even though I have lived only a couple hours from the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) most of my life. But there were also parts that tore deep, stories that I knew from my own life.

I loved this book. I know why Oprah chose it for it is the story of a woman who is broken and strong, alone and part of a community, hopeless and hopeful.

From My Other Blog - Evolving in Monkey Town by Rachel Held Evans

Before I started reviewing books at this blog, I often discussed what I read at my other blog Finding Fruit. Books are a large part of how I learn and grow and experience the world. Rachel Held Evans' book "Evolving in Monkey Town" was the first book I read by someone who had grown up in the church who was now asking questions about what she had been taught to believe. I don't want to give away too much but Rachel has an amazing blog where she writes about faith and life and declares herself a skeptic, a creative, and a follower of Jesus.

Read my post about her book here.

The Bungalow by Sarah Jio

This is another book recommendation from Twitter though I am not sure if it was someone reading it or if it was on a list of summer reads. And again Twitter was right. This was a good read.

As the back blurb states, The Bungalow by Sarah Jio is "A Sweeping World War II saga of thwarted love, murder, and a long-lost painting."

This is entertainment fiction well done. I say entertainment fiction because I just finished reading Judith Hougen's blog "Art and Entertainment: A Final Word on Sentimentality with Bonus True Confession" where she quotes Makoto Fujimura speaking at an International Arts Movement conference:

Entertainment gives you a predictable pleasure. Art…leads to transformation. It awakens you, rather than just satisfying a craving. We need the arts to awaken us to the realities of the Kingdom of God.

The writing was interesting. Bora Bora came alive with hibiscus, sand, and heat. The story moved quickly and kept you engaged. It may not have transformed how I think about art but it did help me imagine the world through the eyes of a nurse serving in the Pacific during World War II. I enjoyed reading the book by the pool during swim lessons and on the back patio in the sun and in bed as I tried to finish the last few pages before I turned off the light.

The only thing that I did not enjoy about the book was the Prologue. Not because it was not interesting or well written but because I don't enjoy prologues. I end up spending the whole book wondering how she is going to tie it all back to the prologue and missing some of the joy of not knowing how it will end.

I know that prologues don't give everything away and often try to surprise the reader but I still end up spending a lot of my reading through the lens of the prologue instead of just letting the story unfold. But that may just be me and my brain. If there is a puzzle before me I need to solve it and I can miss the beauty of the pieces and the whole as I try to make it all fit together.

Maybe I just need to skip the prologues from now on because if I had not read it first, I think I would have enjoyed this book even more.