Sometimes I get a little bummed when I read titles that just leave me feeling "meh." I have read so many wonderful books, but they're always interspersed with books that aren't necessarily terrible (I don't bother finishing those anyway) but they don't sweep me away or leave a lasting impression. I was feeling a little parched for the past few months in the Amazing Book Department until I read Gilead.
I've had this book for many years, and I started to read it once. I stopped myself and I recognized that it would be much more meaningful to me if I read it once I had children. The novel is written journal-style by a dying Iowa pastor named John Ames to his young son. It is so astonishingly beautiful in parts that it literally took my breath away. I was only a few pages in when I wanted to start underlining.
The thing I love most about this book is that it talks about spiritual things and Christianity in particular without being preachy or sentimental. It is a profound reflection on a life well-lived. Such wisdom in its pages. This is one book I know I will be able to reread at different points in my life and get something new out of it every time.
Just one lovely quote to entice you...
“I’m writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you’ve done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God’s grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem to you to be no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. If only I had the words to tell you.”
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