Choose Life
Simon Guillebaud (Monarch, 2014)
For 2022, I’m re-reading this book of daily reflections. It seems perfect for me right now, as Simon Guillebaud seems to be speaking right into the issues I’m dealing with. I whizzed through the book last summer for the Woman Alive book bingo challenge, but now I’m reading it through properly and slowly. Again, I’ve been hooked from the start even though it is my second time through.
Christine Christian
Hope is Coming
Louise Blyth (Yellow Kite, 2021)
I can highly recommend reading this beautiful, honest, thought-provoking book; it’s a very powerful, inspiring and uplifting true story amidst deep grief and suffering. I couldn’t put the book down; I was totally gripped from start to finish.
What I was most moved by was Louise’s personal testimony. She was totally honest about how God came into her life during the tragic time of facing the news about her husband’s cancer diagnosis and his sad passing. God’s grace, peace and provision was there in abundance through it all. This book will make you laugh, cry and sob with sadness, experience joy and yet have so much hope too.
I give this book five stars and thank God for showing himself through others to Louise, George and all the family.
Elizabeth Neal-Alcock
In Search of Julian of Norwich
Sheila Upjohn (DLT, 1989)
I think a few people who are part of the Woman Alive Book Club are fans of Julian of Norwich (I know Amy is). For those, like me, who have heard about her a lot but don’t really know who she was, I can recommend this book. It’s is an excellent brief introduction to the 14th-century mystic. At just 94 pages long, it is readable and even witty, but also scholarly. The author does a masterful job of covering lots of ground in just enough depth to feel thorough without being tedious. Highly recommended.
Note that the book was published in 1989, so you may need to look for a secondhand copy. My mum found my copy in a Christian secondhand bookshop.
Jennie Pollock
The Other Side of the Wall
Munther Isaac (IVP, 2020)
This was one of the best reads for me in 2021. Munther Isaac is a Palestinian pastor with a message that’s essen tial reading for Christians. We need to explore how we can help prevent the disappearance of Christians from the place where Jesus was born, as they live under what can be a brutal occupation.
Ruth Thomas
A Man Called Blessed
Ted Dekker and Bill Bright (Thomas Nelson, 2002)
What an amazing read! Although fictional it paints a very plausible (and somewhat frightening) picture of what might well happen should the Ark of the Covenant ever actually be discovered.
The implications for Jews, Muslims, Arabs, Israel, Syria and Egypt – in fact the whole world – are covered in this well thought out and thoroughly researched book. I loved the main characters and even those I didn’t much like helped me to understand better the conflict within the Middle East and on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.
The main thrust of the book, illustrated beautifully by Caleb – the man called Blessed – is that God’s power no longer lives within the Ark, but since the death and resurrection of Jesus, and the giving of his Holy Spirit, God’s presence and power dwells in all those who love and follow him.
What an amazing faith Caleb had. Oh to be more like Jesus. Read it and be encouraged.
Pauline Philp
Review and win!
Send us a short review of a book you’re reading and you could win a three-month subscription to Woman Alive (current subscribers will receive Amy’s recommendation: The BRF Book of 365 Bible Reflections). Send your review to Amy at Woman Alive at the address on page 4, e-mail womanalive@premier.org.uk, or post your review on the Facebook group: Woman Alive Book Club.
