Books I Read in July

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
I don't even want to describe what this book is about, because when it's written out, it sounds, well, odd, but here goes:  This is the story of a hermaphrodite.  A grown man looking back on his childhood as a girl.  Okay, now that that's out of the way, let me go on and say:  this was the most moving book.  Incredibly moving.  Because it's not just his childhood that Cal reflects on, but it's also the lives of two generations of his Greek family before him.  It's an exploration of family and personal history, and how these are intertwined, and how the actions of our parents and grandparents continue to affect us in the present day, and what that means for us.  Oh, and it's beautifully, beautifully written.  Loved it.  Incredible.  Read it.
P.S. Y'all, it won the Pulitzer.




Bad Girls of the Bible by Liz Curtis Higgs
I've been working through this book for the last couple of months with my Skype Bible Study girls.  Although I found the way Higgs writes her commentary to be a little too "look how funny and irreverent I am!", I did enjoy the book on the whole.  Some of the stories of these "bad" women I either hadn't heard or just plain didn't remember hearing if I had (Michal? Guys, David burned her bad and she wasn't so nice in return), and some were a nice refresher and excuse to dig deeper into them (Delilah, you minx).  It's comforting to read the stories and be given the proof right there in black and white of God's promise that we are covered by grace, no matter how bad we think we've behaved.





...and thus hopefully ends my book-reading drought!  Guys, these are the first two books I've finished since April!  I'm hopping back on the reading wagon.