Sunday, December 19, 2010

Gray Matter by David Levy, MD

Tyndale Media recently sent me an Advance Reader Copy of this book.  I found it fascinating.  Dr. Levy talks about how he started to pray with his patients and the results that he saw from this.  I believe in the power of prayer, and it is wonderful to see a book that tries to portray the wonderful things that can happen with prayer.  We learn about many patients that Dr. Levy has treated and how he has helped their lives.  He doesn't only treat the physical problems of the patients, but he also tries to treat the emotional and spiritual problems as well.  I like that he talks about the surgerys that don't work as well as the surgerys that do.  He shares the struggles that he has and the conclusions that he comes to when things don't work out as expected.  I also found the descriptions of the problems that he treated very interesting.  He keeps it at a low enough level that anyone can follow along.  All in all, I thought that it was a very interesting, insightful book.

Monday, December 6, 2010

A Time to Dance by Karen Kingsbury

I received a complimentary copy of this book through Thomas Nielsons BookSneeze program. Overall I enjoyed the book, but it also had some drawbacks. It is the story of a couple that have been married for over twenty years and have grown apart. They still love each other, but don't know how to come back together. The idea was interesting, and I enjoyed the characters. I felt like the author kept saying over and over how they still loved each other, but it was to late. Several times the husband and wife make it clear that they don't really want to get divorced, but they have already made the decision to do it, and feel like they can't change their minds. It seemed forced. If they really loved each other as much as implied, then they wouldn't have made the decision to divorce in the first place, and if they had then they would be able to take the steps to change their situation. I enjoyed the book, but felt like parts of it were contrived. I would give it a 3 out of 5.