Two Short Books

I polished off two wonderful books today:

Seaside, a novella by Terri Blackstock, is a beautifully written story of a mother who takes her two adult daughters on a week-long vacation in order to share some final memories and impart some important truths about life before she dies from cancer. The book is full of quality spiritual truths, questions, and observations without being cheesy. Thankfully, the author does not sacrifice quality of writing or the beauty of the tale in order to share the moral of the story as some Christian novels tend to do. To her credit, Blackstock isn't afraid to show the flawed side of these Christian women, and she does so without making them into characatures. The women in the story are believable, and the scenery and story came across so real that I could see the whole thing in my mind as if it were a movie. A lovely short book that I heartily recommend.

Heartbeat, by Sharon Creech, is similar in length to Seaside, but was even quicker to read because of it's unusual style. The entire book is written in poetry form, from the perspective of 12-year-old Annie. Annie writes about so many wonderful thoughts and things going on in her life: Her special friend Max, her love of running for the sake of running, the baby that her Mom is expecting, her aging Grandfather that is getting forgetful, her dreams, her art, being true to herself, and more. Although Max sees their small town as always the same, Annie sees it as always changing. Everyone, everything, always growing and moving and changing in so many different ways.

Here is one of my favorite excerpts:

In my parents' room
I lift the miniature white t-shirt
from the basket that holds
a few little things for the baby.

The shirt seems infinitely small
too small for any living person
and I wonder if the alien baby
can think now
and if it can think
what does it think?

And what did I think
when I was small
and why did I forget?

And what else will I forget
when I grow older?

And if you forget
is it as if
it never happened?

Will none of the things
you saw or thought or dreamed
matter?


It would be hard for me to describe all the feelings I had while reading this book. I was stricken by the poignancy of it. The profound-but-simple thoughts that Annie shares are pure gold. It made me smile, made me nod in agreement, made me cry....and made me very glad I read it. Check it out.