Saturday, August 16, 2014

Manga and Philosophy:

Manga and Philosophy edited by: Josef Steiff and Adam Barkman
Non-fiction: Manga, Pop Culture, NYR 332 pages
Book Count: 36

Like other books in this series this book is a collection of essays on subjects relating to the title.  Some essays cover the world(s) made by a single manga artist. Some cover types of manga.  Some deal with themes in manga and how they relate to the culture and world that created them.  And some deal with other things that were in some ways connected with manga.  You start this book by reading a manga found in what would be the back of the book in American books, then you flip the book back over to read the essays.

Friday, August 15, 2014

Thoughts of the Cure D'Ars:

Thoughts of the Cure D'Ars By: St. John Vianney Compiled and Arranged by: W.M.B.
Non-fiction: Religion, NYR, 77 pages
Book Count: 35

This book is just a collection of short one the two line quotes from the various writings of St. John Vianney. The topics range from the love of God to not writing unnecessary letters to the editor.  And yes I did read this on the 4th.

Saturday, August 02, 2014

The Autobiography of St. Ignatius:

 The Autobiography of St. Ignatius by: St. Ignatius as dictated to Fr. Louis Gonzalez S.J.  ed. by J. F. X. O'Conor, S.J.
Non-fiction: Biography, religion, e-book

Yes, Br. Summit, I did read this a couple of days ago, why do you ask?

This book is a rather short history of the life of St. Ignatius.  It includes major dates and places in his life, but do not include a lot of details on his spiritual life.  It does include details on all the times he tried to get the Spanish Inquisition and other courts to formally charge him with being a heretic, but they kept dropping/ ignoring the charges that people had. (The idea being that if there was an official court ruling that his spiritual exercises were not heretical there would be less rumors being spread around.  But, the idea of someone constantly trying to get the attention of the Spanish Inquisition is just humorous to us.)  It also includes after the book information on the history of the Jesuits in higher education.  (Which was not at all biased like it was written by a bunch of Jesuits. . . pay no attention to all of the S.J.s after people's names on the top of this post.)

Friday, August 01, 2014

The Everyday Catholic's Guide to the Liturgy of the Hours:

The Everyday Catholic's Guide to the Liturgy of the Hours By: Daria Sockey
Non-fiction: religion, NYR 115 pages
Book Count: 34

This book goes over the basic things you need to know in order to pray the Liturgy of the Hours or the Divine Office.  (As for some reason both the book and digital forms of the breviary don't bother to include this information in them. The book forms even have other books to buy just to know where in the book you should be reading each day.)  It covers: what it is, why pray the hours, resources, a break down of the hours and seasons, and common issues and problems people have with this method of prayer.  As you can tell from the page count this book is a quick read, but it does a good job as a starting point and the listing of resources included is helpful for people that want more information.