Tortoise
Stew
by Patricia
Camburn Behnke
I met the author doing turtle patrol and managed to get my hands on a
copy. I love the author and I love the setting of this novel in northeast
Florida (High Springs/Gainesville area). A fun read with a lot to say
that does a good job of telling a little about the quirkiness of the area.
by Kim Stanley Robinson
I gobbled up this trilogy. It was a very powerful and thought provoking experience for me. Not that I wasn't already immersed in contemplation of potential impacts of global climate change, but Robinson was able to paint such a clear vision of possibly catastrophic things, while somehow leaving me optimistic that science just might help us out of this mess a little bit. It also caused me to think about how government surveillance programs might work.
by David Kundtz
Another book I keep returing to over and over again. This one for mini immersions to help me quiet my very noisy mind.
by Blair & Dawn Witherington
I love this book! I find myself returning to it again and again to understand things I see and experience on local beaches here. This book was a gift that I received in appreciation for my volunteering as an evaluator with the sea turtle patrol last year. As you might expect from the title the book is aimed at helping you undertand what you come across on the beach - not just the naturally occuring critters and such, but also the flotsam and jetsam. Lots of pictures! Very readable!
by Peter Alden, Rick Cech & Gil Nelson
The
Joy of Living: Unlocking the Secret & Science of Happiness
by Yongey
Mingyur Rinpoche
This book was tremendously heartening
to me. I checked it out from the library, but went and purchased a copy
for myself after I finished reading it for the first time. As I look for
a little guidance along my path this is a book I will return to many times.
Buddha
Volumes 4-8by Osamu Tezuka
by John Bowlby
by Arundhati Roy
by R.D. Laing
by Robert Thurman
So, I picked this one up shortly before I headed to Florida on vacation. I guess I'm a "Nihilistic Materialist" in Robert Thurman's mind. I haven't been much of one for the mysticism and post-this world beliefs of some. For instance, I'm inclined to ascribe some Buddhist belief in reincarnation to the sociological need of folks in Northern India to deal with their existential angst in a familiar way (Hindu) as they built Buddhism. I'm not generally closed to the idea of their being more to our existence than our breating in and out from birth to death. I just require more than some guys telling me there's more. That said, and even though the concept of reincarnation (Infinite Life) is central to Thurman's thesis, the book was probably the most profoundly influential reading I've done in the last few years. There was a certain synchronicity between my readings and things transpiring as I wandered about on vacation, not working, thinking, breathing, relaxing, enjoying, loving,....
by Osamu Tezuka
The story continues and I'm appreciative of both the story telling and the graphics. I'm wondering how much the fantastical nature of it is the creation of the author and how much is rooted in the beliefs of the time.
by Osamu Tezuka
The story continues and I'm appreciative of both the story telling and the graphics.
Finding
Our True Home
by Thich
Nhat Hanh
I've always recoiled a bit at
the use of the phrase Pure Land. There something about it that is a little
too much like heaven, or in the case of TNH's presentation it reminds
me of the Jehovah's Witness's promise of Heaven
on Earth. This book
helped me move beyond that misperception. Or maybe it helped me reconcile
the two things and move off my judgement, a bit.
by Osamu Tezuka
An interesting blending of this graphic artist's characters with a part of the Buddha story with which I was previously unfamiliar. I will very likely pick up the next volume when it's available in November 2003.
The
Story of B
by Daniel
Quinn
I just finished reading this
this morning, 5/25/03. This book continues with the message of Ishmael.
If I'm permitted to oversimplify a bit I'll try to summarize the message
in a sentence or two. Industrialization is a great experiment that is
failing humans who are engaged in the world culture that it is creating.
This failure will result in catostrophic collapse of culture and human
life as we know it. We should return to a greater awareness and live our
lives in greater accord with our animist (tribal) roots. I believe the
unabomber may have been inspired by Ishamel.
by Daniel Quinn
.
Teachings
on Love
by Thich
Nhat Hanh
I'm just beginning this book. Ji-Sing
taught from this book when I attended Q-Sangha
a couple of weeks ago.
The
Yoga of Breath: A Step-By-Step Guide to Pranayama
by Richard
Rosen
I'm just beginning this book. I picked this book in part due to some recent
focus on breathing
and breathwork.
So, I'm reading through the background information as I head towards the
practice portion of the book.
02/02/03
Taming
the Monkey Mind
by Thubten
Chodron
This book is an excellent Buddhist primer. A little too authoritarian
for me to completely embrace it, but great for understanding the basic
principles of Buddhism. I picked this book up at East
Wind Books in San Francisco. I was meeting a friend near by and stopped
in to enjoy a few moments before I headed over to meet my friend. I picked
up the book and it opened to a section of what to expect from a teacher.
One of my fave rants of late has been the corruption
of teachers and how one can follow a teacher or even a lineage that
has been transmitted from teachers who abused their power over others.
Thubten Chodron speaks unequivocally on this.
1/18/03
by Tim F. Lahaye and Larry B. Jenkins
The fourth in the rapture and post rapture Left Behind series. I've been finding these books somewhat engaging, though they stir deep fears in me about how they will be received by their fundamentalist target audience. It's clear that the authors have a big political agenda. They define every progressive thing that exists in our current society as being of satan/antichrist in their little world. Tolerance is a tool of Nicolae (The AntiChrist) to rob religion of its power. Tools of international cooperation, i.e., the United Nations, are the instruments by which Satan and the Antichrist attempt to work their evil on the world. People who represent anything other than a literalist/fundamentalist christian religious view are caricatured in shallow stereotypical terms that reminds me of the political cartoons of Nazi Germany.
2/18/01
by Tim F. Lahaye and Larry B. Jenkins
The third in the rapture and post rapture Left Behind series.
by Dainin Katagiri
"We have to see the positives and the negatives as clearly as we can, accept them, and then continue with our lives - learning from our mistakes, forgiving others, and supporting others so that we may all live in peace and harmony. This is the literal meaning of Dharma - to support or to uphold all beings. When Dharma works in the human world, it is called compassion sometimes, and it is called wisdom sometimes. So wisdom and compassion are one."
1/28/01
by Cecile Andrews
"The life of voluntary simplicity is a life lived consciously, a decision to live in harmony with life, to show reverence for life, to sustain life. It is a life of creativity and celebration, a life of community and participatory democracy, and a life in touch with nature and the universal life force. It is a life that has soul, it is a life that allows the individual's soul to awaken."
1/28/01
edited by Joan Nestle
1/28/01
by Dorothy Allison
"I wear my skin as thin as I have to, armor myself only as much as seems absolutely necessary. I try to live naked in the world, unashamed even under attack, unafraid even though I know how much there is to fear....Trying always to know what I am doing and why, choosing to be known as who I am...is as tricky as it ever was. I tell myself that life is the long struggle to understand and love fully. That to keep faith with those who have literally saved my life and made it possible for me to imagine more than survival, I have to try constantly to understand more, love more fully, go more naked in order to make others as safe as I myself want to be. I want to live past my own death, as my mother does, in what I have made possible for others - my sisters, my son, my lover, my community - the people I believe in absolutely, men and women whom death does not stop, who honor the truth of each other's stories."
1/28/01
by Charlotte Kasl, Ph.D.
1/28/01
by Laurie E. Rozakis, Ph.D.
I worry about someone authoring a Complete Idiot's Guide to anything that feels compelled to list their degree after their name. It seems to me to call into question her credibility. I'm currently focusing on the setting your rates section.
by Thich Nhat Hanh
I picked this one up the other day after finishing the Tribulation Force book. This is a spectacular back to basics of buddhism book. With lots of time on my hands this is just the tool I need to prompt mindful reflection and to help guide me in right action. It has had some influence on recent revisions to this web site.
by Linda O'Keefe
A coffee table book for those who use a coffee can as their coffee table. Lots of wonderful pictures of an incredible variety of shoes. A must have for every drag queen in the trailer park.
by Orland Outland
I enjoyed the first two in this series, so I figured this one would be fun. It was. I don't know if reading all these sequels is wearing on me though, this one didn't get me as excited as the first two, Death Wore a Smart Little Outfit and Death Wore a Fabulous New Fragrance. If Sherlock Holmes had been a transvestite, gay boy and Watson a disinherited, socialite, straight girl, this would have been their story. This one moves from the West Coast to New York City.
by Tim F. Lahaye and Larry B. Jenkins
The second in the series of rapture and post rapture fiction from "the Jesus is coming soon crowd." More of the same as in the first book. We do get to figure out who the anti-christ is in this one and watch how he uses bodies like the United Nations to prepare the world for his evil.
by Erik Marcus
I picked this book up recently when I felt like I needed a little inspiration toward more mindful eating and a little more language to be able to explain to family and friends why. This book isn't disappointing me in either regard. Covering issues of health, animal cruelty and social responsibility this book provides a comprehensive basis for understanding the significance of following a vegan diet.
by Tim F. Lahaye and Larry B. Jenkins
This the first in a series of rapture and post rapture fiction from "the Jesus is coming soon crowd." My mom encouraged me to read this one. (I think it's important for kids to keep up with what their parents are reading. Do you know what your mother is reading?!!!) This series is located on most of the bestseller list/shelves around North Florida book stores. I found it informative and engaging though somewhat predictable. Knowing other work of Mr. Lahaye, I'm sure that this is intended to recruit and bring people to Jesus. On the bright side for all you heathens (this would include you "Christians" who don't follow the right word) out there, after the rapture (when Jesus comes and grabs all his followers and the innocents) you'll get to see lots mayhem and chaos and evil during the 7 years of tribulation that follow and still have a chance at getting into heaven. I'm not too sure if I'll read any more in the series.
by Melissa Bank
Okay, my reading this book has several friends and family members watching me carefully. It's a novel. It's good. It's not some how to guide for silly little women who want to make their husbands happy by hunting and fishing with them. It is the wonderfully told story of a young woman coming of age in our society dealing with men, mom, dad and siblings. I passed this one on to my little sister when I finished it.
by Michele Serros
Okay, my reading lately has drifted toward work written by women about being women. My recent choice of reading probably should not be interpreted as reflecting any intention by me to project a more "feminine" persona in the world. Michele is funny, irreverent and Chicana in this fictional work. I wondered whether she writing about herself throughout the book, but adding what she would like to have done or said to the factual basis of her writing. If I were to write a book about myself, I'd like to be free to invent a little extra here and there. I loved this book.
by Joseph Glenmullen
I've taken Prozac on several occasions when I think it probably saved my life. I've struggled a good bit with depression, but I've also struggled a good bit with psychiatrists with a psychopharmacological bent who have wanted me to stay on Prozac or one of the other Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI) for the rest of my life. And who claim that there are no long term consequences to taking the drug other than improved mental health. Well, Dr. Glenmullen answers those psychopharmacologically inclined folks with examples of harm that has been done to people by the SSRIs. He advocates what I have advocated for myself all along. Take the drug when it is seriously needed, but avoid taking it for trivial matters and for long periods of time if possible. They mess with the chemistry in your brain and cause lots of nasty side effects. At least one similar drug, fen fen, has been shown to cause brain damage in lab rats.
by David Chadwick
Perhaps the most inspiring reading I've done recently. Reading this book it's hard not to become attached to the thoughtful, mindful, simple lifestyle that Shunryu Suzuki modeled here in the Bay Area for many years. Shunryu Suzuki played an instrumental role in bringing Zen Buddhism to the West. Any who practice Zen Buddhism in the West are likely practicing on his shoulders. This book carefully and graciously shows his example.
by Nell Bernstein
Nell Bernstein, with the support of the Pacific News Service, has put together a book that looks at the Foster Care system through the words of young people in it. Ms. Bernstein spent a year interviewing and surveying kids caught up in the Foster Care system and has turned those interviews into a powerful discussion of what what foster care is about in our society and how it impacts those it purports to help. I started doing social service work working with kids in the "juvenile justice system". It distresses me to read the young people saying the same things about our failed system 20 years and 3,000 miles later.
by Harry Crews
A collection of works by my favorite author. This book includes The Gypsy's Curse, Car and A Childhood: The Biography of a Place, as well as a couple of essays. If you're not familiar with Harry, he's hard to explain. The Gypsy's Curse and Car are two of my favorites of his. His writing has been labeled "Southern Gothic." But I'm not really sure what that means. He was influenced by Flannery O'Connor and Graham Greene. He writes with an edge, usually humorously pressed, that presents the grotesquely different as usual. His writing reflects my experience of life. Car is about a man who decides to eat a car on the showroom floor of a Jacksonville auto dealership. This is biting social commentary as the protagonist struggles to transcend the separation between himself and his car.
by Lewis Richmond
You'd think I'd have more to say about this book. I've turned to it several times during the last year or so to help me find my center at work. It's an excellent resource.
by Harry Crews
Duffy Deeter runs amuck in North Central Florida. I just finished rereading this one. It's definitely not his best and I don't quite buy his ending, but I love the book.
by Clark Strand
Talk about somebody either after my heart or feeding my dysfunction. This guy does it. This book should be called how to meditate and make the whole dogma, ceremony and mystique around it irrelevant.
by Malcolm Gladwell
I'm appreciating the premise of this book. It's an interesting book that is, unfortunately, perfect for co-optation, distortion and abuse by people with a variety of political interests. I've already encountered references to this work by those writing from all sides of the political spectrum
by Don Richard Riso with Russ Hudson
Okay, blame Hillary for this one. She brought it up in an e-mail and I thought it might be good time to revisit it. My last pass through this book was at Fran's urging while Bill and I were in couple's therapy. I took advantage of the Internet this time and found a couple of sites that administered tests to help place you into an appropriate type. Four out of five times I ended up a 4. (The fifth time I was a 5.) Anyway, I'm still slugging through all the stuff it has to say. I've been avoiding the description of an unhealthy 4 since I figure it will just piss me off if it's too on target.
Interviews Edited by Erik Bledsoe
Did I mention that I'm a fan of Harry Crews? In a fascinating, if sometimes repetitive, review of interviews with Harry Crews that have spanned his career, we get to see the author emerge as a potent literary force in contemporary American literature and we see him fall as both a writer and a human.
Diana St. Ruth
A very simple, overpriced, guide to meditation. It helps with the details of how to meditate with several different options and techniques that reflect my experience with Buddhist meditation. I like this book. It has helped me remember technique and tools I've learned and has provided a grounding point for me.