I’ll be honest: when I was in school, I hated to read. I guess it was because so much of our reading was what we were required (forced) to read, and I didn’t find much of it all that interesting. Rarely did I find time to read anything that I really enjoyed (except for Beckett Baseball Card Magazine when I was a kid). Now, though, I read constantly. From books to blogs, from websites to bulletins, I am constantly reading. Also, I have started trying to encourage others to read, and to read things of different lengths. It’s fine to read blogs (especially this one!), but you also need to…

Raising Real Men Hal and Melanie Young $15.00 (paperback) / $9.99 (Kindle) I was honored to be contacted by the Youngs and asked if I would review their book. It has been a joy to read. Raising Real Men is a highly practical book, showing how this family is raising six sons (and one daughter, poor girl!). The Youngs regularly present some of this material in seminar/workshop form, but the book is well-done and easy to read. One of the aspects I appreciated the most in this volume is the emphasis on true masculinity as God defines it, not as the world defines it. The boys are taught to be mannerly,…

Ronnie Floyd’s latest book, Our Last Great Hope, is meant to awaken within evangelical Christians the need and necessity for fulfilling the Great Commission. Floyd served for one year as the head of a group within the Southern Baptist Convention that was charged with studying world situations and how best to approach taking the Gospel to the entire world. He wrote this book, not so much as a “report” from that committee, but from his heart that was awakened by seeing the situation. Of course, there are some statements in the book that deal with doctrines that are false, but this book still needs to be read. As I read…

Written by Bob Waliszewski, Plugged in Parenting is designed to help parents in the digital age. Though backed with numerous statistics and examples, the book is still easy to read and is a quick read. One of the positives of this book is that it doesn’t just present “troubles,” but shares with parents tools to help them equip their children to use technology both for information and entertainment. As one might expect, though, the book quickly points out many of the struggles parents face with the complete glut of technology in our children’s world. As a reader might expect, the book mentions the website PluggedIn.com quite often, at times too much.…

Jennifer Grant’s story of international adoption was intriguing to me. As a parent of an adopted child, I love reading other adoption stories. This book did not disappoint. However, since our adoption was from within the United States, reading about an international adoption added to our knowledge of the subject. Love You More is written by an obviously gifted writer, and the book truly shares the heart of one who wanted to adopt, but had to go through many of the usual “hoops” of an international adoption. The daughter they adopted, Mia, is from Guatemala, a nation that made adoptions quite difficult while Grant and her husband were trying to finish…