Category: Book review

Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan has exploded on the scene as the #1 bestseller on several lists and become a media feast. This book suggests that Jesus was just a failed revolutionary and that the apostle Paul should be credited with making him into “Christ.” This is not news on several levels.
Continue reading “News Flash! Zealot Isn’t News”

Why are some academics so addicted to bad writing? Why do they churn out passive verbs like promises from a politician? Why do they multiply abstract nouns like mosquitoes in summer? Why can’t they escape from the jungle of jargon? And maybe most important, why can’t they be funny?
Continue reading “Stylish Academic Writing 3: Why So Bad?”

Is my writing flabby or fit? Am I a lean, mean writing machine, or have I invaded heart attack territory? I went to Helen Sword’s WritersDiet Test to find out. And find out I did.
Continue reading “Stylish Academic Writing 2: WritersDiet Test”

More and more I am convinced that the doorway into understanding the New Testament is the Old Testament. It’s not a new idea. I think Jesus had something to do with it. But it’s one of the reasons we made this a major feature in our recently released LifeGuide in Depth series, including A Deeper Look at James, that my wife, Phyllis, and I wrote. An example can illustrate the point.
Continue reading “The Wisdom of Solomon”

In an era of extreme, vitriolic rhetoric, when someone offers calm, straightforward fairness, it is like a cool, refreshing breeze on a hot, muggy day. That is what Gerald Rau provides in Mapping the Origins Debate on the very contentious issue of evolution and creation. He offers a model not only of clarity in thought but of civility in presentation.
Continue reading “Mapping the Origins Debate”

Writers and publishers have always had a love-hate relationship. Mark Twain once offered “the perfect recipe for a modern American publisher” as follows: “Take an idiot from a lunatic asylum and marry him to an idiot woman and the fourth generation of this connection should be a good publisher.”*
Continue reading “Good Prose 3: The Business of Writing”

For thirty-five years I’ve been recommending William Zinsser’s On Writing Wel. It is the essential book on the craft, especially for new writers. Zinsser zeroes in on all the myths, bad habits and misunderstandings people have when they start writing.
Continue reading “Cut the Clutter”

With the release of the movie version of the musical Les Misérables, friends and foes alike have debated its merits, demerits–loving it and hating it for being and not being faithful to the original stage production. Here’s an excerpt from A Deeper Look at James, forthcoming from IVP this spring and from my wife, Phyllis, and me, that considers what’s behind both versions of Victor Hugo’s famed book.
Continue reading “Les Misérables You Never Knew”

Before we get to the winners of the 2013 Andys (gotta build a little suspense), let me offer an overview of what I read this year. Of the twenty-four books listed, five were fiction, two were business books, six were audio books and eight were narrative non-fiction.

Anything new in my reading habits this year? Yes, a couple things. The list included the first ebook I read on my Kindle given to me last Christmas. And there were two self-published books in the list. Both suggest I am part of key trends–and I do love to be trendy.

But now, to the winners, with my own incisive and hyper-witty Synop-Tweet (a tweet-sized synopsis) of each:
Continue reading “The 2013 Andys”