In the last decade, professional athletes and sports in general have taken debilitating blows to its character and integrity. Woefully gone are towering sports giants of not only legendary athleticism, but also worthy, decent lives. Though pro sports have always sported its share of “colorful banditos” – Babe Ruth, Wilt “the Stilt” Chamberlin, and many others – there was still an aura of comportment and decency clinging to these heroes that’s missing today.

With a media awash with stories of pampered, selfish, and cruel athletes guilty of everything from physically assaulting fans to torturing illegal fighting dogs, young athletes and their mentors are in desperate need of positive role models. A collection of sports stories fitting this bill is the recently published anthology, All The Good In Sports, edited by veteran Sportswriter Mike Sandrolini.  While most headlines usually center around trades, front office disputes, championship predictions, and of course, everyone’s favorite – scandals – this collection offers stories of courage, determination, goodwill, and faith.

International fiction writer Karen Kingsbury caught the eye of USA Today on October 17, 2007, when it ran a lengthy feature on the prolific novelist.  Kingsbury's novel Just Beyond the Clouds ranked No. 17 on The New York Times best-seller list for paperback grade fiction for Oct. 7.  Her Summer ranked 15th the previous week.

 

She calls her books "life-changing fiction."  It certainly has changed her life.  A former reporter, Kingsbury, 44, now has 6 million copies of her books in print.  She sold 2 million copies in 2007, making 25 cents to $2 for each one sold, according to the article, written by Nancy Haught of the Religion News Service.

There's a dead man on the bus at Sushana River,

Where the cold air punishes you more than any fever,

Where the tundra feeds the miles

And the estate of imagination runs wild.

 

Those words were my introduction to the tragic story of Christopher McCandless, the young man from Washington, D.C. who walked into Alaska in 1992 to experience his "great Northern odyssey," never to walk out again.  

 

I was captivated by the song, called "Walk Into the Wild," by the folk duo Harrod & Funck, and I had to know the rest of the story.  It is chronicled in Jon Krakauer's bestselling 1994 book, Into the Wild.  Recently, I re-read the book for the first time in five years.  This time, I am the age that McCandless was when he starved to death in Alaska, and I can't help but wonder: have I lived my life as honestly and fully as he did?

 

Also, how do you review such a meaningful book?  I don't want to be overly dramatic, but Chris McCandless affected a lot of people while he was alive.  After his death, the story of his life, as told by Krakauer, went on to affect many, many more.  I am just one of many people who took his story to heart.  It's hard not to.  Anyone who lives with that much enthusiasm is bound to have a big influence on the world, even by living such a quiet, unintrusive life.

Last Friday J. K. Rowling, author of the immensely popular Harry Potter series, revealed that the headmaster of her fictional school of witchcraft and wizardry,Albus Dumbledore, was gay. She made the revelation to fans in Carnegie Hall in New York in response to a question whether or not the aged wizard found "true love."  Rowling stated that Dumbledore had, in fact, been smitten with Gellert Grindelwald in his youth, a relationship that readers of the seventh book know did not end well.

Every month, someone at Infuze will write a review of one of their very favorite books.  Emily Zenker from the Books Department introduces this series with a review of one of her all-time favorites, Sophie's World by Jostein Garrder.

 
When Sophie Amundsen opens her mailbox one May afternoon, she discovers a cryptic, unmarked note. It reads: "Who are you?"  With that seemingly simple question, she begins a journey which challenges her understanding of life and her very existence.

Without explanation, young Sophie finds herself enrolled in a correspondence course with a mysterious philosopher who has taken it upon himself to shake up her complacent views of the universe. He anonymously begins sending her lessons in "handy-sized portions," every letter cheerfully introducing philosophical ideas like new friends.

You may have missed this gem of a book, but I'm here to tell you, you want to read it.

Same Kind of Different as Me was quietly published in June 2006. (Read: launched with little marketing support from the publisher.) It is a true story of how God drew two impossibly different men into an implausible friendship

Ron Hall was a good-ol'-boy Texan and nominal Christian who made a fortune as an international art dealer. Denver Moore was an illiterate homeless black man, a former modern-day slave from Louisiana.

Between them was Ron's wife, Deborah, an on-fire believer determined to help the downtrodden. She saw beyond Denver's street-honed hostility and decided God told her He had called Denver to change the city.

Same Kind of Different as Me is no sentimental do-gooder saga, though. Just how Denver's unlikely lofty calling is fulfilled will make you sit back and let out your breath. Wow.

First, a minor disclaimer: I am a part of the Lebowski Podcast , a monthly forum on The Big Lebowski and its many applications to life.  In other words, I'm a bit biased towards liking things about this movie.  That said, here's a review of the latest book about the film!

 

I was a latecomer to being a fan of The Big Lebowski.  In fact, a year ago, I was hardly even a fan.  I never made Lebowski jokes, and I rarely caught my husband's sly references to the movie.  I'd only seen it once or twice.

 

Things can sure change a lot in a year!  I am so glad that I was inducted into the world of Lebowski fandom before this book, I'm a Lebowski, You're a Lebowski, was released.  Now I get to really enjoy it!

 

 

The fuse is lit; the count-down begins. The combustible material-opposing Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious beliefs that mandate ownership of Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Fuse of Armageddon, by co-authors Sigmund Brouwer and Hank Hanegraaff, is unlike any end-times novel you've read. Fuse is a fast-paced, international political suspense shaped by the theology of radio's The Bible Answer Man, Hank Hanegraaff.  Don't go looking for drooling, sulfur-stinking Satanic beings in Fuse.  Evil in this novel is portrayed much more subtly as it influences human decisions based on human pride, just as it behaves in real life.  Fuse is terrifying because it's based on the realistic premise of what could happen if men driven by intemperate religious fervor seek to force God's hand to bring about Armageddon.

The internationally-popular Chronicles of Narnia series are being adapted to reach a new audience: the blind. The Missouri-based Center for the Blind is preparing a new edition of C.S. Lewis' seven-volume set, anticipating completion by July 1, 2008. The books have been produced in Braille before, but the upcoming releases include graphics that allow blind readers to "see" the story through tactile pictures.