The first is The Choice–Embrace the Possible. It is a memoir of parts of Dr. Eger’s life. She survived the Holocaust and time in the camps. Her father, mother, Eva and her sister were taken and she and her sister survived. 

But this is primarily a survival story with ways to apply it to your own life. She made a new life for herself in this country, worked to get a Ph.D and set up a practice and to help other people heal from all kinds of trauma.

At one point she writes: When we grieve, it’s not just over what happened–we grieve for what didn’t happen.

Her other book is titled The Gift–12 Lessons to Save Your Life. This is a shorter book and focused on the lessons she and all of us can learn. At the end of each chapter in this book there is a page of bullet points for that chapter’s particular focus. I am still reading them over one at a time just to check out where I am and how I’m doing.

The Choice is hard and inspiring reading. And The Gift is an extremely helpful I read. I recommend reading both.

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I think my favorite one was Reason for Hope by Jane Goodall. It was her account of becoming involved with chimps and of establishing Gombe, and led me through her journey to helping others see that everything is connected. On her website, www.janegoodall.org the statistic is pointed out that in 1900 it is estimated that one million chimpanzees lived in the wild, and that today there are as few as 340,000.

One of the children’s books which was gentle and beautifully illustrated was A Different Pond by Bao Phi—about a Vietnamese father and his son as they go fishing each morning.

A disturbing book was Caste—The Origins of Our Discontent by Isabel Wilkerson. This was about the caste system in the U.S. and was an eye-opener to me. One of my book groups discussed it and it was good to have a group.

Two books filled my need for historical fiction, The Atomic City Girls by Janet Beard; and The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict.

Lenten Lands by Douglas H. Gresham was satisfying. Last year I read C. S. Lewis’ book, A Grief Observed. Douglas Gresham was Joy’s son from her first marriage and it was somehow settling to fit his perspective into this part of their joint lives through his eye-witness account of Lewis and his mother, Joy Davidman.

And the last book I’d mention for January is This Is My Story, This Is My Song by Jerome Hines. I am not a fan of opera but I read about Hines in a book by Madeleine L’Engle and it led me to his autobiography (short, very readable book). He told of his daily relationship with God and his asking for and receiving guidance directly.

What a varied bunch of books for one month.

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