Friday, May 20, 2011

A Reluctant Queen

Review by my wife:

I absolutely enjoyed this book. The author does take some creative license with the story, as she provides background and reasons for the actions and attitudes of the various characters; she creatively fills in historical gaps, rounding out the story and giving it greater depth.

The story of Esther is a beautiful one, and Joan Wolf did a wonderful job in telling it. While this book is a novel, and can't possibly accurately reflect the true story (seeing as the Bible recording only provides so much information), the message of the story comes across loud and clear - and that is what I found so appealing.

As the author says in the end, "Where the Bible story and the novel come together is in the underlying premise. God has a plan for the world, and He works His plan through the actions of humans. The big question is, will we allow God to work through us? God wants us to be His partners, but we have the free will to accept or refuse His challenge. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, all of God’s people must listen to His voice and open their hearts for Him to use us for His purposes."

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from Thomas Nelson Publishers through BookSneeze.com - their book review bloggers program. I wasn't required to post a positive review. These are my own opinions on this book.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Doing Virtuous Business

As I am building a small business, building on virtuous practices and Christian ethics is extremely important to me. I got this book, hoping that it would provide a comprehensive look at virtuous business practices - a guide book of sorts, that would offer insight into how to deal fairly and rightly in the business world.

Unfortunately, Malloch only rehashes the very basics of "doing good" in business - aimed mainly at large corporations. Now if only some CEOs of those large companies would pick this book up.

I can't really give a good recommendation on this book. It wasn't very helpful and didn't provide relevant information for anyone who already tries to uphold a moral standard in their life and business.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

How to Write a Book Proposal


It's long been a dream to become a published author, so I jumped at the chance to read this book by Michael Larsen. This book was a pretty easy read - straight forward and to the point without a lot of unnecessary information.

I'd recommend this book to anyone looking to become a professional writer as it not only contains helpful information on getting published, but also plenty that can be applied to writing in general.

Unfortunately, I'd only give this book three stars. The reason for this is that while it contains much helpful information, that same info can be found on many publishing websites for free.

If you want to avoid the time spent researching online, go ahead and get this book. However, if you want to save money, go ahead and spend a little time googling questions you have and you'll find many of the same answers that this book provides.