The Law of Attraction isn’t biblical. It’s anti-biblical. It’s occultic, not Christian. It makes Jesus your life coach and God your loyal servant. But “believing in Jesus” is not a magic formula. And God isn’t your golden retriever.
Happy Lies, by Melissa Dougherty, p. 141
Lunes Latin: The Gauls are Metal
… oppida sua omnia, numero ad duodecim, vicos ad quadringentos, reliqua privata aedificia incendunt; frumentum omne, praeter quod secum portaturi erant, comburunt …
“All their towns, in number about twelve, and their villages, about four hundred, and the remaining private buildings, they burned. All their grain, except what was meant to be carried with them, they burned …”
… ut domum reditionis spe sublata paratiores ad omnia pericula subenda essent …
“… that they might be ready to undergo all dangers after destroying the hope of returning home.”
Yikes!
Taken from The Gallic Wars, trans. Franz Ruedele, pp. 12 – 13
Reminder: The Strange Land will be 99 cents on Kindle Tomorrow
Ope, that’s not the cover we went with! That was an earlier draft of the cover. I thought you would like to see it, though.
Here’s the official cover:
The Strange Land will be Book of the Day over at onlinebookclub.org, which I’m sure Scott Hughes (the onlinebookclub guy) would be delighted if you’d visit. Scott is on all the platforms.
In a former life, I reviewed books for onlinebookclub. Now that I’m an indie author myself, I’ve used this site to get reviews and promotions. Their reviewers are, on the whole, terrific people.
How do you promote your book on social media when you are not, yourself, on social media? That is a good question, Grasshopper. What is the sound of one hand clapping?
The Strange Land is a coming-of-age story set in ancient Beringia, among a small tribe destined to become the ancestors of the Native Americans. It focuses on a teenaged boy named Ikash, but you’ll find all kinds of drama, heartbreak, mysticism, and wilderness survival among its large ensemble cast. Some people’s favorite character is the bear. Get this thick, satisfying ramble through Ice-Age Asia and enjoy it over your summer vacation!
O.K., that is enough shameless self-promotion. Next week, I’ll go back to reviewing other people’s books, peering at other people’s ancient ruins, and ranting about their failure to define their terms. It’s going to be fun!
But thanks in advance to any of you who have gotten curious about, or helped me promote, The Strange Land.
Quote of the Week: Teenaged Hunter-Gatherer
Grandmother Zillah had apparently come by for a private word with Ikash’s father.
“Not forever, my son,” he heard her say. “Surely you and the boys can shift for yourselves for one winter.”
Ikash did not want to hear this conversation, but now he was trapped in the bunk while it was going on. He pulled a blanket over his head and tried to go back to sleep. He found his mind skipping over the actual content of his father’s words (this was a tactic that had often helped him to stay sane), but focusing in curiously on the words of Zillah. Had she really said something about Mother going away for the winter? Where could she possibly go?
He heard her say “You remember all the trouble that Ninna had,” and “Sari loves to cook.”
“She’ll bungle it up,” said his father. “She always does.”
“Always?” said Zillah. “No one is perfect, you know.”
“You were, Mother. I remember.”
“I had servants helping me, foolish boy! I had Shufer and Shulgi to help me clean and cook, and a whole farm to supply our house in the city.”
About half these words were unknown to Ikash. “Servants,” “city,” and even “farm” carried only the vaguest meanings in his mind.
The Strange Land, by me, p. 36
The Strange Land will be 99 cents on Kindle this Saturday
Lord willing an’ the creek don’t rise.
I agreed with onlinebookclub.org to make TSL Book of the Day on June 14, but only on the condition that it was free on Kindle. As of drafting this post, I’m still communicating with my publisher to make the durn thing free. As John Piper might say, Brothers, We Are Not Professionals. I’m certainly not. But, with plenty of prayer, I trust that TSL will be free on this Saturday and will of course, with plenty of prayer, rocket into the stratosphere due to large numbers of positive reviews.
Edit: 99 cents was the best I could do. I have made arrangements with onlinebookclub. It will be 99 cents.
The Strange Land is a family saga that takes place in Beringia, the vast plain that used to exist where the Bering Strait now is, in approximately 10,000 B.C. Please go out and get it, if that’s just what you were looking for in your summer reading! Thanks in advance.
I Got Nominated … Sort of
(Is the above really the latest Sunshine Blogger Award logo? Looks kinda messy.)
So, Bookstooge sort-of-nominated me for the Sunshine Blogger Award! Thank you, Bookstooge! I am so flattered. I think his exact words were, “If you’re reading this, consider yourself nominated, because it means you have a pulse.”
Rules For The Sunshine Blogger Award:
- Display the award’s official logo somewhere on your blog.
- Thank the person who nominated you.
- Provide a link to your nominator’s blog.
- Answer your nominators’ questions.
- Nominate up to 11 bloggers.
- Ask your nominees 11 questions.
- Notify your nominees by commenting on at least one of their blog posts.
Questions from Bookstooge:
- Why Would Anyone Consider Cereal to be Soup?
It’s because they are trying to categorize things according to algorithmic rules/decision trees instead of the way the human mind normally works, which is by constructing a schema for the thing in question and then eyeballing it.
With schemas, if the thing mostly resembles the schema, it is considered an instance of that thing, even if it misses checking some important boxes. And if it checks all the boxes but manifestly does NOT resemble the schema at all, then it’s not an instance of that thing.
Cereal is in the latter category. It’s an ungodly modern creation of Mr. Kellogg, who believed that eating meat was morally wrong as well as unhealthy, and sought to banish it from the breakfast table. And I say this as someone who very much likes breakfast cereal, particularly as an evening snack, even though I know it has wreaked havoc with my metabolism (see question #10).
2. Why Do You Blog?
I blog to get you interested in my books. Go buy ’em. BUT, warning, don’t buy the Kindle version of The Strange Land until the end of next week, when it will cost 99 cents because of a special promo.
3. How Do You Justify Your Existence? (I got that one from the Tales of the Black Widowers, good isn’t it?)
Yep, it’s a good one.
“So God created man. In the image of God created He him, male and female created He them. And He said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, the cattle and the creatures that move along the ground.'”
Edit: By quoting this passage, I am NOT asserting that the only justification for our life is to reproduce … i.e., that your life somehow has no meaning if you are not a parent. I happen to have been given three children, but that’s God’s gift to me, not mine to Him. No, the point of quoting this passage is this: I justify my existence because God made me. He made us. He wanted there to be people. He wanted us to exist as male and female. And, per the latter part of the passage, He wanted there to be a lot of us. If you exist and you are a human, He is happy about that.
4. How Do You Choose Who to Follow?
Unfortunately, I’m a lot like Trump in this way. If you say nice things to me, I like you and then I follow you.
An alternative route is that you posted something that really interested me. This usually means book reviews, discussion about writing, theology, ancient history, and sometimes art.
5. If John McClane and John Wick were tied on a railroad track and you could only set one of them free, which would you choose and why?
O.K., I had to duckduckgo him, but John McClane is the Bruce Willis character in Die Hard. I would save John McClane instead of John Wick for the following reasons:
- John Wick could definitely save himself.
- I only saw the first Die Hard, but in it, John McClane is a family man, whereas John Wick doesn’t even have a dog anymore.
- Once when we were in Indonesia, somebody swore that my husband looked exactly like Bruce Willis and now I can’t unsee it. That makes me think Bruce Willis is even more handsome.
6. In a game of Parcheesi, who would win, Spongebob Squarepants or the Doom Slayer?
I expect Spongebob to win in the same way that Bugs Bunny would.
7. Do you feel guilty about all of my oxygen that you are breathing?
Yes. My gosh, don’t remind me!
8. What is your favorite movie?
It’s a tie between The Princess Bride and a little hidden gem called Undercover Blues.
9. If you were going to be “accidentally but on purpose” killed tomorrow, how would you spend today?
I would write long letters to each of my children. If I had extra time, I’d move on to my husband, then other close family and friends.
I might try to transfer the rights to my books so they don’t go out of print, but I don’t think that could be done in one day. If you snooze, you lose, and I guess I snost and I lost.
10. Are mirrors Friend, or Foe?
Friend, but only in the sense of “faithful are the wounds of.”
11. If you could change ONE THING about your blog, what would it be?
Every single visit to my blog would result in a book purchase and then a breathless review on Amazon GO BUY MY BOOKS PEOPLE!
Ahem. I Nominate:
I nominate seven friends (the number of perfection!) plus Bookstooge cause I want to hear his answers too. And I nominate you, Reader, if you want to do it! After all, you are breathing! Which might provide the answer to my first question!
- Eustacia
- Fran
- Jacqui
- Diana
- Snapdragon
- The Orangutan Librarian
- Chris
- Bookstooge (It’s a boomerang tag!)
To Answer These Questions:
- What is the best gift God has given you?
- Without sharing details you don’t want to share, how did you come out of your darkest hour/day/year?
- What kind of biome would you most prefer to live in (one that can be inhabited by people)?
- In real life, how are your social skills (and do you have any tips for me haha)?
- What is your favorite genre of fiction?
- Do you ever read nonfiction and what makes you pick it up?
- Tell me one nice thing about your grandparents.
- If you could speak any language, ancient or modern, fluently besides your native one, which one would you choose?
- What are your feelings on the Harry Potter series?
- Do you have a favorite YouTuber/podcaster? What do they talk about? Now’s your chance to promote them!
- When did you first seriously consider the claims of Jesus of Nazareth? If you never have, would you do me a solid and consider doing so?
Unintentionally Hilarious Quote of the Week
Progressive Christianity is inherently always evolving and progressing. Please take these lightly but seriously.
ProgressiveChristianity.org, quoted in Happy Lies by Melissa Dougherty, p. 175
Words That Mean Things, Part I
- kill — This means to cause to die.
- murder — Murder has to have the following components: direct killing, of a human being, intentional, and unlawful. Therefore, the following things are not murder: Executing someone who has committed a capital crime (lawful). Killing an enemy soldier in war (lawful). Accidentally killing civilians in war (unintentional). Shooting in self-defense (unintentional, and in the case of a firefight, indirect). Killing an animal, even a highly sentient animal (not human). Being unable to provide prompt medical care for someone who is OD’ing while in your custody (not direct or intentional, and also not actually killing).
- genocide — direct, intentional, systematic killing of an entire ethnic group, with the express purpose of wiping them out. Not genocide: a war that has a devastating impact upon a particular ethnic group, unless all the abovementioned components of genocide are present. Invasion and conquest. Intermarriage. Taking captives. Poverty. Death of a culture because of any of these causes or because of urbanization. All of these are tragic things that have happened to many, many ethnic groups throughout history, but they are not genocide. Definitely not genocide: natural cultural change that happens because of the spread of an innovation like the written word, or a new religion.
The YA Maya-themed Adventure Series of My Dreams
We continue our journey through darkest Jen’s TBR Pile with this book, which I picked up in an Idaho Falls thrift store several years ago and has been waiting patiently, like a pyramid under jungle cover but more durable, to be excavated.
One week ago, Max Murphy’s biggest problem was deciding which pizza to order. Now he’s lost in the perilous rainforest and running for his life with Lola, a modern Maya girl. Their terrifying journey will take them into the heart of an ancient evil and awaken powers that have slept for a thousand years. For fate has delivered an epic challenge to this pampered city boy. From now on, only one thing is for sure: Max Murphy won’t be eating pizza again any time soon.
from the dust cover
This book is the perfect YA Maya adventure. It starts with Max in Boston. His parents are archaeologists. They have to be gone a lot for their work. Max believes they “care more about the Maya than about him,” and he has learned to leverage this guilt into all the video games and snacks, and other luxuries his heart desires. This beginning is presumably there to ease the book’s target audience (American teens) into the Mayan context without a steep learning curve. They aren’t just thrown in; they find out things as Max does.
“Did anyone ever tell you that you’re bossy?” said Max.
“Did anyone ever tell you that you’re lazy?” said Lola.
“Yes,” said Max proudly, “all the time.”
“In the rainforest, lazy boys get eaten by jaguars.”
p. 150
But the book doesn’t stay in boring Boston for long. By Chapter 2, Max is in the fictional country of San Xavier (based on Belize). There is an excellent description of a nightmarish 3rd-world backcountry bus ride, a chapter or two at Max’s estranged uncle’s mansion, and then, he’s off into the jungle.
Behold this perfect author photo. Apparently, Jon grew up in Central America. Note also that the endpapers have a map of San Xavier. The map includes the Monkey River, Villa Isabella (Max’s uncle’s estate), and the five pyramids of Maya cosmology. If a place appears on this map, be sure we will visit it, either in this book or in a sequel.
Middleworld is an excellent introduction to the Maya cosmology, which is incorporated into a very lively adventure. As Max and Lola visit the different pyramids, they discover the purposes of the still-preserved machines within them: controlling the weather, time, etc., and even opening portals to Xibalba, the Maya underworld, into which Max’s parents have disappeared when they jumped into a cenote.
The overall adventure story is a good blend of actual Maya mythology and fictional or fictionalized characters. Lord Six Rabbit, who comes into the story, is a fictional ancient Maya king. The gods and demons we encounter are taken from actual Maya myths. Friar Diego DeLanda, an actual historical person who burned the majority of the Maya codices, makes an appearance. And because the intricate Maya calendar played such a large role in their cosmology, so it does in the events of this book. An Appendix contains an explanation of the interlocking calendar cycles and of how to read Mayan date glyphs, which are quite complex. Other appendices show a diagram of the Mayan cosmos; how to read Mayan numbers; and a glossary of characters and terms which appear in the book. By the time a reader gets to the end of the book, he or she might be interested enough to actually read this material.
It’s clear that the authors love Mayan culture, but they don’t shy away from the fact that many things about it were horrifying. Most of the rituals described call for blood, but the archaeologists have figured out that the blood doesn’t necessarily have to be from a human sacrifice — or even, necessarily, human:
[The archaeologist] Hermanjilio sighed. “Give me a break, will you? I don’t think there’s a precise science to these rituals. As I understand it, they’re more about showing swagger and confidence than following any particular steps. The Maya gods are like children. They like costumes, special effects, and plenty of action. We just have to put on a good show.”
“So you’re going to bluff it?” said Max.
“In a manner of speaking.”
pp. 244 – 245
For example, here is an entry from the glossary:
LORDS OF DEATH: The Maya underworld, Xibalba, is ruled by the twelve Lords of Death. According to the POPOL VUH … their names are One Death, Seven Death, Scab Stripper, Blood Gatherer, Wing, Demon of Pus, Demon of Jaundice, Bone Scepter, Skull Scepter, Demon of Filth, Demon of Woe, and Packstrap [???]. They are usually depicted as skeletons or bloated corpses. It’s their job to inflict sickness, pain, starvation, fear, destitution, and death … Luckily for us, they’re usually far too busy gambling and playing childish pranks on each other to get much work done.
p. 371
Given that everything in the Maya cosmos is simultaneously gross, horrifying, and (at least in this book) funny, it’s not surprising that Max and Lola are able to convince the Lord Six Rabbit and his mother that their chicken is a fearsome beast much more dangerous than its size would predict.
“Now tell them the bad news,” sighed Lady Coco. “Tell them what we heard!”
“What? What was it?” asked the others anxiously.
“The Chee Ken of Death,” said Lord Six-Rabbit. “We did not see it, but we heard its infernal crowing. It seemed to come from behind the cooking hut. I doubt my sleeping draught will work on that scaly devil.”
“Don’t worry, Lord Six-Rabbit,” said Hermanjilio. “I believe I am more than a match for this Chee Ken.”
“Thou art truly a brave man, Lord Hermanjilio.”
pp. 285 – 286
This book, apparently the first in a series, strikes a good balance between a satisfying end to the adventure, and leaving some significant unfinished business open for later books. Near the end, Max strikes a deal with the Lords of Death in exchange for “a small favor” that they will ask of him in the future. That can’t be good.
My only complaint with this book is that there’s very little publication information on it. I can’t find the year it was published or the titles of the other books in the series. I guess I’ll have to go online to find out more. I will definitely seek to acquire the other Jaguar Stones books if the opportunity arises.
Edit: According to FictionDB, there are four books in the series:
- Middleworld (2010)
- The End of the World Club (2011)
- The River of No Return (2012)
- The Lost City (2015)
Elisabeth Elliot’s Boarding School: Wow.
Wow. I have never seen anything go from utopia to dystopia so quickly.
The DuBoses’ school had large, gracious bedrooms, an underground passageway, swimming pool, lake, stables, a bowling alley, laundry, tennis courts, and formal gardens. The public rooms were decorated with invaluable antiques from China. Students’ rooms had ruffled curtains and white bedspreads … which some students augmented with treasures from their homes on the mission field, such as tiger skins on the floor or African spears on the walls.
There were vespers (evening prayer services) every night, a private church service for the school on Sunday morning … The most select female students would be given the honor of hand washing Mrs. Dubose’s underwear and daunting array of girdles, as well as serving her breakfast every morning on a silver tray with a starched white linen placemat …
“We are hand-cutting diamonds,” Mrs. DuBose would explain. Relentless discipline, pressure, legalism, and social pain were evidently her tools for doing so. She would occasionally call errant students to her bedroom; the student would stand, head bowed, at the end of Mrs. DuBose’s big, white bed with its intricately carved eagle headboard. Reclining therein and attired in a pink satin bed jacket, Mrs. DuBose would review the student’s sins. The kids called these “White Eagle Sessions.” Years later, Betty would remember being so stressed during one of Mrs. DuBose’s little reviews that she peed herself.
Becoming Elisabeth Elliot, by Ellen Vaughn, pp. 33 – 35
Out of Babel Books 