Wow!  I can't believe it has been almost a year since I have written anything in this blog.  To be honest, for the first time in my life,  I have had a hard time reading.  There has been some stress, blah, blah, blah no one wants to hear about that, but I have been feeling like I need to be on "high alert" and wasn't really able to concentrate. Perhaps I was afraid of the appeal of disappearing into a story...way too easy to want to stay.

Anyway I read bits and pieces of some wonderful books for book club in the last year which I will finish (I swear) but my kids gift to me on Mother's Day was uninterrupted time to read. (Which means they all had to work so I got to spend the weekend with my nose in a book.)

I read the Tent City series by Kelly Van Hull.  It is set in a dystopian America  (possibly "post- apocalyptic, I'm never sure if it has to be one or the other but saying both just seems too depressing.)

Tent City has a strong heroine which seems to be so popular right now. I ALWAYS want my book club to read these novels because there is so much to discuss. I'm sure they groan when they see I've read another.  But, when the laws of order have been altered or ended it always brings up alluring topics for discussion.  What saves this from being another version of Hunger Games, or Divergent , is a captivating thread in the story which follows the Biblical plagues of Exodus.  While not written to be a theology book there are  meaningful theological inquests in which one could delve, or what we would call in the church world, "catechisma."

Dani the main character finds strength she didn't know she had and develops skills she would have thought herself incapable of at the beginning of the story.  Like all great adventures, parents have to stay out of the picture. In the words of my friend Lisa "No one can have a righteous adventure with their mama hanging around making all the decisions!"  (cue Disney)

Kelly Van Hull is a mother of five and miraculously finds time to write, and I'm so happy she does.