The Bullet That Missed (Thursday Murder Club, 3) Richard Osman. Penguin Books (ISBN: 9780593299418) 2022.
Summary: The Thursday Murder Club investigates the murder of a TV journalist while Elizabeth must kill an old spy friend.
Once again, the Thursday Murder Club are in deeper than they expected, and loving every minute of it. The four have decided to investigate the unsolved murder of Bethany Waites. Waite was a TV journalist investigating a VAT avoidance scheme and was about to break the story. The same night she had called Mike Waghorn, the news host, her car was found at the bottom of a cliff, with bloodstains that matched hers. Investigators find clothes but no body. It was assumed she had washed out to sea. The one woman who went to prison for the scheme said nothing.
Meanwhile, a man who calls himself the Viking abducts Stephen and Elizabeth. He gives Elizabeth a stark choice. Either kill an old KGB spy, Viktor Illyich, or the Viking will kill Joyce. As it turns out, Elizabeth and Viktor had gone from rivals to lovers, long before Stephen. Yet she takes Joyce along to Viktor’s suite to kill him, not having told Joyce about the Viking’s threat. But in reality, they feign his death and he joins the Club, both to catch the Viking and to work on the other murder.
The question is, why does the Viking want Viktor Illych dead? And who is he? It turns out Stephen supplies a key clue, in a moment of mental awareness, even as he gently and sadly declines into dementia, a decline that will hit Bogdan as hard as anyone.
Meanwhile, the Club is meeting all the people associated with Bethany Waites from Mike Waghorn, who wants her killer found, to Pauline, the make-up person, who falls in love with Ron, to a rival, Fiona Clemence, now a famous TV personality. They work with Chief Constable, Andrew Everton, and even enlist Connie, the drug dealer’s help, despite the fact that she intends to kill Ron and Bogdan.
Before they wrap things up, two more murders take place while Joyce faces a murderous Viking. And I will leave things there so you can have the same fun I did reading to the end!
Summary: Thirty-three creative, walking meditations integrating mind, body, and spirit to discern God’s direction in our lives.
Life includes many seasons of trying to find our way. Choosing colleges or other vocational training. Finding a life partner. Discerning our calling and how that might shape career and job choices. Raising children. Understanding spiritual gifts and how we may best serve in a community. Deciding on a career change or move. Facing loss and aging. Life never stops posing the two questions Deborah Gregory asks in this book: Who am I? Where am I going?
Spanish poet Antonio Machado said, “We make the way by walking.” In other words, life is a pilgrimage, and we discover the trail blazes or way markers of God as we walk. Deborah Gregory is a spiritual director who meditated on the Ignatian Exercises as she took long walks. That is, until she fractured her ankle on an uneven sidewalk. However, the time of healing also became the time of discovery out of which she wrote these meditations. For example, it led to a deeper realization of how embodied discernment can help one find their way. Not only that, she took a deep dive into the science of walking, discovering its benefits for our whole person.
Another shaping influence upon this book is her neurodivergent daughter Alina. Neurodivergent people often differently experience the world sensorily and cognitively and have a unique form of “embodied wisdom.” That phrase, embodied wisdom, reflects a key theme of this book–that God often encounters us, helps us understand ourselves, and our direction in life through our bodies.
After introducing these ideas, the remainder of the book consists of thirty-three “walking meditations” organized in six parts. The first three parts focus on the “Who am I?” question, developing our awareness of our senses, emotions, and thoughts. Then the second three parts focus on “where am I going?,” under headings of “spiritual orienteering,” exercising discernment,” and “the pilgrim’s way.”
Each walking meditation consist of a short reading explaining the idea behind the walk. Then, on a single page, Gregory offers a scripture on which to meditate, walking meditation directions for before and as you walk, and then a rest and reflection question.
But what makes this guide both fun and stretching are the variety of creative ways of walking it incorporates. For example, under sensory awareness, it includes a “forest bathing walk.” To encourage exploring our emotions it includes a “stomp walk” followed by a “yuck walking” experience. Then “pattern spotting” invites us to note the fractal-like patterns in nature and discern the patterns of God’s working. And she even invites us, as we are able, to walk barefoot. And so much more!
She also offers suggestions for using this book. Some will “thru-hike” working through all thirty-three walks. Others will use them on retreats or focus on specific exercises. Then they can also be used by spiritual directors or others as a resource for individuals or groups.
I loved several things about this guide. One is that I walk daily and this gave me some new things to try. In addition, I delighted in the fun and creative ideas, some inspired by her neurodivergent daughter. Also, I appreciated the deep grounding of the meditations in the Ignatian Exercises. Finally, I appreciated the scientific insights into the benefits of walking.
In the interest of full disclosure, I know the author from the time she lived in the same city as I do. She was in a book group I hosted and also offered great advice on using social media. But one of the unexpected surprises of the book was to discover in the acknowledgements that she also knew my son, who shared with her his lifelong love of and knowledge of fractals! What fun!
Often, we consider spiritual disciplines as something practiced in a closet or quiet room, or at a desk. Gregory helps those of us who tend to live in our heads connect our embodied experience in the world with discerning God’s leading. Because of that, this book makes a unique contribution in spiritual formation literature.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
The Divine Profile, David J. Claassen. Self-published (ASIN: B0FKZQ14Y4) 2025.
Summary: Thirty-one short reflections on the attributes of God, distilling deep theology into a succinct and accessible form.
“If I could preach or write on only one scriptural or theological topic it would be the attributes of God.”
With these words, David J. Claassen introduces this short book of thirty-one reflections on the attributes of God, that can be read over a month. The introduction of the first day is followed by reflections on twenty-nine attributes, one per day. Finally, the concluding day invites us to continue a journey that “will continue for all eternity.”
Over the twenty-nine days, Claassen reflects upon:
Each reflection is only a few pages in length, easily readable in ten minutes or less, concluding with a relevant verse of scripture. What Claassen seeks to do is distill heavy tomes of theology into a pithy, readable reflection. And he succeeds. Consider how much he captures in this brief paragraph on God’s self-sufficiency:
“One of the wonderful attributes of God is that He needs nothing from anyone. God is self-sufficient. He needs nothing found on earth, in the cosmos, or from us. God was complete in and off Himself before He made anything. He didn’t create all that he created out of some kind of personal need.”
It is obvious from those he cites that he has read those heavier works. As a skilled teacher, he articulates complex ideas in simple, but not simplistic terms. And he is theologically sound.
However, his aim is not to make us into nerdy theologians but to enlarge our minds and hearts with God’s awesomeness. At the conclusion of the first reflection, he offers six guidelines that are well worth following;
Read God’s attribute for the day.
Think and meditate on what you’ve read.
Pray, talking to God about this attribute of His.
Contemplate why this attribute of God is so amazing.
Consider how this attribute should impact your life.
Develop the holy habit of reminding yourself of this attribute throughout the day, or the next day if you’re reading The Divine Profile in the evening.
To sum up, the strength of this devotional is that Claassen centers on the knowledge that is important above all, the knowledge of God. Not only does he focus on the divine attributes in brief, daily reflections. He also achieves the “simplicity on the other side of complexity” in his reflections without ever dumbing down the content.
Furthermore, as a self-published work, it was available for a period for free on e-book and currently for $1.00 ($7.00 for paper). I consider it worth far more.
Worth Doing, W. David Buschart and Ryan Tafilowski. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514009482) 2025.
Summary: Addresses unrealistic theologies and ideas of work that do not reckon with our finitude and fallenness.
During seminary, I studied the theology of work. I remember discussions with a good friend who worked on an assembly line at an auto plant. When I talked of the dignity and intrinsic value of work, he wasn’t buying it. As it turns out, I was talking about the world of Genesis 1 and 2, where many of our theologies of work are based. He lived in Genesis 3. He found ways to serve God in his work, but not through the work itself. And he used his earnings to support family and church and pursue mission. But he wasn’t buying my talk of “dignity” and “intrinsic” worth.
Our conversation exemplifies the theme of this book. The authors of this work believe our theologies of work focus heavily on the creational intent of work. Even so, they ignore human finitude, something true of us prior to the fall. More egregiously, most treat lightly the effects of the fall on human work. Instead, we indulge sub-biblical slogans like “You are what you do” and “Do what you love.” We are far more than what we do, and many do not have the option of doing what we love, and none of us does that all the time in work we love.
First of all, they address the idea of creational finitude both more generally and then as it pertains to work. They discuss how finitude is a gift and not a limit and precedes the fall. In work, we are limited in both space and time, including the span of lives in which we work, or work for paid compensation. The chapter includes helpful insights on retirement, challenging the “Bible knows nothing of retirement” narrative.
Then, they turn to our fallenness. They focus on the phenomenology of sin, addressing the conditions it creates: absurdity, enmity, and tragedy. Then they show how this works out in the real world of work. They offer examples of the bad, absurd, enmitous, and even tragic work that is the lot of too many.
The final two chapter explore how we may constructively and realistically engage the world of work, reckoning with our finitude and fallenness. They call this a quotidian theology of work, a theology for the everyday, not the eschatologically ideal, whatever that is. Often, what we achieve in work is the “good enough,” what my friend Steve Garber, calls the proximate. They note how Paul speaks of work as simply a means of support, calling his own work “toil.” The authors also helpfully differentiate work and vocation, often collapsed into the same thing.
In addition, an appendix offers a helpful history of the faith and work movement, including many of the books I read on this over the years. They follow David Millers division of the movement into three waves: 1890-1940, the social gospel; 1946-1985, the rise of lay involvement and parachurch movements; 1985- present, the faith at work era, integrating faith and work. I found that a helpful framework.
More than that, I found the whole book helpful in addressing the lacuna in theologies of work, mine included. We address finitude in spiritual formation, but not in workplace theologies, where we live it out. And the discussion of the ways the fall manifests in work will hopefully prepare the rising generation not to be gob-smacked by the workplaces they encounter. Rather, it is hoped they might be better equipped to engage redemptively. This book is a refreshing, original contribution to the theology of work conversation!
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
I came up with this phrase in writing this article, but it turns out that it is a real “thing.” Google’s “AI Overview (!) defines it as “the mental, emotional, and operational exhaustion resulting from the rapid, relentless influx of AI tools, news, and pressure to adopt artificial intelligence in the workplace.” My search turned up pages of articles on the phenomenon.
Within this definition, I think I’m able to locate my own fatigue. For me, it is the relentless news and discussion of AI in the world of books. I receive numerous newsletters, and instead of writing about books and the world of reading, they are writing about AI–reviews written by AI, books written by AI, the fear that writers will be replaced by AI, and the difficulty of detecting AI usage unless human developers and publishers are transparent. And the big element is the theft of intellectual property underneath all this. The work of humans. It needs to be talked about.
We also need to come to some solutions. Rules, tracking, and appropriate compensation of intellectual property. Transparency about AI content and blacklisting and withholding of payments for deception. I’d like to see an emblem used indicating a book or other written content is 100% human.
So why do I press for this? Frankly, I’m tired of all the AI stories (even though I’m posting one this week). I’m eager for us to get back to talking about books. Many of us read to engage with another human. And we often talk with other humans about what we read. We like to hear authors read their works. The world of books and reading is actually a highly social world. I also think it would be helpful to make it an AI-free world. Wouldn’t it be great if the world of books and reading could serve as a retreat for the AI fatigued?
Five Articles Worth Reading
John Cheever is back in the news. His daughter Susan has published a new book exploring the relationship between Cheever’s fiction and his own life. Rands Richards Cooper reviews it in “The Father Behind the Fiction.”
Another name in the news is Lena Dunham. Actually, I knew nothing of her until I learned she is a leading voice of young adulthood in these times. I learned much more about her in Sophie Gilbert’s “What Does Lena Dunham Want to Tell Us?,” a review of Dunham’s new memoir, Famesick.
Speaking of names, Andrew Lawler asks “Who Is Blake Whiting?” “Blake Whiting,” for whom no biography or CV exists published thirteen books on complex historical subjects in one week. Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing publishes his work, yet they missed the lack of biography, and the fact that “Blake Whiting” exceeded their ten book a week limit. Of course, there is no Blake Whiting, but only Amazon knows who is behind this.
Another name I keep coming across is Iris Murdoch, novelist and philosopher. We often speak of “the good, the true, and the beautiful.” In “Iris Murdoch and the Metaphysics of the Good,” Matthew B. Crawford explores Murdoch’s thinking about “the good.”
Thornton Wilder, born on April 17, 1897, offers a watchword for all of us:
“Seek the lofty by reading, hearing and seeing great work at some moment every day.”
Miscellaneous Musings
We are grieving the passing of my wife’s lifelong friend. They met when my wife was three–sixty nine years ago. She was a dedicated educator and reading advocate, working in our state’s Reading Recovery program for many years and teaching the children of children she’d had in classes. She fed my son’s love of reading and writing. And she typified the very best of public school education.
I’ve come to the end of Deb Gregory’s Spiritual Wayfinding. I had the delightful experience of finding my son’s name in the acknowledgements for a lesson on fractals, one of his loves. Deb used to live in our home town, but I am really curious how they crossed paths. A bit of a wayfinding project in itself. By the way, if you like to walk and care about spiritual life, the book creatively combines the two!
Lastly, I bit the bullet and ordered a new Kindle after Amazon’s email (and had it sitting at my door 6:30 the next morning). I’ll still use my old one to read the many books already loaded on it as long as it works. But I decided to go that route to avoid juggling multiple e-book accounts and different platforms, and to be ready when my old Kindle finally bricks. I really like reading on e-readers versus phones or tablets–easier on the old eyes.
Next Week’s Reviews
Monday: W. David Buschart & Ryan Tafilowski, Worth Doing
Tuesday: David J. Claassen, The Divine Profile
Wednesday: Deborah Gregory, Spiritual Wayfinding
Thursday: Richard Osman, The Bullet That Missed
Friday: Tom Holland, Dominion
So, that’s The Weekly Wrap for April 12-18.
Find past editions of The Weekly Wrap under The Weekly Wrap heading on this page.
The Old Ball Game, Frank Deford. Grove Press (ISBN: 9780802142474) 2006.
Summary: A dual biography of John McGraw and Christy Mathewson of the New York Giants and their partnership in elevating the game.
Muggsy and Mattie. Those are the nicknames of the subjects of this dual biography of John McGraw and Christy Mathewson. Two men could not be more different. McGraw grew up in a hardscrabble Irish community and was a scrapper as ballplayer and manager. He fought with umpires, often getting ejected from games. Mathewson was the good looking, college-educated pitcher, the poster child for “muscular Christianity.” Surprisingly, they got along so well that they and their wives shared lodgings for many years. The secret, Frank Deford reveals, is that they loved the art and strategy of the game, and not just the physical athleticism.
In this work, veteran sportswriter Frank Deford combines a dual biography of the two men with a study of their unique partnership. Together, they elevated the New York Giants, and professional baseball, from mediocrity to greatness. They were a part of the transformation of baseball from poorly run teams of “ne’er do wells” to increasingly well-managed and more highly disciplined teams. This was accompanied by a move from ramshackle, small stadiums to modern concrete and steel ballparks able to accommodate the larger crowds the game attracted.
But it almost didn’t happen. Specifically, Mathewson signed for a mediocre Giants team under poor ownership. And McGraw loved his wife’s home of Baltimore, coming to manage the new Baltimore franchise in the American League. From 1900 to 1902, Matty showed only glimpses of future greatness, including a no-hitter in 1901. But McGraw was finding out he didn’t fit the manager mold of Ban Johnson, the organizer of the American League. So he was forced out in 1902. Then New York hired him, along with a pitching ace from Baltimore, “Iron Man” McGinnity.
By 1905, they won the pennant and agreed to play in the nascent World Series against the Philadelphia Athletics. While there had been a couple previous “inter-league series” this was the first to garner national attention. Deford takes us through game by game, chronicling the utter mastery of Mathewson over the A’s. He won three shutout games, with Iron Man winning the other in a five game series. McGraw’s Giants dominated.
However, they never repeated this success during Mathewson’s years despite a number of 30 game seasons for Mathewson and pennant wins. They missed out on one pennant due to a baserunning error at the end of a game that would have put the Giants in the Series. Although the winning run scored, the baserunner on first never tagged second base. The error was spotted, the ball thrown to second and the run nullified. While everyone on the Giants insisted he had tagged second, Mathewson stood out by saying he didn’t. Then in 1912, a dropped fly ball cost Matty a victory and the Giants a the Series.
McGraw was know as “The Little Napolean,” not only for his size but his tight control of how his team played. A mark of the confidence he had in Matty is that he was the only one permitted to call his own game, including positioning his fielders. He tried to keep his players sober by tight discipline, including some with drinking problems. Sadly, alcohol would contribute to his own ill health in later years. Players stopped listening to him. He finally hung it up in 1932, dying two years later.
However, tragedy came for Mathewson young. One brother died of tuberculosis, another took his own life. But Mattie kept winning over twenty games a year until 1914, after which his arm gave out. He won only a handful more, finishing with 373 wins. In 1916, McGraw helped Matty get a managing job in Cincinnati. But he wasn’t there long before going to war. He was never the same after, debilitated by gas exposure. His lungs weakened, he contracted tuberculosis. He returned to the Giants as a coach, recovered briefly in 1922, but worsened in 1924, dying the next year on October 7, at the end of the first game of the 1925 World Series.
Deford’s account focuses less on statistics than on the character and achievements of the two men. Together, they helped lift the Giants from mediocrity in 1902 to become a powerhouse team through the rest of the decade. They attracted record crowds to the re-built Polo Grounds. Mathewson defined the art of pitching with his consummate control. McGraw became the model of the tough guy manager, later exemplified by Earl Weaver, and Woody Hayes and Bobby Knight. All in all, it is a fascinating account–a good way to begin another season of baseball.
The Tech Coup, Marietje Schaake. Princeton University Press (ISBN: 9780691241197) 2025.
Summary: An expose’ of how tech companies have seized power from government and the danger this poses to the public interest.
At one point last year, big tech firms accounted for 40 percent of the gains in the U.S. stock market. In the last few years, over 150 data centers have popped up on rich farmland in Central Ohio. It seems most residents only woke up to the significance of this boom when they learned this would more than double power demands on our power grid, leading to rising costs for “infrastructure enhancement.” Much of this has been driven by the tremendous resource demands of Artificial Intelligence and cryptocurrency. And there are a number starting to ask how this high tech juggernaut has gained so much literal and cyber space in our culture. Increasingly, many realize a small number of huge tech firms are driving this tech revolution, wanted or not.
Marietje Schaake is a tech insider. As a member of the European Parliament between 2009 and 2019, she was part of an effort to establish guardrails on the burgeoning tech industry’s footprint in Europe. More recently, she moved to Silicon Valley to continue these efforts as international policy director at Stanford University’s Cyber Policy Center. She is also an international policy fellow at Stanford’s Institute for Human-centered Artificial Intelligence. The basic message of this book is that these tech industries have engaged in a power grab. They have subverted government efforts to establish guardrails, even while supposedly pleading for them. This poses great risks to our democratic interests and to the interests of the public. And it is a plea for governments to assert their proper role of oversight to protect the public interest.
Schaake opens with how online technology, once a means of free speech, has been transformed into a means of surveillance. It even extends across international borders. Even the smartphones most of us carry are used to track our movements. How has something touted to be so beneficial, and in fact is, also become so dangerous. Schaake argues that this is a result of “the code” of these companies that resists efforts for external regulation. She then seeks to delineate the layers of our digital infrastructure, “the stack.”
Furthermore, the whole infrastructure has been turned into a weapon. “Zero day” vulnerabilities in code render all systems subject to cyberattack. Cyber trading of cryptocurrencies can make and unmake fortunes. Datamining can scrape all kinds of private data for law enforcement, a form of illegal search and seizure. And social media platforms combined with AI can generate huge and convincing amounts of misinformation. Meanwhile, the same tech industry seeks to frame the conversation as over-regulatory governments stifling the advance of new and beneficial technologies, even while tech company interests have supplanted the public interest.
The final part of the book is a call for international governments to reassert their role, not to stifle technology, but to ensure that it serves the public interest. This especially needs to engage the world’s four major digital powers: the U.S., the EU, India, and China. That seems challenging because of differing political situations and priorities. Finally, she argues for prioritizing the public. This includes curbing anti-democratic technology: spyware, databrokers, facial recognition, and cryptocurrency. She advocates for transparency and public accountability and the creation of public digital infrastructure.
The strength of this book is its analysis of how Big Tech has gained such a dominant influence. Likewise, as an insider, she offers great insights of how Big Tech maintains and extends its influence. The challenge is the role of government in protecting democratic institutions. It seems the EU has done the most. In the U.S., however, it feels like Big Tech has paid in the form of political contributions to avoid regulation. Furthermore, it is most troubling to see the selective vigilance over the weaponization of digital resources. We fight TikTok while actually utilizing anti-democratic technology. Furthermore, we are not preparing for cyberattacks.
Part of the challenge is the complexity. Perhaps a start is using the lens of the public good consistently throughout. The question, I think, is how to mobilize public advocacy, which the author doesn’t discuss. Such advocacy is proving effective on particular issues, like curbing datacenters, perhaps one of the most visible aspects of Big Tech. But what about those that are less visible?
Schaake’s book, nevertheless, offers crucial analysis of the whole industry and the dangers it poses. And pointing to the question of the public interest seems crucial. And that is a good beginning.
Enabling Grace, Susan Mathew. Langham Global Library (ISBN: 9781839732782) 2025.
Summary: A disability reading of Paul’s letters focusing on 2 Corinthians 12:7b–10, asserting the grace of God amidst human weakness.
In recent years the church has begun to recognize the importance of welcoming and supporting those with disabilities. In the U.S., it is estimated that 28.7 percent of our people have some form of disability. The reality is that that at some point in our lives, most of us will have some form of disability. In all our communities, this group represents a significant part of our mission field.
Much of the writing has focused on what churches can do to accommodate persons with disabilities. Increasing thought is also being given to how we support families of those with disabilities. For most of us, when asked for the biblical grounds for such work, we might appeal to both the Great Commandments to love God and neighbor and the Great Commission to make disciples of all the nations and those within them.
But how does God regard, and how ought we regard those with disabilities? Dr. Susan Mathew is uniquely equipped to address these questions. She not only has a doctorate in biblical studies and teaches New Testament at Faith Theological Seminary in Kerala, India. She is the parent of a son, Jyothish, with cerebral palsy. As she sought to address the needs of her son, she recognized many other families in Kerala with children with special needs. This led to founding the Deepti Special School and Rehabilitation Centre, which she directs. Thus, she combines biblical scholarship and extensive personal experience in this book.
Her focus is on select letters of the Apostle Paul, his use of the language of weakness including his “thorn in the flesh.” She considers how God works in human weakness and how the body of Christ may honor its weakest members. Mathew begins by addressing definitions and models of disability. She also identifies the passage in 1 and 2 Corinthians she will discuss. She lists the words used, with a focus on asthenia or “weakness.” Before turning to more detailed examination of relevant passages, she discusses disability in antiquity. Sadly, the fate of infants with disability was abandonment and death. In Judaism, disabilities excluded people from temple service. Many viewed disabilities as the result of sin or God’s curse.
Then chapter three considers God’s choice of the weak and foolish, described in 1 Corinthians 1:18-2:7. God works through the ultimate expression of weakness, the foolishness of the cross to subvert society’s norms and worldly wisdom. God identifies with and choose the weak as objects of his grace. Chapter four then turns to Paul’s teaching on gifts and the interdependence of the body of Christ. Among the gifted are those with disabilities, revealing God’s power working through human weakness. This calls for mutual concern and the honor of the less honorable. Above and over all is the love of 1 Corinthians 13. Chapter four also deals with 1 Corinthians 15 and the resurrection of the body. In this is both continuity and discontinuity, most notably, the transformation of all weakness and disability.
But what hope is there for the suffering and affliction caused by disabilities in this life? Chapter five turns to this question, looking at 2 Corinthians 1:3-10 and 12:7-10. Mathew considers the role of patient endurance, our partnership in suffering, and the comfort we have in Christ. Then she turns to an in depth study of Paul’s “thorn in the flesh.” She explores what this may have been, Paul’s prayer and how Christ met him in weakness.
The final chapters unpack all this. Chapter 6 recounts the author’s personal story and her experience of God’s power in her Christian community. In the final chapter, she explores what a holistic theology of grace means in the context of disability, including how Paul’s disability deepened his understanding of enabling grace.
This book is a good beginning toward a theology of disability. Coupled with the author’s personal testimony, it speaks powerfully of God’s enabling grace for persons with disabilities. And it calls us to be communities of mutual care and interdependence, recognizing the grace and gifts of God on those with disabilities.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
The Joy of Solitude, Robert J. Coplan. Simon & Schuster (ISBN: 9781668053423) 2025.
Summary: A study of the complexities of solitude and how it can enrich our lives and relationships.
I’ve read a number of books discussing solitude from a spiritual perspective. But this is the first from a secular perspective. Robert J. Coplan is a psychologist who has been studying solitude for thirty years. It all began when he was observing children at play and the different ways they reacted to playing alone. He was curious why some were content to do so, while welcoming others to join them but others were more uneasy about this.
That’s an example of how solitude can mean different things for different people. And it’s not always something we like. In one experiment students were asked to spend fifteen minutes alone in a room. They also had the option to self-administer painful electric shocks. For the majority, sitting alone with one’s thoughts was more aversive than the electric shocks!
But what is solitude? Is it physical separation from others? Does this include animals? Can one experience solitude on a crowded commuter train? Or walking through an art gallery? Turns out all of those can be forms of solitude, So why does solitude get a bad rap? Often, it is because it is rightly believed that it is good for us to be with others and not alone. And extended solitude, especially in childhood can be bad for social development. Forced solitude from ostracism or isolation, leading to loneliness has all kinds of negative impacts. We don’t want that!
But there are times we do want to be away from people. And it seems the key difference between good and bad solitude is in whether we want it. Solitude offers a sense of freedom. Research has also shown that time in natural environments makes us feel calmer, happier, less anxious. A key element is the deactivation of emotions and the fostering of attention. Perhaps that’s why solitude has benefits of both creativity and connectedness. Not only that, there is a “goldilocks factor.” We each have a “just right.”
There is a balance between solitude and socializing, unique for each of us. But the quality of both is important. Alone time just spent ruminating as opposed to engaging in activities like hobbies, reading, or being outside. Temperament also matters. Introverts welcome solitude to a greater degree but introversion is about more than solitude. On the other hand, introverts also under-estimate how short social interactions can positively affect them.
Coplan then gets into how we can do solitude better. Our attitude is important. Those who understand the benefits have a more positive experience. Sometimes, it even helps to “fake it until you make it.” He encourages a journal to track our time to notice what is most helpful. There is no one right way. Like exercising, starting with small doses and building up can help. Even just fifteen minutes can make a difference in our sense of well-being. And avoid ruminating!
He also explores how solitude helps creativity by letting our minds wander. When working on a problem, taking a break and switching helps incubate new ideas. Solitude also allows us to achieve a state of “flow.” Like many others, he advocates solitude from our devices. He invites us to cultivate “JOMO,” the Joy Of Missing Out. At least we should turn off notifications, and avoid scrolling through newsfeeds.
He offers advice on solitude and children. For younger children building solitude muscles by choosing how they’ll spend time alone (but not on screens) can benefit them. Older children, on the other hand, may have so many schedule demands that they need help carving out alone time. And parents also need alone time (and can model this!). And alone time can enhance time together, including for couples.
I found the discussion distinguishing good and bad solitude and the diverse activities that one may pursue in solitude to be helpful. There were so many helpful, practical ideas for finding the right mix of solitude and socializing for each person with lots of permission to experiment. I loved the suggestions for creativity.
I mentioned the practice of solitude as a spiritual practice. While the book takes a secular, mental health approach to this, I think a non-sectarian discussion of solitude and spirituality might have enriched this book, since this is a place where many are introduced to solitude, often with helpful direction.
That said, this is a helpful introduction to the benefits of solitude, and the opportunity to become one’s own best friend.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
Knowing Christ Today, Dallas Willard. Harper Collins (ISBN: 9780062311795) 2014 (first published in 2009).
Summary: Why the knowledge of Christ is real knowledge of true things on which one may base one’s life and confidently speak.
I’ve encountered it. Statements like “God exists,” Christ died to save us,” Christ is risen” and many others are treated quite differently from E=MC2. We treat the former as opinions or sentiments whereas we treat the latter as a statement of fact. We relegate the former to the category of “faith” whereas the latter is “knowledge.”
In this book Dallas Willard argues to the contrary, that Christian belief is equally a form of knowledge, accurately representing reality, based upon evidence. We may act upon this knowledge. Faith is not “blind” but acting upon the known. Not only that, Willard goes on to argue that this is indispensable knowledge, without which we perish into some form of idolatry, as Willard points out in contrasting other worldviews to Christian belief. Furthermore, Willard goes on to argue that the rejection of Christian knowledge has been accompanied by the disappearance of moral knowledge
But how does Willard make the case for Christian belief as true knowledge? In chapter four, he puts forth a form of the cosmological argument for the existence of a creator. He then puts forth a case for God’s activity in the world, including his active intervention in miracles culminating in the resurrection of Jesus.
But how does one live out the knowledge of Christ? Chapter 6 pulls together strands from other works on entering the kingdom with humble obedience and the practice of spiritual disciplines in community. The concluding chapter 8 discusses the role of preachers, calling them to base their preaching upon this knowledge.
However, Christians have often come off as arrogant know-it-alls? How is the assertion of Christian faith as true knowledge to avoid this in a religiously pluralistic world? First of all, he asks whether believing oneself right about something and others wrong is inherently arrogant? Or is it possible to be humble and loving about our disagreements? Then he recognizes the value of a “weak” pluralism that affirms the good wherever we find it. Yet no true believer would say it makes no difference what one believes. However, there is the troubling question of the fate of those who never hear the gospel. While affirming that salvation is always by grace and through Christ, he joins Billy Graham in affirming that these are decisions only God will make.
This work is important for Christians who feel faith is relegated to the personal and private. It helps them understand both how this has come about and why its wrong. Without extensive excursions into epistemology or apologetics, it outlines why Christian belief is real knowledge. However this reveals a shortcoming of the work. It makes arguments without dealing with why many have challenged them. But that would require a much longer book. That said, this work helps restore a humble confidence in believing and proclaiming Christ.
