Radical by Davis Platt

The reason I picked up this book was because I wanted to strengthen my faith in God and to learn how to follow His will.
This book covers just that topic, how to learn God's will by turning from the American Dream.

Radical opens up talking about underground churches, which I like. I have long respected Christians in closed countries and pray for their strength, during this day and age of Christian persecution; which is worse then it has ever been in history.
Then it talks about how you can be a radical Christian and implies you will be a strong Christian like underground church members. The book goes in depth on a 5 point plan to become a stronger Christian:

1. Pray for the world

2. Read the entire Bible

3. Sacrifice your money

4. Give your time for God

5. Join a Church or Small Group to help you grow in your faith

If you do these five points you will be a Radical Christian, and I agree with all of these 100%. I need to read my Bible more often, I should go on a mission trip, I try to keep track and pray for both local and world problems, I also give what I can to church and charity, and I am an active church member.  But I don’t consider myself a true Radical Christian, at least not what I want my version of Radical to look like. I guess this book is perfect for Christians who go to church, then live like anyone else the rest of the week, and for middle road Christians who do the actions but don’t share their faith.
David Platt also brings some strong points to mind like; How can we sit in comfortable multi-million dollar churches while children starve to death? Shouldn’t we be more concerned about people’s eternal lives then what fast-food joint we should eat at? Just he never gave a good solution about how to solve this. Other then donate, but American churches are not going to stop expanding and building. VBS still helps teach young kids, Retreats still save eternal lives, so I don’t know how David Platt expects us to stop growing our churches yet do all he wants in the American church. 

Over-all this book is a good read, just I don’t think this book covers what it said it would. Use it as a motivational plan to strengthen your faith, by doing the 5 point plan, but don’t expect a radical change. I know that, at this time, I don't have the strength to deal with half of what most underground church members do, but I hope to some day with God’s strength.
So I guess yes, follow his step by step and you will be a stronger Christian, but I think radical is not the right word. 

C

Thank you Waterbrook for giving me this book to review.  

Cyndere’s Midnight by Jeffrey Overstreet

House Abascar is regrouping after the traumatic quake, slowly one by one people are finding out who lived and who died in the kingdom. Turning from Abascar “Cyndere’s Midnight” focuses on House Bel Amica’s princess as she goes though hardships most people can’t even dream of dealing with. Trying to run from the power hungry Seers and get some time to think Cyndere goes to a secluded fort. Slipping out of her room at night she goes to a clearing, there she is nearly killed by a beastman. But this beast is more of a man then the others of his race. Could Cyndere’s dream of saving the beastman from their curse come true with this creature?

This book wasn’t nearly as good as the last book in the series. Now Cyndere and the others were created well, but I didn’t feel like I could relate to her, or the others like I did last time. A big thing I had trouble with is something called the Keeper, it is designed to be a mystery to pull you through the book but I found it annoying. We know of this thing and having everything dragged out and learning nothing got really old, fast.  

A friend described the book as a modern “Beauty and the Beast” and it was. The plot was predicable, to the point it was slow. Sadly, I feel asleep reading this book twice (at times I was NOT sleep deprived). I just couldn’t get into this story, something that didn’t help was the multiple perspectives and then the fact everyone was on slightly different times. This made the book very confusing, Ale Boy might be two days behind Cal-raven, while Cyndere was hours ahead of Krawg’s time line. It just had me baffled.  

Something I would like to point out, this is the second book in the series. By looking at the cover art you would have no idea it is part of a series. The cover says “A Novel” like it should stand alone, yet you couldn’t pick this book up and understand what is going on without reading “Auralia’s Colors”. This was a huge problem I have with the books in general.

Now this book was interesting just very, very slow. I couldn’t get into it, but since Auralia’s Colors was good I’ll continue on in the series. 

C

The Charlatan's Boy by Jonathan Rogers

Thank you to Water Brook's Blogging for Books program for giving me this book to review.

Showbiz! Grady is on tour with Professor Floyd, the local Feechie Show Master. Grady and Floyd travel from city to city putting on shows were Grady is the only "real" Feechie in the civil world. But when the show losses it's attraction to the public they must making a living some other way.

Grady was a good character. I think he could be fondly liked by underdog and big-timer alike. With him being an orphan, his all around ugly looks, and his only "friend" being a grouch everyone is sure to take pity on the boy.

Since the book is in first person the fact that Grady hasn't been to a school shows. Rogers wrote the book like anyone without a formal education would. Ain't that odd? I think Rogers broke every rule in the English language at some point in the book. I know it was an attempt to make the book realistic but I couldn't read it without getting a headache.

The plot was all around slow for me. It took me a week to read this book; normally a book about this size would take a couple days. I didn't really understand what Rogers goal for the plot was till the last 100 pages or so. Though on the last 100 pages the book picked up and then the last 20 pages he made this book even better. He had a nice happy ending for this over all sad story.

Rogers' did a good job on making a book I think a lot of people will enjoy. It just wasn't for me.

C

Masters & Slayers by Bryan Davis

Thanks to Living Ink Books for giving me this book to review. 

Masters & Slayers is about a young-man, it is also the story of a young-woman. Together they will travel to another world to search for his missing brother who left months ago, they will search for her mother's killer after he has been loose for years. They will look for a lost population, stolen by dragons to be their slaves. Though this book is based about searching it has a lot more to it. 

I was expecting a lot from this book by Bryan Davis. I had never read one of his adult books and was ready for a grand adventure. Sadly though I had my hopes too high.

Davis starts out in a tournament ring and after the first paragraph I almost put the book down.
What he did in the first paragraph set what the rest of the book would be like. He was going to make the main character perfect and then the female characters wimps. Sadly I was right, Adrian Masters, the main character would be just like all of Davis' others. Perfect, he can’t make a mistake. I understand where Davis comes from but I just don't like it.  Everyone falls so I got tired of Adrian always making the right choice.
Mean while, Marcelle the main female character couldn’t do anything right. She is a warrior whom I grew to like. I was disappointed when I noticed that Davis would build her up to be a clever fighter, then he would throw her back down by having her make a mistake, or lose the fight, it was always her fault. She is a warrior but Davis made her seem like an inferior weakling. I do fencing so that irritated me, a lot.
While the other main female was manipulative impulsive, conniving, and self centered.

The plot was slow, an A-typical love triangle, a corrupt government, an underground group. For me the biggest problem was the beginning, like I said above Davis’ opening chapter was ok. Then he spent the next 100 pages filling you in on the characters background, I felt like he was forcing them on us. Telling us everything we would need to know for the rest of the book, if he would have taught us throughout the book it would have been an easier start and not overwhelm me so much. After the first 100 pages though it did pick up.

Now I will give Davis a pat on the back, I understood all that was going on. Davis kept things more down to earth then he normally does but still kept his “different spirit” feel throughout.
I also have to say this book is the best cover art Bryan Davis has ever had! I love the cover.

Davis doesn't write a lot of adult books, and to me this book was a lot like his teen books, just a bit more intense.  It was good but not excellent. 

C