Books to Read – September 2012

This month’s list of books are books that I predict you will have a hard time putting down.  I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.

Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, death and hope in a Mumbai undercity by Katherine Boo

Every now and then I come across a book that rips my guts out.  Katherine Boo is an amazing storyteller documenting the lives of families in the Annawandi slum in the suburbs of Mumbai, India.  Boo is a Pulitzer-prize winning writer best known prior to this book for her work in the The New Yorker.  As the title suggests, this book runs the gamut of emotions.  You will be inspired as you read about small triumphs such as a young girl teaching other kids who have no other education, or kids with amazing resolve figuring out how to keep their families alive by scavenging for recyclable material to sell.  You will be discouraged as you read about humans taking advantage of others in ways unthinkable.  Most of all you will be enlightened and better off for having read the book.  It’s this month’s Must-Read.

Love Does by Bob Goff

I first heard about Bob Goff while reading Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years.  Miller portrayed Goff as a larger than life character who did wild things, mostly for people he cared about.  When Goff released this book, I decided to give it a go.  If you read Miller’s book, you will like this book in terms of the style.  It’s conversational and easy to read.  The theme of the book is, as the title hints, about love.  Love is about doing, not talking about doing.  Goff does a masterful job of relating real-life events to his view of the teachings of Jesus Christ and, above all, taking action.  Whether or not you agree with his view on religion, his approach to life makes this book worth the read.

Lethal Circuit by Lars Guignard

I was trolling for a new fiction author one night and Lars Guingard popped up in my Amazon search.  The teaser piqued my interest because it mentioned that readers who enjoy Tom Clancy would enjoy this book.  I was at once skeptical (I was a huge Tom Clancy fan) and excited.  I downloaded the Kindle trial and read the first few chapters.  I was hooked.  Guingard’s main character is Michael Chase, who is in China looking to find his missing father.  There are a number of really interesting plot turns, and I found it to be really entertaining reading for when I just needed to give my mind something different to chew on.

That’s it for this month.  I hope you enjoy the list, and please leave comments about what you liked or didn’t like about either this month’s list or a previous one.  It’s great hearing from you, regardless of whether you love or hate the recommendations!