Archive for the 'Books' Category

Book Meme

My Bookshelves

Meme’d by the lovely Aelki. One can never have too many books (much like toilet paper).

Number of books I own: Well, there are 220 on the two shelves pictured (not counting the books in the reflection). I have a bunch more in boxes, and five more are sitting on my desk right now. See above philosophy.

Last purchased book(s): The Complete Peanuts 1955–1956 (Vol. 3)

Last re-read: Started reading my updated copy of The Illuminati. Fell asleep before I got very far.

Five books for a desert island: My NASB, This Present Darkness, The Lord of the Rings, an empty journal (with attached pencil), and … hmm … maybe How to Build a Wooden Boat. That one might be helpful.

Book I’d thwack someone on the head with: Core PHP Programming, Second Edition. 769 pages of high-performance, cross-platform pain. Nice and thick and heavy.

Book I’d like to burn: The Da Vinci Code. Bleh. Not linking it. And yet I might go see the movie, which I am also not linking. Isn’t that sad?

Book that is overrated: Left Behind, volumes 3-12. Not linking them, either.

Fun classics: The Chronicles of Narnia, any and all Sherlock Holmes stories, Treasures of the Snow, and 34 MORE Tested, Ready-To-Run Game Programs in BASIC. Good for laughs, especially since I could never really get any of them to run properly. Maybe one.

Last book read: White, by Ted Dekker, I think. I haven’t had much time to read of late. That doesn’t mean I’m not in the middle of Monster, Obsessed, Mostly Harmless, and probably six or seven others that I can’t think of right now. And I still plan to finish A New Brand World.

Five people that I tag to answer these questions and post a photo of their bookcase: Tim, Steve, Pete, Andy, and Guy. You all are it. Be there or be square.

Cardinal Urges Catholics to Shun Da Vinci Code

The Vatican is blasting Dan Brown’s novel The Da Vinci Code. I’m not Catholic, but I completely agree with their assessment. The book does not make a distinction between verifiable fact and rampant speculation in it’s presentation of Church history.

Because of that, its near-blasphemous indictments against Christianity and Christ Himself will almost certainly confuse potential believers and give uninformed skeptics yet another reason to shun faith.

“Don’t buy this. Don’t read this because this is rotten food,” said Bertone, the highest ranking Catholic churchman to speak out against the blockbuster. “A lot of novels do good but this book is rotten food … it does harm, not good,” Bertone said in the 30-minute interview in the offices of the Vatican’s doctrinal department. Full Article