Top 8 Agatha Christie Books Read in 2017

1. Murder on the Orient Express (1934)
2. And Then There Were None (1939)
3. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926)
4. The A.B.C. Murders (1936)
5. 4.50 From Paddington (1957)
6. The Pale Horse (1961)
7. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case (1975)
8. Hallowe'en Party (1969)

Top 15 Books by C. S. Lewis Read in 2017

1. The Great Divorce (1945)
2. Letters of C. S. Lewis (1966)
3. Mere Christianity (1952)
4. The Four Loves (1960)
5. The Screwtape Letters (1942)
6. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)
7. The Horse and His Boy (1954)
8. The Magician's Nephew (1955)
9. Prince Caspian (1951)
10. The Silver Chair (1953)
11. On Stories and Other Essays on Literature (1982)
12. God in the Dock (1970)
13. The Dark Tower and Other Stories (1977)
14. Spirits in Bondage (1919)
15. Spenser's Images of Life (with Alistair Fowler) (1967)

Top 15 Books Read in 2017 about C. S. Lewis and/or One or More Inklings

1. C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table - James T. Como
2. The Christian World of the Hobbit - Devin Brown
3. Bringing Narnia Home - Devin Brown
4. The Oxford Inklings: Lewis, Tolkien and Their Circle - Colin Duriez
5. The Heroes of Tolkien - David Day
6. The Wisdom of the Shire - Noble Smith
7. Through Joy and Beyond - Walter Hooper
8. A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War - Jospeh Loconte
9. The Pilgrim's Guide: C. S. Lewis and the Art of Witness - David Mills
10. C. S. Lewis: Through the Shadowlands - Brian Sibley
11. The Most Reluctant Convert - David C. Downing
12. C. S. Lewis: Images of His World - Douglas Gilbert & Clyde S. Kilby
13. The Lion's World - Rowan Williams
14. C. S. Lewis: Christian and Storyteller - Beatrice Gormley
15. C. S. Lewis: An Apologist for Education - Louis Markos

Top 40 Books Read in 2017 (Excluding C. S. Lewis and Agatha Christie)

1. The Man Who Was Thursday - G. K. Chesterton
2. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
3. Right Ho, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
4. The Return of the King - J. R. R. Tolkien
5. The Sacrament of Evangelism - Jerry Root & Stan Guthrie
6. Parnassus On Wheels - Christopher Morley
7. Dancing on the Head of a Pen - Robert Benson
8. The Flying Inn - G. K. Chesterton
9. One for the Books - Joe Queenan
10. The Place of the Lion - Charles Williams
11. The Golden Key - George MacDonald
12. The Ballad of the White Horse - G. K. Chesterton
13. Defiant Joy: The Remarkable Life & Impact of G. K. Chesterton - Kevin Belmonte
14. Letters to Heaven: Reaching Beyond the Great Divide - Calvin Miller
15. All Hallows' Eve - Charles Williams
16. The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle
17. Cupside Down - Terry Cliett
18. The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman
19. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
20. Thrones, Dominations - Dorothy L. Sayers & Jill Paton Walsh
21. A Moveable Feast - Ernest Hemingway
22. The Divine Comedy I: Hell - Dorothy L. Sayers
23. The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library - Alice Kimberly
24. Striding Folly - Dorothy L. Sayers
25. The Uncommon Reader - Alan Bennett
26. Clouds of Witness - Dorothy L. Sayers
27. Quest for Celestia - Steven James
28. 84, Charing Cross Road - Helene Hanff
29. Chivalry - Zach Hunter
30. King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table - Roger Lancelyn Green
31. Lilith - George MacDonald
32. The Lair of the White Worm - Bram Stoker
33. Descent into Hell - Charles Williams
34. The Bookshop Book - Jen Campbell
35. Saint Francis of Assisi - G. K. Chesterton
36. Smith of Wootton Major & Farmer Giles of Ham - J. R. R. Tolkien
37. Poor Folk - Fyodor Dostoevsky
38. Four Quartets - T. S. Eliot
39. De Doctrina Christiana - St. Augustine
40. The Pastor as Scholar & The Scholar as Pastor - John Piper & D. A. Carson

December Reading

1. The Epistle to the Galatians - Ronald Y. K. Fung
2. Galatians - Richard N. Longenecker
3. Galatians - Douglas J. Moo
4. The Epistle to the Galatians - F. F. Bruce
5. Galatians - R. Alan Cole
6. The Epistle to the Galatians - Floyd E. Hamilton
7. Galatians and You - C. Norman Bartlett
8. The Glory of Galatians - Fred M. Wood
9. Galatians: Saved by Grace - Thomas Lea
10. Spurgeon Commentary: Galatians - Elliot Ritzema
11. Galatians - Martin Luther
12. Galatians - John MacArthur
13. Exploring Galatians - John Phillips
14. The NIV Application Commentary: Galatians - Scot McKnight
15. The New American Commentary: Galatians - Timothy George
16. Galatians - J. Vernon McGee
17. The Place of the Lion - Charles Williams
18. The Christian World of the Hobbit - Devin Brown
19. Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in Galatians - David Platt and Tony Merida
20. The Lion's World - Rowan Williams
21. The Pale Horse - Agatha Christie
22. The Heroes of Tolkien - David Day
23. A Year with C. S. Lewis

November Reading

1. Hallowe'en Party - Agatha Christie
2. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case - Agatha Christie
3. Through Joy and Beyond - Walter Hooper
4. And Then There Were None - Agatha Christie
5. The A.B.C. Murders - Agatha Christie
6. Letters from Father Christmas - J. R. R. Tolkien
7. Bringing Narnia Home - Devin Brown

October Reading

1. The Latin Letters of C. S. Lewis - C. S. Lewis & Don Giovanni Calabria
2. Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie
3. All Hallows' Eve - Charles Williams
4. The Road Not Taken and Other Early Poems - Robert Frost
5. The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle
6. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie
7. The Lair of the White Worm - Bram Stoker
8. The Golden Key - George MacDonald

Fantastic Fiction

Greetings!  Happy Friday to you!
After looking over my shelves, here's some recommended reading from the fiction category.  I've placed these in alphabetical order by author's last name.

I consider the following to be Fantastic Fiction:


Dante Alighieri - The Divine Comedy

Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice

L. Frank Baum - The Wizard of Oz

Alan Bennett - An Uncommon Reader

Emily Bronte - Wuthering Heights

John Bunyan - Pilgrim's Progress

Albert Camus - The Stranger

Geoffrey Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales

G. K. Chesterton - Father Brown, The Flying Inn, The Ballad of the White Horse, Four Faultless Felons, The Ball and the Cross, The Napoleon of Notting Hill, Manalive, The Man Who Was Thursday, The Man Who Knew Too Much

Agatha Christie - 4.50 from Paddington, Murder on the Orient Express

Roald Dahl - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The BFG

Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol, The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist, David Copperfield

Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Brothers Karamazov

Arthur Conan Doyle - Sherlock Holmes

F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby

E. M. Forster - A Room with a View

Neil Gaiman - The Ocean at the End of the Lane

William Golding - Lord of the Flies

Kenneth Grahame - The Wind in the Willows

Roger Lancelyn Green - King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table

Graham Greene - The Power and the Glory

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm - Grimm's Fairy Tales

Ernest Hemmingway - The Old Man and the Sea, The Sun Also Rises

Homer - The Illiad, The Odessey

James Howe - Bunnicula, Howliday Inn, Nighty-Nightmare, Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow

Washington Irving - The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Rip Van Winkle

Rachel Joyce - The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

Alice Kimberly - The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library

Harper Lee - To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Set a Watchman

Gaston Leroux - The Phantom of the Opera

C. S. Lewis - Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, That Hideous Strength, The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Great Divorce, Till We Have Faces

George MacDonald - Phantastes, Lilith, The Princess and the Goblin, The Princess and Curdie

Thomas Malory - Le Morte d'Arthur

Herman Melville - Moby Dick

John Milton - Paradise Lost

Christopher Morley - Parnassus on Wheels, The Haunted Bookshop

George Orwell - Animal Farm

Ovid - Metamorphoses

Christopher Paolini - Eragon

Frank Peretti - The Visitation, The Oath, This Present Darkness, Piercing the Darkness

Edgar Allan Poe - The Tell-Tale Heart, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Gold-Bug

Rick Riordan - Percy Jackson & The Olympians

Barbara Robinson - The Best Christmas Pageant Ever

Thomas Rockwell - How to Eat Fried Worms

J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter

Dorothy Sayers - Clouds of Witness, Striding Folly, The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club

George Bernard Shaw - Pygmalion

Charles M. Sheldon - In His Steps

Mary Shelley - Frankenstein

Lemony Snicket - A Series of Unfortunate Events

John Steinbeck - Of Mice and Men

Robert Louis Stevenson - Treasure Island, Kidnapped, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Bram Stoker - Dracula

J. R. R. Tolkien - Smith of Wootton Major, Farmer Giles of Ham, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings

Leo Tolstoy - The Death of Ivan Ilyich

Anthony Trollope - The Warden

Jules Verne - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Virgil - The Aeneid

H. G. Wells - The Invisible Man, The Island of Dr. Moreau

Charles Williams - Descent into Hell, All Hallows' Eve

P. G. Wodehouse - Right Ho, Jeeves

We Don't Have to Go to Hell

Wonder of wonders!
Jesus loves us
Despite our blunders

That Christ should choose us
And use us, after all
We deserve the blunderbuss

The mystery!  So profound!
The captain-pastor spoke well
Once lost, yes, but found
We don't have to go to hell

September Reading

1. The Four Loves - C. S. Lewis
2. The Great Divorce - C. S. Lewis
3. The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman
4. Miles of Smiles - Bruce Lansky
5. Revise Us Again - Frank Viola
6. Go Set a Watchman - Harper Lee
7. The Ultimate Fender Book - Paul Day & Dave Hunter
8. The Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum
9. The Dark Tower and Other Stories - C. S. Lewis
10. The Diary of Samuel Pepys: 1662
11. Descent into Hell - Charles Williams
12. Guitar World Presents Stevie Ray Vaughan

August Reading

1. The Summer We Read Gatsby - Danielle Ganek
2. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows
3. Thrones, Dominations - Dorothy L. Sayers & Jill Paton Walsh
4. Poor Folk - Fyodor Dostoevsky
5. The Diary of Samuel Pepys Volume One: 1660
6. The Wisdom of the Shire - Noble Smith
7. Heaven Bound: Creating a Funeral or Memorial Service for Your Pet - Paraclete Press
8. The Diary of Samuel Pepys Volume Two: 1661
9. The 40 Most Influential Christians - Daryl Aaron

July Reading

1. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry - Rachel Joyce
2. A Moveable Feast - Ernest Hemmingway
3. 4.50 From Paddington - Agatha Christie
4. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
5. Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats - T. S. Eliot
6. 84, Charing Cross Road - Helene Hanff
7. Playing for Pizza - John Grisham
8. The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry - Gabrielle Zevin
9. Biblical Preaching - Haddon W. Robinson
10. The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend - Katarina Bivald
11. The New City Catechism

June Reading

1. The Sacrament of Evangelism - Jerry Root & Stan Guthrie
2. Everyday Evangelism - Matt Queen
3. The Bookshop on the Corner - Jenny Colgan
4. The Uncommon Reader - Alan Bennett
5. Saint Francis of Assisi - G. K. Chesterton
6. Nighty-Nightmare - James Howe
7. Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow - James Howe
8. Runaway Ralph - Beverly Cleary
9. The Furious Flycycle - Jan Wahl
10. Smith of Wootton Major & Famer Giles of Ham - J. R. R. Tolkien
11. The Bookshop Book - Jen Campbell
12. C. S. Lewis: Christian and Storyteller - Beatrice Gormley
13. The Wife of Bath and Other Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer (Translated by Nevill Coghill)
14. Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing - Judy Blume
15. Weird Things Customers Say in Bookstores - Jen Campbell
16. Parnassus On Wheels - Christopher Morley
17. The Flying Inn - G. K. Chesterton

May Reading

1. George MacDonald: An Anthology - C. S. Lewis
2. God in the Dock - C. S. Lewis
3. Living the Braveheart Life - Randall Wallace
4. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
5. The Sacred Journey - Frederick Buechner
6. Church Elders - Jeramie Rinne
7. Song of the Sun - St. Francis of Assisi
8. Defiant Joy: The Remarkable Life of G. K. Chesterton - Kevin Belmonte
9. The Magician's Nephew - C. S. Lewis
10. The Return of the King - J. R. R. Tolkien
11. Clouds of Witness - Dorothy L. Sayers
12. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
13. One for the Books - Joe Queenan
14. The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam - Edward Fitzgerald
15. Right Ho, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
16. Unidentified Flying Oddball - Vic Crume

April Reading

1. 1 Peter: Message of Encouragement - John H. McClanahan
2. The NIV Application Commentary: 1 Peter - Scot McKnight
3. Freakonomics - Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
4. The Most Reluctant Convert - David C. Downing
5. C. S. Lewis: Images of His World - Douglas Gilbert & Clyde S. Kilby
6. Letters of C. S. Lewis - W. H. Lewis & Walter Hooper (editors)
7. Reading Spenser: An Introduction to The Faerie Queene - Roger Sale
8. Mere Christianity - C. S. Lewis
9. Jane Austen - Peter Leithart
10. Preparing for Easter: Fifty Devotional Readings - C. S. Lewis
11. Lilith - George MacDonald
12. Spirits in Bondage - C. S. Lewis
13. Spenser's Images of Life - C. S. Lewis with Alastair Fowler

Good Friday

Soon after ribbons of flesh hung from His back

The regal color purple quickly fades to black

The Son of Man bearing our sin on the cross

The Son of God awfully redeeming our loss

God, forgive us for what we put You through

God, we praise You for making all things new

In Christ, our hope, our joy, our all-in-all

Because of the Resurrection, reverséd is the Fall

Once in a garden Father Adam sealed our fate

An empty garden tomb now provides a new slate

Up from the grave, He arose, He arose

When He'll be back? Truly, God only knows

Dear sinner, repent, cease your struggle and fight

Surrender yourself to Heaven, you may be there tonight

March Reading

1. The Great Divorce - C. S. Lewis

2. Teaching Christianity (De Doctrina Christiana) - Augustine

3. Virtue and Vice: A Dictionary of the Good Life - C. S. Lewis

4. The Oxford Inklings - Colin Duriez

5. Chilvalry: The Path of Love - Jeremy Catto

6. The Blood of Olympus - Rick Riordan

7. A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War - Joseph Loconte

8. Devotional Talks on Everyday Objects - Robert J. Hastings

9. On Stories and Other Essays on Literature - C. S. Lewis

10. Prince Caspian - C. S. Lewis

11. Discussing Mere Christianity - Devin Brown

12. The Divine Comedy I: Hell - Dante (translated by Dorothy L. Sayers)

13. The Man Who Was Thursday - G. K. Chesterton

February Reading

1. C. S. Lewis: An Apologist For Education - Louis Markos
2. Dancing on the Head of a Pen - Robert Benson
3. Striding Folly - Dorothy L. Sayers
4. C. S. Lewis At The Breakfast Table - James T. Como
5. The Silver Chair - C. S. Lewis
6. The Song of Songs - Marcia Falk
7. The Laws of Marie de France - Robert Hanning & Joan Ferrante
8. Four Quartets - T. S. Eliot
9. The Pilgrim's Guide: C. S. Lewis and the Art of Witness - David Mills
10. The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library - Alice Kimberly (Cleo Coyle)
11. Letters to Heaven: Reaching Beyond the Great Divide - Calvin Miller
12. William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back - Ian Doescher
13. Cupside Down - Terry Cliett

I Don't Like That Preacher

Every Thursday afternoon, you can find me at a little dance studio.  I'm there because my six-year-old daughter is a student at this particular studio.  I like it because it's small, clean, and has comfortable seating in the waiting room.  I usually have a book open in my lap, and, despite the noise, I can get a little bit of reading done.  I try to use my time wisely.  So it's me, a few mothers, a couple of grandmothers, and a few young children waiting for the class to end.  Two of the girls spend their time playing, screaming, and generally entertaining everyone else in the room.  These same two girls like to play a game with me.  This game is called "Every time the boy looks at us, let's run, scream, and hide from him!"  It's a great game.  The other day, while playing this game, I suppose they got really loud--loud enough for the dance teacher (the mother of one of the girls) to come out of her class to see what was going on.  Then the conversation went like this.

Mom:  What are you doing?
Girl:  We're hiding from that boy!
Mom:  (looks around the room)  What boy?
Girl:  (points at me)  That boy!
Mom:  He's not a boy.  He's a man.  And you better behave because he's a preacher.
Girl:  But I don't like that preacher!

Now at this point the mom is mortified.  Smiling through it all, I said, "It's ok.  She's not the only one."  Now others enter the into the discussion.

Grandmother #1:  Well, at least she's straightforward with you unlike others would be.
Grandmother #2:  I didn't know you were a preacher!  You can't please everybody.  I get so tired of hearing people complain about the pastor over the stupidest things.  (she gives a few examples of the stupid things people complain about)  Who cares?!

One example she gave was this.  Some people who sit in front of her at church used to complain about a previous pastor because he would talk about his wife (in a good way) during the sermon.  Her response, "They ought to be glad he talks about his wife and not somebody else's wife!"

January Reading

1. C. S. Lewis Through the Shadowlands - Brian Sibley

2. Chivalry - Zach Hunter

3. The Ballad of the White Horse - G. K. Chesterton

4. The Horse and His Boy - C. S. Lewis

5. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - J. K. Rowling, John Tiffany, & Jack Thorne

6. King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table - Roger Lancelyn Green

7. To Live Is Christ To Die Is Gain - Matt Chandler & Jared C. Wilson

8. Understanding Tolkien and the Lord of the Rings - William Ready

9. The Pastor as Scholar & The Scholar as Pastor - John Piper & D. A. Carson

10. Quest for Celestia - Steven James

11. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader - C. S. Lewis

12. The Screwtape Letters - C. S. Lewis

December Reading

• An Experiment in Criticism - C. S. Lewis
• A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
• The Practice of the Presence of God - Brother Lawrence
• Clive Staples Lewis: A Dramatic Life - William Griffin
• The Southern Poets - William Lander Weber
• The Chimes - Charles Dickens
• Glorifying God: A Yearlong Collection of Classical Devotional Writings - Thomas Watson
• Holy Bible: English Standard Version
• A Severe Mercy - Sheldon Vanauken
• The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
• That Hideous Strength - C. S. Lewis
• Walking with Bilbo - Sarah Arthur
• Diary of a Jackwagon - Tim Hawkins
• C. S. Lewis, My Godfather: Letters, Photos and Recollections - Laurence Harwood