Welcome to Book Readers Heaven! Find Books, Reviews, Short Stories, Authors, Publicity, a little poetry, music to complement...and other stuff including politics, about life... "Books, Cats: Life is Sweet..."
One thing about blogging and reviewing for more than 10 years is that my body has gotten older and not quite able to deal with the results of a reader's life. As this little paw symbolizes, I'm holding on more as I walk and cutting back on sitting for long periods, reading or typing. My joints are presenting problems and I'm trying to do more walking in response. Having to use a cane quite often. But that doesn't stop me from reading...it just means that I'm trying to do more work around the house, standing, to get myself back hopefully to moving without pain... Here's some of the beautiful growth that is sprouting as I walk:
Use lots of River Rocks for Areas!
So I decided, because my need to review has stacked up, I would cut back on my normal overview and just try to give you a good feeling of my thoughts on each book, hoping you will read other reviews and the book description to learn what the book is about... As you know, I am no longer accepting new requests, but since they keep coming, sometimes I'll check it out! Let's see what I've been reading over past weeks in no order of listing! I'll be doing this type of review until I finish with backlog, unless, of course, I get inspired, to really get into a book, with music, got instance and...can't resist!
Dylan has become one of my favorite nonfiction authors. Here's the first words of this latest book I purchased. "The world system, both political and economic, has, yet again, descended into a state of confused chaos, like some old, creaky, runaway steam-train about to veer off its highly dysfunctional tracks. The common man, stunned...remains disillusioned with the leadership of all political cowboys, equipped with their six-shooters, honed egos, and unreformed, highly inflated expense accounts. The answer doesn't seem to lie there then!" What I value most about this author is his willingness to look at daily living, critique it as he has seen or faced it, and shares what he thinks, along with some potential path for his readers...You either choose to consider his brilliant thoughts, and maybe even not be sure what he's talking about some times, so you have to reread... For me, what he says makes sense and I have found I keep his books on my reader so that I can daily, when possible, spend time to receive what he's sharing with us. Any of his books, I would recommend. His topics. sometimes based on a quote from another writer, in this book speak much to me...Highly recommended.
This is the last book in the Moon series--a wonderful series that I've enjoyed from the beginning. Sokoloff does an excellent job in closing out the series, touching on all the characters, and what's been happening. I think the main villain character, Cara, is one I will never forget, perhaps there is even a touch of admiration, as she goes through life, after having all her family killed, and returning the favor to all who violate the innocent. Indeed even Roarke, the man who was been on her trail remembers: "It was where he lived now, in his mind, that windy night when he’d stood in the palm grove, calling out for Cara. Had he heard her say, 'Come'? Or was that his own, desperate imagining? The truth was, he had been half a breath away from following her out into the desert, never to return. We are all mad, here..." Perfect series, perfect ending...but don't start with anything but the first book is my recommendation. This intriguing series must be read from the start and is highly recommended...
Ok, even if it's a children's book, I love reading stories about cats...and this book about a misfit cat is a great tale for your children (and anybody else who loves cats like I do.) Rattles was a barn cat, but when he got older, he was different that the others...He liked humans--in fact, he preferred humans to staying in the barn... But there are also some life lessons to learn, of course, and the author and colorful illustrated book is an excellent way to help teach about being different... Enjoy!
When an individual closes herself off from the world via her church and home, it is often difficult to take in, absorb, and react to something extraordinary...Meet Senora Teresa Reina who has served her family and church all of her life. Now her husband has died and she is left with only her brother, already in the priesthood, and her son who is now a novice priest, and her daughter. Blessings that she clings to. Until the outside world comes. I've often heard that Satan chooses to attack devout families often. Perhaps that was the challenge. Or perhaps, it was just a biological fact of nature. I have often thought about God's love and in His creation of all of us. Did he really make a mistake? Or, was homosexuality a biological evolutional change throughout the years that, indeed, have affected so many. I don't have an answer, but the church has always been outspoken. This time, the most important men left in Teresa's life had allowed homosexuality to reign, if we are to believe that it is a sin... What Teresa knew was that she had lost the only two male family members... She and her daughter stood alone to face the choice of suicide that both of the men chose...But Teresa was not to be satisfied to continue her life as it had been... God's judgment or something else... Was it a dream or a true "shudder from Heaven...Make of it what you may, for Kemp has given us a provocative, unique, and memorable tale...is each of our paths known in advance by God? Highly recommended!
All I had to do was read the title and I figured this was going to be a fun book! Did I snicker throughout? You bet!To be Continued...
I met Dylan through his personal story, The Prodigal Prophet, six years ago, and Divine Love in 2016... The thought comes to me that, perhaps, he comes into my life again when I need him...to refresh me, to know that Jeshua - Jesus is always with us and His Divine Love covers us, even now, in this chaos that is erupting out of America across the world, dividing our nation, using God's name in ways that should never be... leaving behind our basic values of goodness, kindness, truth, and love for our fellow man...
Lightning bolts come from above. So too the sayings you are about to read. I can assure you that they were definitely not birthed in my earth bound consciousness. Rather, they appear to have flowed from somewhere else via an open portal in my higher unconscious. As a young, Irish Charismatic prophet, my prophecies for others just came, bubbling up from a spirit well deep within, totally bypassing my rational mind. So too with the content of this book. Lightning bolts momentarily light up the surrounding countryside. Hopefully, what you read here will have a similar effect, bringing Light to the dark recesses of your psyche-soul. Co-operating operating with the staccato-like wisdom of what follows may change your inner landscape for ever. Lightning bolts contain huge amounts of high voltage, electrical energy. Hopefully these mini-insights will channel an intense Divine energy into your psycho-spiritual batteries.
Whilst writing them, I felt a power surge within. Hopefully, this spiritual oomph will also transmit itself to you, my readers. Lightning bolts can easily bring down obstacles that stand in its earthbound way. Trees, buildings, and even people can be the unsuspecting victims of its fierce intensity. Human ingenuity has cleverly invented lightning conductors to safely redirect the rampant rage of Nature's fiery downloads.
Hopefully, the target of these mystical musings will be the debilitating towers of religious legalism and spiritual abuse. These dysfunctional mutations of the spiritual path fully deserve to fall to the ground. Of course ego will try and protect its psycho-spiritual allies by conducting the fiery flashes of Spirit Breath into the neutralizing rod of our conceptual minds. May Light, however, strike where it wills – the open hearts of those with ears to hear and eyes to see. On a more practical point, I have formatted my little, literary offering as a daily reader. The reason for this is two-fold. Firstly, the spiritual thoughts that comprise it came to me on a daily basis. Divine Love seems to realize that we can't handle too much paradigm-changing truth at one go. Drip feeding seems to be its preferred modus operandi.
Hopefully each little saying will contain enough spiritual fat to chew on over a twenty four hour period. Secondly, Divine Love delights to approach us each day. Yesterday's soul food tends to go stale if left unabsorbed by the human heart. Today's spiritual bread always miraculously appears, if we but tune our ears to the frequency of Spirit Breath.
One simple thought, energized by Divine Presence
is a great way to start our day.
~~~
In Bolts From the Blue, Morrison shares Thoughts, bits of knowledge, pieces of wisdom, and spurts of praise... It can be used as a daily meditation, but like many readers, I just kept on reading... although I did a lot of highlights even as I read, wanting to pinpoint simple or bold statements and issues that I was most impressed with.
If this is the first book by the author read, it will perhaps be surprising. Morrison openly shares the evolution he has experienced from his youth to his time, now spent with Divine Love. Morrison's books are meant to challenge you, just as he challenged himself. When he saw the religious experience in one form or another, he was quite willing to question and, if necessary, move on to continue his search... to find the life that Divine Love can bring...
Just happy to be a Divine kid, dancing in the Light of Day.
I find Spiritual growth when I read Dylan Morrison. Not because I agree with everything he may say, but because he shares his thoughts, his words, and his opinions for us to consider--do they speak to me, because they are my own opinions? Or do they go further than I have ever been and am not sure I can accept his thoughts? What I like best is the challenge! I recognize that many of Dylan's experiences are my own--interest in self-help books, psychology, as well as spiritual teachings, including mysticism... Surely, if there are others across the world seeking God and knowing Him, I am able to learn and grow. I do not accept the strict singing of Joyful, Joyful as written by Beethoven. Instead, I want to experience that joy from God's love and know him intimately as one who shares with me daily.
And that's what Morrison presents to you... Either a short statement mostly not more than 10 lines that you can read each day, or, open the book, and read until you find what is important for you at the time.
Here's just one question that struck me--Do we pray to convince Divine Love to act or to listen to what it's already planning?It is a time when black seems white and up seems down--when truth has been discarded for choosing words to mean whatever it is that is desired at the time. Many have chosen to put their own plan into motion, rather than listening to what Divine Love always speaks of--love one another--do unto others as you would have them do unto you--love your neighbor as yourself--do unto the least of these as you would do unto Me... Are we in a time when some people pray to convince God how, why, and when to act instead of listening to His Plan?
Another that hit me right in the eye--To Debate Or To Be? Religious debate is the unusual, little love child of religious belief. Whilst appearing as an angel of light, one with the most holy of intent, it often hides a most vicious and murderous violence. Beware of the debate junkie.Ok, I realized that the merge of religion and politics had gotten me into a "debate" phase. Was this little gem sent directly to me? Well, I sure stopped to reread it several times. Perhaps I had become a junkie because of my frustration, rather than allowing peace and acceptance of what He has planned... But...I'm going to have to reread that often...just like you might find those that hit you...But I do know that a new calm has come to me...
Elections Every four or five years, political egos participate in ritualized debate, only to abandon folk to get on with it, after getting into office. Authentic freedom is always discovered outside the camp of skewed desire, and hence, by definition,outside the popular, cultural scapegoating game known as politics.
It seems the "bolts" given to us through this book are timely and affect our daily lives as well as our spiritual lives. That was important for me, and perhaps for you? Because we do live in this diverse world and need to consider how our lives are affected by that world's actions... We can rejoice when Dylan points out that "It was never designed to be this hard." And isn't that a wonderful bit of wisdom... How many of us grew up with the don'ts and thou shall nots and more, yet were never introduced to His Divine Love, which frees us from even having to make those choices that we've stopped to make over and over during the years...
Elections Every four or five years, political egos participate in ritualized debate, only to abandon folk to get on with it, after getting into office. Authentic freedom is always discovered outside the camp of skewed desire, and hence, by definition,outside the popular, cultural scapegoating game known as politics.
It seems the "bolts" given to us through this book are timely and affect our daily lives as well as our spiritual lives. That was important for me, and perhaps for you? Because we do live in this diverse world and need to consider how our lives are affected by that world's actions... We can rejoice when Dylan points out that "It was never designed to be this hard." And isn't that a wonderful bit of wisdom... How many of us grew up with the don'ts and thou shall nots and more, yet were never introduced to His Divine Love, which frees us from even having to make those choices that we've stopped to make over and over during the years...
One thing you will quickly realize--Dylan Morrison does not speak and write like most of us. His research and experience has been extensive. And he speaks about what is happening around and about him in words that is within his own lexicon. His merge of psychology, spirituality, religion takes some time to get used to. And his lightning bolt aim at different aspects of our lives can be startling. Yet, once you put aside any pre-conceived ideas of what a daily teaching book should be like, you may find each bit of thought-provoking images he places before you, as stimulating, maybe traumatic at first, but, then with a growing sense of awareness--awareness that he just might be right in what he presents... And that his words just may be what you are looking for...
Are you willing to take the risk to find His Divine Love...right where it's always been available?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dylan Morrison is a spiritual author, poet, and contemporary Yeshua thinker, presently living in the historic, cathedral city of Lincoln, England. Raised in Northern Ireland, Dylan has a great empathy with all who've travelled through dysfunctional religious movements in their search for meaning. He writes to expose religious control whilst bringing hope to those who've suffered from various forms of spiritual abuse. I decided to start with this author's statement. I think it is important to first share the general theme of Morrison's latest book--spiritual abuse--as you consider it for your own use. One thing I've noticed about writers who have written in a specific area, is that they tend to begin to use a specific lexicon that evolves from their research and study. In this case, psychological terminology was added and, I would say, simple words like ego to separate our mind and body, helping to understand.. The series of musings, thoughts, some humorous, some very serious, had become a reality to me... Why? Because many of us had found a less than godly environment within a church, or churches, in which they had become involved. Sexual abuse from supposed godly men had led to much of this. For me, at least two were leaders in the church...and the last, when I was older, was the pastor. But there are many other types of abuse--especially, as Morrison dwells on--the lack of Divine Love toward one another within the church as well as toward all others as well...
A WORD BEFORE I have to admit it! I'm a bit of a dreamer. I always have been, and I guess, I will always be. As a young lad wandering around my grandpa's little Northern Irish farmstead, I was always pondering the meaning of life, albeit from a somewhat naïve, childlike perspective. And yet, perhaps, that's the best way to make some kind of sense out of this mysterious dance that we nonchalantly call life. A viewing through the eyes of innocence, those still untouched by the adult delusions and machinations of ego. As a naive, little, six-year-old lad, I once sheltered under an enormous oak during a fierce lightning storm at the bottom of grandpa's cattle paddock. The sights, sounds, and torrential rain of the Irish sky seemed to elevate me to a higher place, one tinged with both fear and wonder. Who or what lay behind all this, the powerful flailing of Nature at both its worst and best? Something stirred deep within me as I stood there soaked, and more than a little apprehensive that the lightning might soon seek me out to silence my metaphysical questionings. Of course, like all our momentary encounters with Source Reality, it didn't last...
Thankfully, our heightened state of alert doesn't last. Divine Love sees to that. With one touch of Its hand we're reduced to quivering wrecks, as our defensive energies finally run dry. A transpersonal crisis, one that removes us from the survival war zone for good. In our weakness we are finally free to enter that other realm, that place of Ultimate Reality which has never suffered the stresses and strains of ego and its weary ways. A recovery unit where the desperate cries of Self-inflicted conflict are but a distant nightmare, one that quickly fades into the restorative mists of time. It's only at this point that we can listen, truly listen, to the Voice within. The whispers of Self and Spirit combine as One to gently, yet purposely, guide us on our Way.
~~~
Divine Love
Dylan Morrison
Morrison begins his book with a fairly length Opening Word before he shares over 100 short...poems, musings, thoughts... You will easily see that he has thought much about those who have been faced with some type of personal crisis within one of the world's religious facilities--synagogue, church, cathedral, or mosque--I saw nothing to indicate that the author is speaking to any one religion or any one belief system. He speaks only to those who have questioned, grown concerned, wondered about events... I remember once that a man had stolen from the church treasury. Was it the proper thing to do to handle this totally within the church, even though the money of the church had been given by its members? I still don't have an answer to that in my heart, as opposed to my mind...I wonder, what would the author say to this thief??? To the church leaders who made their decisions about what had happened...
The Dance of Spirit leads us through many and various belief steps on the dance floor of life. Never once does It urge us to look down at our free-flowing feet. Rather, It encourages us to lift our gaze upwards, towards the Mystery that emanates from the Heavens.
~~~
When the storm hits there's only one place of refuge, and, surprisingly, it's within. That timeless dwelling space of Divine Presence where the frenzied fears of ego cannot reach and where All is still. A portal to a place beyond where One is All and All are One. ~~~
After the initial reading, this is the type of book that may be used to start your day or take a break to spend a little time in thinking, and perhaps healing just a wee bit more. Most of you know that my healing is ongoing from the trauma I experienced when I had to choose between my professional life and my own health. Many of these pages had words that spoke directly to me; you, too, might find the same, although they are different selections than the ones that touched me.
Morrison makes us realize that it is serious business when anyone, or anything, including our religion, separates us from God. Some of us may not even have realized it, but with what is happening in today's world where religion is the basis on which wars, death, executions, etc., are started and continued, we surely have become the author and begun to speak out and express concern... Divine Love speaks of your connection to our God. Some might think first of Jesus--Yeshua... Others might think first of God--El Shaddai and so many other names used around the world to express praise and adoration.
Morrison provides us with an excellent tool, specifically speaking to those of us who have become disheartened, hurt, or suffered outright abuse of some kind. Consider the excerpts shared yesterday, today, and maybe sometime in the future. Far better, to place this little book somewhere where you can reach it quickly and seek out a needed message. Mark your favorites for specific concerns, or do as I often do, read a page randomly to find out what God may have provided through the author... And receive God's blessings...Highly recommended.
GABixlerReviews
Much religious energy is expended in debates over which model of church to adopt. I'm afraid that I put the issue up there with the “How many angels fit onto a pinhead?” type of question, viz. totally irrelevant. I speak, not as anti-church zealot, but as one who is merely anti-spiritual abuse and control. When one encounters the freedom and wonder of Divine Presence, sacred surroundings matter not one whit. ~~~~
Divine Love is an inspirational collection of spiritual musings from the pen of Irish writer, Dylan Morrison. The fruit of a life-long, roller-coaster journey, it encapsulates Morrison's personal take on all things God, Self and Relational. Each pithy reflection aims to release us from our propensity for self-deception, by leading us to the Mystery of Source and its healing offspring, Self-compassion. Morrison's literary tools are humour, mixed with a disarming, Irish honesty as he examines what really makes us tick. The favoured Linus blankets of both organised religion and New Age philosophies come under his razor-sharp scrutiny, opening up liberating, new areas of exploration for the sincere, spiritual seeker. If you're asking life's big questions, then Divine Love is surely the book for you.
Review Coming...
Every so often Divine Love comes calling,
giving us a series of little signs
that it's time for another in-depth therapy session.
