1. The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr. This was a reread in order to review information for a podcast recording on the relationship between reading and electronics. After a five year lapse, I found the research and examples to be even more compelling than when I first read this book. If your kids don’t like to read, or you have forgotten to do it much lately, this book is an important and eye-opening resource.
   
2. The Tech-wise Family: Everyday Steps for Putting Technology in Its Proper Place by Andy Crouch. This short and lively book very simply outlines ten ways the author and his family have battled to control the time and influence of technology in their growing family. It contains some research findings, but is full of practical ways to manage the necessity of electronics in the modern life. I appreciated his perspective that the family is essential to society and how the control of this invasive aspect of our lives will result in stronger, happier, more productive families. His suggestions and honest confessions of failure to implement his best intentions at times make the ideas presented appealing and attainable.

3. Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain by Maryanne Wolf. I was delighted to find this classic book now available to me through the National Library Service so that I could read it. This is the book to which most other books on reading and electronics refer. Wolf is a professor who also has dealt with dyslexia in her own family. The process of reading and some of the current theories about how the brain manages this complex activity, as well as how damaged or differently made human brains adapt to accomplish the task is intriguing. Every teacher or parent with a struggling reader needs to discover some of the ideas packed into this book.

4. The Money Room by  Eloise Jarvis McGraw. Another title in my summer project to read some children’s books I have not read before by favorite children’s authors. This was  light and fun for those avid mystery lovers from grades 3-8. It tells what happens when two overly imaginative children come to live in their mother’s childhood home. Still, they end up successfully helping their struggling single mom through their relentless search for the family’s supposed treasure.

5. Multiply: Disciples Making Disciples by Mark Beuving and Francis Chan. This book is a simple challenge to move Christians from churchgoing consumers of information to actually spreading the Gospel to others. No matte r how far you are in your Bible knowledge, the concise summary of the entire story of the Bible will help equip you to share your faith with anyone.
   
6. Saving Truth: Finding Meaning and Clarity in a Post-Truth World by Abdu Murray. If you find yourself frustrated by the social arguments raging these days, this book provides a helpful perspective for the reasons those arguments rage. In a very logical and compassionate manner, Murray presents Biblical thinking and communication skills to cope with and communicate with those so enmeshed in the controversies that swirl around us and seem so hopeless to confront. No longer “post modern” but post-truth, confusion, Murray asserts, has become a virtue, and certainty a sin. This book will help you think justly and argue winsomely with the people you deal with without relying on pat answers and labeling of those who differ from and who disagree with you.

For the joy of reading,

Liz