HIGHWAYS, DITCHES, AND DIRT ROADS

A series of autobiographical vignettes looks at the world from a Christian viewpoint.

Unger intends his short, almost aphoristic stories to be “conversations of hope amid the storms of life.” He recounts his wide-ranging experiences, from his Canadian boyhood on a farm in southern Alberta, living with his parents and his six siblings, to his marriage and the birth of his two sons. “Life was good,” he writes. “Little did we suspect the tragedy that lay around the corner.” That tragedy, the shattering loss of stillborn twins, shook the author’s religious faith and began a personal journey that started in anger and gradually moved to acceptance and joy. “I used to think that working through the stages of grief” was like peeling an onion, “and eventually you get to the end of the process,” he writes. He later realized that often it’s like doing laundry: There’s always more to deal with. He mentions depression as a “constant traveling companion” since he was a teenager, and in these pages (illustrated with quite lovely full-color photographs by the author; his wife, Diane; and his father, John, throughout), he chronicles his lifelong grappling with this and other challenges, always filtered through the viewpoint of his Christian faith. The author’s religion tells him that although people live in a broken world, “there is hope for a restored future.” He cites Revelation: “He will wipe every tear from our eyes,” adding “May the Peace of Christ be with you all.” This tone of simple, straightforward personal disclosure runs throughout each of Unger’s short chapters, some of which are more faith-oriented than others. He writes effectively about his own past, but his book’s most memorable sections feature his homespun ideas about religious faith, as when he compares it to two partners learning how to dance together. The author’s fellow Christians will feel a kinship.

An engaging, beautifully illustrated account of one man’s Christian life.