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The Breaking Point

LESSONS FOR LIFE FROM A SCATTERBRAINED WIFE

From the Funny Coffee Girl series , Vol. 1

Folksy, optimistic discussions on home and spiritual life for those who miss their daily doses of Paul Harvey on the radio.

Prolific inspirational author Brumbaugh (Diary of a Wimpy Elf, 2015, etc.) collects a number of her newspaper columns about amusing events in her life and the Gospel-oriented meanings she draws from them.

Each of these short pieces usually begins with an observation of a household incident, and each ends with a pertinent chapter-and-verse quote from Scripture. For Brumbaugh, a housewife from rural Texas, spiritual epiphanies come from the quotidian, such as pulling a seemingly never-ending array of weeds in a fruitless effort to get the perfect magazine-cover garden, or arguing with her husband (aka “Superman”) about who misplaced the TV’s remote control. She describes a brush with “show business” as a supporting singer-actress in the evangelical stage-musical pageant The Promise in Glen Rose, Texas, and about having to contend with the dung from live lambs that ambled in front of the production’s giant, moving sets; she also tells of forgetting to pass a portable microphone to the actor playing Judas Iscariot. The good news, she writes, is that the real Good News didn’t involve such intricate memorization and borderline-absurd stagecraft. She also ruminates on recent archaeological research indicating that Cleopatra and Marc Antony were nowhere near as good-looking as Hollywood likes to pretend. The author’s syndicated column, “Coffee Talk,” has a style like Erma Bombeck’s but with an explicitly religious orientation, and this compact collection of upbeat prose pieces could pass for sermons in a hip, folksy church. There’s no talk about being a “domestic goddess” here, but the author does point out to its red-state target demographic that God is in the details. Along the way, she never hesitates to paint herself as a humble example of a “vain” sinner, drawing biblical morals from such events as cleaning the kitchen floor. Overall, only the hardest-hearted are likely to be offended in any way by these pieces. 

Folksy, optimistic discussions on home and spiritual life for those who miss their daily doses of Paul Harvey on the radio.  

Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2015

ISBN: 978-1-5086-3352-5

Page Count: 164

Publisher: CreateSpace

Review Posted Online: Aug. 10, 2016

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THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE

50TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION

Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...

Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.

Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").

Pub Date: May 15, 1972

ISBN: 0205632645

Page Count: 105

Publisher: Macmillan

Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972

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NUTCRACKER

This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

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