Told you I would try!
Though, now it's going to be more me updating than usual. I lost my job (lame, I know) so to entertain myself, I'm updating my reviews, just like I promised. So this entry is going to be two reviews!
Title: Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Rating: 5/5
Pages: 532
Genre: Adolescent Lit
Summary (off Goodreads): Raised in a religious -- yet abusive -- family, Pattyn Von Stratten starts asking questions -- about God, a woman's role, sex, love. She experiences the first stirrings of passion, but when her father catches her in a compromising position, events spiral out of control. Pattyn is sent to live with an aunt in the wilds of Nevada to find salvation and redemption. What she finds instead is love and acceptance -- until she realizes that her old demons will not let her go.
As usual, Ellen Hopkins delivers a wonderful, stunning and sensitive novel. The way that she writes just hits me like no author has in quite some time. She approaches problems novels in such a way that makes them just unique and beautiful and great.
This particular novel resonated with me particularly. Pattyn is a 17 year old Mormon girl who is trying to figure herself out. Raised as a Mormon kid myself, I'm overly critical of authors, or really anyone, who uses the religion in novels or movies. It's not because I care that they criticize the religion, I don't. I'm no longer a practicing Mormon and have more than a few disagreements and criticisms of the church but often the Mormon church gets criticized for things that aren't true of their religion. I appreciated that Hopkins had actually done her research.
I related to Pattyn in a way I never had to a character before. While some things about her life were VASTLY different (my father never beat my mother, nor did he drink and I only had three siblings, not the seven or more Pattyn seemed to have), her conflict with religion and her development as a woman and a person was almost exactly what I had gone through at her age. She begins to develop sexually, have an interest in boys, in sex and begins to question her role in life and in the world and God's presence. She doesn't believe that her only duty in life is to pop out a bunch of kids and do nothing but what her husband tells her to do, even though that's what the church keeps telling her. A woman's role is to be subservient to her husband.
Throughout the first half of the book she does nothing but struggle with herself and everything that she's been taught. She gets a non-Mormon boyfriend, something completely taboo to her family and religion, something I completely understood. I hid every relationship I ever had from my family from the time I was 15 (a year too young to date), when I was 17 (dating a guy too old from me) and even in college when neither of those things was an issue, I didn't really talk to my family about my relationship because I got nothing but criticism when I did. My family was never happy unless I was within the Mormon faith, marrying a nice Mormon boy.
When her father found out, Pattyn was shipped to her Aunt's house, her father's sister. Really, this was Pattyn's awakening. It allowed her to see that just because the church taught something, it didn't mean the church was right. She learned things about her father that she wasn't sure that she wanted to know (he almost murdered his sister to keep her from a non-Mormon boy.) Pattyn met the boy she fell in love with while at her Aunt's house. I feel like what Pattyn went through at her Aunt's was what I went through in college. I learned that it was ok not to be Mormon. That despite what my parents said that religious extreme wasn't for me and that was ok.
Eventually, Pattyn had to return home to a father who was now beating her because he couldn't beat her pregnant mother (finally pregnant with a boy), to a school where everyone hated her and she had no friends and a world where she couldn't be herself, where she was just another woman in training, waiting for a husband to tell her what she was going to do with her life.
Once again, the only thing that bothers me about Hopkins book is the ending. Pattyn becomes pregnant and when she tries to escape with her non-Mormon boyfriend comes to get her, her father comes after her. He dies in a car crash, she almost dies, loses the baby and her family disowns her. It ends with her about to go on a killing spree, ready to shoot her father, mother, everyone at school and finally herself.
I'm not sure how I feel about the ending. Yes, I could definitely see it happening. But I think Hopkins sometimes takes her stories to extremes. However, the rest of it was beautifully written. I related to Pattyn on a severely personal level. I knew almost exactly what she was going through. I knew the conflict of religion vs. growing up in a way that most people just don't and that made me just love this book.
I really recommend this book to girls struggling with their religion, Mormons, and girls who have fallen away from the Mormon church. It was a nice feeling knowing that I wasn't the only one out there, that someone knew exactly what I was going through.
Title: Is God Just a Human Invention by Stan McDowell
Rating: 1/5
Pages: 304
Genre: Theological Literature
Summary (off Goodreads): From talk shows to bus campaigns, the question of God is up for public debate. The New Atheists want you to question your faith. So do authors Sean McDowell and Jonathan Morrow. They know that the solid evidence for God and Christianity can withstand the New Atheists' emotionally compelling and sometimes disturbing attacks. The tigated and honestly discussed.
I won this book off Goodreads and it definitely fell into the disappointment category. Through the whole thing McDowell is trying to convince me that God exists, that he is an actual thing and not just something that mankind created to comfort themselves.
Now, this is the point that I probably need to tell you my own religious views. It's a necessary evil with a book as weighted as this one. I am not a big fan of any religion. However, that does not mean I am not a spiritual person. I believe in a God and an afterlife, I just don't think a person needs religion for that sort of thing.
My first problem with McDowell was that he was writing this book for the sole purpose to counter act Dawkins The God Delusion but really, it comes off more like a smear fest than a theological debate. I wanted the debate. I understand that The God Delusion might have offended McDowell but Is God Just A Human Invention really did nothing more than make me want to go read The God Delusion, which I'm fairly certain wasn't the point.
I'm not saying that McDowell didn't make valid points in his book but it was so bogged down by anti-atheistic views that it turned me off to anything valid he might of had to say. The proper response to another book was to take an analytical, non-religious view to the God question and McDowell just couldn't do that. He made it way too personal.
Overall, it was a terrible book. McDowell did the very things he was accusing the Atheists of but from the non-Atheist point of view. The point of a debate is not to smear the other side but to use what facts you have to disprove their facts. McDowell did not do this. I don't recommend this book to anyone.
Title: Burned by Ellen Hopkins
Rating: 5/5
Pages: 532
Genre: Adolescent Lit
Summary (off Goodreads): Raised in a religious -- yet abusive -- family, Pattyn Von Stratten starts asking questions -- about God, a woman's role, sex, love. She experiences the first stirrings of passion, but when her father catches her in a compromising position, events spiral out of control. Pattyn is sent to live with an aunt in the wilds of Nevada to find salvation and redemption. What she finds instead is love and acceptance -- until she realizes that her old demons will not let her go.
As usual, Ellen Hopkins delivers a wonderful, stunning and sensitive novel. The way that she writes just hits me like no author has in quite some time. She approaches problems novels in such a way that makes them just unique and beautiful and great.
This particular novel resonated with me particularly. Pattyn is a 17 year old Mormon girl who is trying to figure herself out. Raised as a Mormon kid myself, I'm overly critical of authors, or really anyone, who uses the religion in novels or movies. It's not because I care that they criticize the religion, I don't. I'm no longer a practicing Mormon and have more than a few disagreements and criticisms of the church but often the Mormon church gets criticized for things that aren't true of their religion. I appreciated that Hopkins had actually done her research.
I related to Pattyn in a way I never had to a character before. While some things about her life were VASTLY different (my father never beat my mother, nor did he drink and I only had three siblings, not the seven or more Pattyn seemed to have), her conflict with religion and her development as a woman and a person was almost exactly what I had gone through at her age. She begins to develop sexually, have an interest in boys, in sex and begins to question her role in life and in the world and God's presence. She doesn't believe that her only duty in life is to pop out a bunch of kids and do nothing but what her husband tells her to do, even though that's what the church keeps telling her. A woman's role is to be subservient to her husband.
Throughout the first half of the book she does nothing but struggle with herself and everything that she's been taught. She gets a non-Mormon boyfriend, something completely taboo to her family and religion, something I completely understood. I hid every relationship I ever had from my family from the time I was 15 (a year too young to date), when I was 17 (dating a guy too old from me) and even in college when neither of those things was an issue, I didn't really talk to my family about my relationship because I got nothing but criticism when I did. My family was never happy unless I was within the Mormon faith, marrying a nice Mormon boy.
When her father found out, Pattyn was shipped to her Aunt's house, her father's sister. Really, this was Pattyn's awakening. It allowed her to see that just because the church taught something, it didn't mean the church was right. She learned things about her father that she wasn't sure that she wanted to know (he almost murdered his sister to keep her from a non-Mormon boy.) Pattyn met the boy she fell in love with while at her Aunt's house. I feel like what Pattyn went through at her Aunt's was what I went through in college. I learned that it was ok not to be Mormon. That despite what my parents said that religious extreme wasn't for me and that was ok.
Eventually, Pattyn had to return home to a father who was now beating her because he couldn't beat her pregnant mother (finally pregnant with a boy), to a school where everyone hated her and she had no friends and a world where she couldn't be herself, where she was just another woman in training, waiting for a husband to tell her what she was going to do with her life.
Once again, the only thing that bothers me about Hopkins book is the ending. Pattyn becomes pregnant and when she tries to escape with her non-Mormon boyfriend comes to get her, her father comes after her. He dies in a car crash, she almost dies, loses the baby and her family disowns her. It ends with her about to go on a killing spree, ready to shoot her father, mother, everyone at school and finally herself.
I'm not sure how I feel about the ending. Yes, I could definitely see it happening. But I think Hopkins sometimes takes her stories to extremes. However, the rest of it was beautifully written. I related to Pattyn on a severely personal level. I knew almost exactly what she was going through. I knew the conflict of religion vs. growing up in a way that most people just don't and that made me just love this book.
I really recommend this book to girls struggling with their religion, Mormons, and girls who have fallen away from the Mormon church. It was a nice feeling knowing that I wasn't the only one out there, that someone knew exactly what I was going through.
Title: Is God Just a Human Invention by Stan McDowell
Rating: 1/5
Pages: 304
Genre: Theological Literature
Summary (off Goodreads): From talk shows to bus campaigns, the question of God is up for public debate. The New Atheists want you to question your faith. So do authors Sean McDowell and Jonathan Morrow. They know that the solid evidence for God and Christianity can withstand the New Atheists' emotionally compelling and sometimes disturbing attacks. The tigated and honestly discussed.
I won this book off Goodreads and it definitely fell into the disappointment category. Through the whole thing McDowell is trying to convince me that God exists, that he is an actual thing and not just something that mankind created to comfort themselves.
Now, this is the point that I probably need to tell you my own religious views. It's a necessary evil with a book as weighted as this one. I am not a big fan of any religion. However, that does not mean I am not a spiritual person. I believe in a God and an afterlife, I just don't think a person needs religion for that sort of thing.
My first problem with McDowell was that he was writing this book for the sole purpose to counter act Dawkins The God Delusion but really, it comes off more like a smear fest than a theological debate. I wanted the debate. I understand that The God Delusion might have offended McDowell but Is God Just A Human Invention really did nothing more than make me want to go read The God Delusion, which I'm fairly certain wasn't the point.
I'm not saying that McDowell didn't make valid points in his book but it was so bogged down by anti-atheistic views that it turned me off to anything valid he might of had to say. The proper response to another book was to take an analytical, non-religious view to the God question and McDowell just couldn't do that. He made it way too personal.
Overall, it was a terrible book. McDowell did the very things he was accusing the Atheists of but from the non-Atheist point of view. The point of a debate is not to smear the other side but to use what facts you have to disprove their facts. McDowell did not do this. I don't recommend this book to anyone.