Book Review/Giveaway: Playdates with God

I met Laura Boggess in the blogosphere and consider her a friend. She reminds me of home, and when I say that I mean East Tennessee. Laura is actually a native of West Virginia, but I guess I'm not enough of a Tennessean to be able to tell much difference; she's felt kindred to me from the outset, and I'm blessed to have received a copy of her new book Playdates with God in exchange for an honest review.

I started reading Playdates with God as I was reading several other things, and that was a mistake. If you're familiar with Laura's blog, you know there's not a lot of bang-clash to her written voice. Thank God. I get tired of bang-clash, and Laura's voice travels like fog, like mist, like dappled sunlight, like the tinkle of piano keys from some unseen place up the hollow. There's a poetic, ethereal, almost haunting quality to it. It isn't the kind of voice that will assert itself or rise easily above the din. It's a lot like our Father's: still, small.

I say all that to say: you'll want to carve out space and time for this book. Inasmuch as I do not think it's best read when one is reading ten other things, I do not think it's best read in one sitting, or when one is in a hurry. It reminds me a bit of Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts in that it includes a million little profundities-- examinations of scripture, quotations from great thinkers, grains of truth, nuggets of wisdom--that are impossible to digest quickly. I do find Laura's writing tighter and more succinct than Voskamp's.

Each chapter of Playdates with God can be enjoyed independently of the others, and the book can very nearly be considered a collection of essays on a similar theme: seek God through the rediscovery of your childlike (or newlywed!) heart.

I do recommend this book and plan to reread it in the ways I've suggested, above. More than that, though, I recommend your continued attention to this author. She can write anything (essays, research, fiction, poetry, etc.), and she can write it well. If I were to prophesy a bit, I'd tell you her best work is yet to come and that it will deliver a quiet punch unlike any we've experienced since Jeannette Walls' The Glass Castle.

Laura Boggess' Playdates with God is available at Amazon (paperback and kindle). I'll be sending one blessed someone a copy directly from Amazon. If you'd like to enter my giveaway, comment below. The winner will be chosen/announced in one week on October 14th, 2014, so be sure to check back; I'll need an address!