Cycling
Greg Garrett
Kensington Pub Corp, 2003
ISBN: 0758205317

Greg Garrett's redemptive second novel, Cycling, sets readers smack-dab in Waco, Texas during a scorching 1993 summer and artfully follows stuck-in-a-rut cyclist Brad Cannon through a first-person account of seasonal, emotional, recreational, and spiritual "cycles" that span the course of a year.

Cannon's passions are centered around his daily rural bicycle treks, which offer an escape from his past and allow him to avoid the risk of furthering his stalled writing career. His love interests and family members are kept in tow as he weaves a fictional life that accomodates and alienates them, but he is ultimately unable to sustain his balance. Life gets in the way.

Garrett's brand of literary realism offers crisp details: the barking dogs lurching at a blur of bicycle spokes, the Mexican Coca Colas Hector Portillo sells in his midtown store, the levity and gravity found amidst friends wrangling 900 pounds of dry-weight concrete, and a defunct East Waco soul food café called Martha's. Through all this he allows his characters to find their skin within his photorealistic microcosm. More importantly, he tells a great story.

Throughout the narrative, the shifting weather patterns (important for any cyclist) help plot the story's trajectory. Overheard song lyrics serve as a Greek chorus commenting on the state of the characters. The folks that interact with Cannon are birthed from a rich intersection of genteel Southern life, Western American culture, and the Baptist/Christian subculture that is so much a part of Waco. Even bit characters are presented in such a way that you believe each one has their own novel waiting to be excavated.

The payoff is a fun and surprising ending that conveys an unmistakable (yet complex) grace, much like the final scenes of Garrett's first novel, Free Bird. Cycling stands as an inventive — at times gripping — ride, and is one of the few books that this reviewer has ever devoured in a single sitting.

-prs

Mudhouse Sabbath
Lauren F. Winner
Paraclete Press, 2003
ISBN: 1557253447

In Girl Meets God, Lauren Winner brought her readers a enjoyable account of life as a twentysomething Christian woman converted from Judaism; in Mudhouse Sabbath she wonderfully brings to light many ways in which the praxis of her Christianity is informed and enriched by the rich practices of her Jewish background. She reminds us that "Practice is to Judaism what belief is to Christianity."

In a beautifully designed book from Paraclete Press, Winner reflects with fond yearning on eleven facets of Judaism, ranging from the Sabbath (shabbat) to hospitality (hachnassat orchim) and prayer (tefillah); from fasting (hiddur p'nai zaken) to candle-lighting (hadlakat nerot) and the artistry of mezuzah doorpost reminders.

Winner points out in her introduction that, "the spiritual disciplines... can form us as Christians throughout our lives." Toward that end, she takes these eleven timeless forms — devoting a chapter to each — and expands her readers' knowledge of scriptural and midrashic reasons for the various observances and traditions. She then views the disciplines through her insightful and personal lens, focusing on the ways her past is shaping her present Christian journey.

As 21st century Christianity moves from knowledge toward pragmatism, and as headlines turn toward daily Middle Eastern tensions, Mudhouse Sabbath gracefully returns our thoughts to the beautiful practices that God's People have quietly undertaken for thousands of years.

-prs

Reviewed by Paul Soupiset