Rebecca Books

I fell in love with Rebecca when I was 10 yrs. She was so cheerful, inspiring, naive, and reminded me a lot of Anne of Green Gables. This series takes the book that is originally by Kate Wiggin and expands it. Eric Wiggin follows and gives more detail about her as she continues to grow. Rebecca is charming and by her patient love wins over her crusty Aunt Miranda. At 11 Rebecca goes to live with her mother's sisters: Aunt Miranda and Aunt Jane. Everyone says living with Aunt Miranda will be the "making" of Rebecca. My family just listened to this on tape and I was again reminded of how delightful it is.

What a great way to end a wonderful series. For those of you who loved Anne of Green Gables you will adore Rebecca Rowena Randall! The way she takes care of her mom and Aunt Jane is so sweet. Of course, Emma Jane is there also. Life wouldn't be the same without her. Mr. Aladdin is taking on a whole new role! Never leave him out of the picture. Even if you haven't read the first 2 in this series and have only read the book by Kate Wiggin this book is still enjoyable. I read this when I was 12 and I still love it. Unfortunately, classics like these are no longer written or read these days.

Set in colonial New England, this is the story of a talented but conventional portrait painter (trained in England) who encounters a child prodigy, a young girl who paints brilliant but often bizarre pictures. The early scene in which Daniel Sanborn first watches Rebecca Wentworth paint is remarkable. The author conveys both the attraction of genius, of superlative ability, and also the degree to which its originality can be deeply disconcerting.

Begiebing's earlier novel, The Adventures of Allegra Fullerton, also featured a woman artist, and the books share a concern with the opportunities afforded women in two different eras of American history.

I've included several essays about Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. I compare her reporting on the Nuremberg trials with the work of Janet Flanner and Martha Gellhorn. West's anti-Communism and her politics in general, including her view of Kipling and colonialism, are treated in new essays that go beyond what I included in my biography of West. The collection ends with a discussion of her attitude toward religion.

I am very partial to this delightful book by Dr. Claudia Rose because it brought back warm and pleasant memories of my parents and grandparents as well as thoughts about anccestors I never could have known. Hers is a fascinating concept that everyone should contemplate. She uses a paradigm of leadership she adapted from one I teach and brings it to life for a purpose I never imagined until reading her marvelous book.

Rebecca's Return will strike a chord with all middle school students. Have you every wanted to be in the popular crowd? No matter the cost? You will see through Rebecca and her experiences, that nothing is as wonderful as REAL friends.

This book is a compilation of stories authored by members of a writing group, and while reading it, I almost felt as if I was sitting in as a member of their circle. In addition to the delightful, beautifully-written stories, the book also includes a picture of each author. Connecting their faces to their stories added extra enjoyment to my reading experience--the style of each author is as unique as his or her face. I loved the story about enlisting cats to rid a house of mice, a young mother experiencing a health scare, and even though I'm not normally a fan, two stories about baseball. Once I started the book, I wished for a huge snowstorm to hit my town in Colorado so that I had an excuse to stay home and finish it. Kudo's to Rebecca's Table writing group!

Young Rebecca is illicitly peering through her father' brand new astral telescope when she is suddenly transported to another planet. There, she meets the green fur clad Grisby, who has the most painful feet in the universe; Captain K, an unprepossessing superhero with a homemade red costume; and Kovak, a spy with a thousand disguises, all embarrassingly alike.

Their planet, once covered with a beautiful forest, is now occupied by a glittering glass city. Long ago, when the Glister family learned to make glass, their furnaces were fueled by wood, and the forest was soon destroyed. The planet's inhabitants didn't realize that the scent from the trees repelled GHOSTS, horrible shapeless monsters who kidnap people, torture them, and change them into GHOSTS.

When the GHOSTS invaded the city, the already affluent Glisters seized the opportunity to increase their wealth by cutting down the last few trees and creating wooden GHOST shelters.

During the frequent GHOST attacks, the people are charged a fee to enter the GHOST shelters, then charged double to leave. Except for the GHOST shelters, the only remaining piece of wood is a pointy stick Captain K uses to combat the enemy.

According to an old story, the last living tree sits on an unidentified island in the middle of a lake. Its exact location can only be determined by decoding a map that is currently in the possession of the last member of the Glister family, Mister Glister.

When Rebecca is invited to Mister Glister's palatial home for tea, she plans to steal the map and find the GHOST tree, with or without her three unusual friends. Will her quest succeed, or will Mister Glister's greed finally destroy the inhabitants of the Forbidden Planet?

This exciting and creative quest tale is like a cross between The Wonderful Wizard of Oz: 100th Anniversary Edition (Books of Wonder) and The Lorax (Classic Seuss) with a dash of The Phantom Tollbooth thrown in. It illustrates how greed can lead a world to the brink of extinction, and how ordinary people can accomplish the extraordinary tasks necessary to restore the environment.

Not counting the maps on the front and back endpapers, the book contains forty-four whimsical illustrations by Larry Learmonth (thirty-two black and white, and twelve in color).

It is a shame that this book is out of print. Somebody, please reprint this!

I like having favorites all under one cover. Makes them easier to find.

In 'Reconstructing Christian Theology', Rebecca Chopp and Mark Lewis Taylor have brought together a collection of essays from a formidible cast of theologians. As part of a Workgroup that met together regularly to reshape and construct a new theology for the new millennium, Chopp and Taylor served to focus the group together in this text that, while it embraces a diversity of voices, theological traditions and methodologies, nonetheless serves as a solid foundation for students and other interested readers to reconstruct theology along new lines.

This is intended for use in theology classes in seminaries and universities, most particularly in systematic theology classes. Essays address the classic topics of systematic theology (God, Church, Humanity, Creation, etc.), but it does so in ways that address modern concerns as well as traditional theological questions. For instance, in discussion of Humanity before God, essays include a discussion of those who are handicapped and differently-abled, ideas of race and justice, and environmentalism and stewardship of creation. In looking at the tradition topic of Christology, care is also given to examine the unfortunate history of Christian anti-semitism (rather strange in some regards, given the Jewish origins of Christianity), and ideas of pluralism in an inter-religious context.

If there is one overarching idea that runs through the entire text, from start to finish, across all categories, it would be that of Hope. Hope for the future of humanity, humanity before God and humanity in community with each other and all of creation -- this is what theology is ultimately concerned with in all of its facets. The theologians in this text would agree that such Hope is not found in rote recitations of ancient texts rendered into Elizabethan English; such Hope is not found in blind allegiance to bibliolatry or dogmatic codes. Rather, this kind of Hope follows on from the broadest concept of God that encompasses all of creation in all of its diversity, looking for those life-affirming practices that honour all of God's world as reflecting God's will, and all of humanity as reflective of God's image.

Through the essays, one feature that is of central importance is that of teaching the ability to ask questions. There are, in fact, few final answers here. What stands in place of this is the guidance of these theologian-educators toward the proper framing of questions, and the methodology for searching for answers. The task of theology is an important one, but one is in for disappointment if one looks for unmediated absolutes; at the very least, our understanding, our senses, and our capacity for faith itself is imperfectly cast in our limited physical being, and therefore God will always be somewhat (if not moreso) a mystery.

The one drawback that this collection has is that is contains little of theological voices beyond the currently-dominant North American/Western European paradigm. While this theological reconstruction does take account of different voices and issues, it is still very much a product of its culture. The authors present the image of a collage as opposed to a melting pot, recognising that for many people (including many theologians), their differences cannot be 'melted away'. While no theology can escape its origins entirely, this text does a good job at trying to mitigate the negative influences cultural contexts can bring.

A useful text for classes, small groups, and individual study, 'Reconstructing Christian Theology' should prove to be an engaging and enlightening experience.