If I were asked to name my single favorite author, many would be surprised not to hear me say J. K. Rowling. While the Harry Potter series is most likely my favorite series or perhaps one of the individual books is my favorite book, I would most likely name Donald Miller as my favorite author.
Blue Like Jazz is his main successful novel, and I would advocate that it is his best, but also wrote Searching for God Knows What, another great book.
But this is all beside the point. I just finished reading Miller's Through Painted Deserts, which was the very first book that he wrote. He published it originally in the mid-90s to very little success. He released Blue Like Jazz a few years later, became well-known with it, then changed up this old book a bit and re-released it a few years later.
The book is a memoir of a road trip across the country in an ancient VW van that Miller took when he was only a littler older than I am (he's now 30s or 40s). He grew up in Texas, so the road trip began there, and the trip led him and a buddy to Oregon (he has resided in Portland for about a decade I believe). (A large reason why I like him is because he talks about Portland a ton. He goes to Imago Dei, a church in Portland that I've gone to quite a few times, and he even mentions the church's beginnnings in Blue Like Jazz).
Along the way, he discusses subjects that get down to the core of life that one is incapable of addressing while residing in a sidewalk-ville city. They lose track of time after only a day ("Our friends back home live an existence under the weight and awareness of time; a place we are slowly escaping; a world growing fainter by the hour and the mile."), and begin to think about the "why" questions of life instead of simply pondering "how" to be happy or successful.
Donald Miller does not fail to get the mind going in his seamless fashion in this book. He once again addresses issues of utmost importance while writing carelessly and readably. If you've never read any of his work, please go read Blue Like Jazz immediately. Through Painted Deserts is very worthy of a read but does not quite reach the caliber of his first hit.
LB
Currently listening to: Aladdin soundtrack
1 comment:
ohhhh aladdin soundtrack! crazy!!
lovin it lovin it! I am very interested to read this book and will definately have to find it when i get back if not down here. I really want to read it1çby the way the blog shows up well except for the things you typed, in spanish down here. I am at my school chillin waiting another few hours for class to start yay! umm ok I am going to go read other ones . . . and leave notes hopefully there too!
Post a Comment