Presbyterian Outlook's Page Turners - For curious and compassionate readers 📚

Curious and compassionate readers Dear Outlook Readers,   I’m glad you can’t see my nightstand; it isn’t pretty. Neither is the stack of books just to the left of it. Or the second stack to the left of that one. The leaning towers of books continue to grow. The sheer volume of books being published today is overwhelming. I select carefully, with the hope that the Outlook will be a trusted resource for readers of Page Turners, our website, and magazine to find “just right” books.   This past week, I’ve been a part of several conversations at church about Chicago, and our church’s role in our community. We don’t always agree. In one particularly heated conversation, I slowly realized that what was presented as anger at the church was frustration with the world. My conversation partner was troubled by the changing landscape of Chicago – including race relations, civil life, the economy and more. They wanted the church to be a refuge while the church insisted on drawing the world in.   Friends, this is why I keep culling the stacks of books! So that I – and you – can come to these conversations better prepared. I pray our reading makes us curious and compassionate, familiar with perspectives, lifestyles and locations other than our own. May it be so.   Happy Reading, Amy Pagliarella Outlook Book Review Editor BOOK OF THE MONTH Disillusioned: Five Families and the Unraveling of America’s Suburbs Benjamin Herold Penguin Press, 496 pages Published January 23, 2024   I grew up in the suburbs. We moved multiple times; my parents simply choosing another middle-class suburb based on the quality of the public schools and proximity to a shopping mall (I was, after all, a teenager in the ‘80s). I took all of this for granted in the way that children often do, assuming that my experiences were the norm. Journalist Benjamin Herold’s new work dispels this myth.   Most books that cross my desk focus on the challenges of urban and rural communities; Disillusioned describes how similar issues play out in suburban communities that grew up around major cities. Herold posits that the portrait of suburban America as a place of upward mobility for all is an illusion. He offers a well-researched perspective on how national issues around race, class, education and more are alive and (not) well in suburban areas.   Herold deftly combines historical factors (e.g. housing discrimination/redlining, the impact of legal and legislative decisions), with contemporary depictions of race, class and the American education system. This look back is essential, but it’s the modern stories that make Disillusioned compelling. The five families Herold follows are diverse including Black, White, Hispanic and mixed-race families that fall into the middle and upper class with children in public or private schools. Yet, all the families seek a school where their children can thrive. Unsurprisingly, the families who can afford to relocate to farther and more homogenous suburbs have better options. And the COVID pandemic hits them all — hard.   Herold treats his subjects with compassion. Whether describing a Black mom advocating for her child against a disproportionately punitive school system or a White mom relocating her family into a more homogeneous (i.e. White) school system, Herold withholds judgment. He does not, however, let us off the hook. Herold returns to his hometown outside Pittsburgh, where he confronts his own complicity in the system — first through the ways families like his fled communities when Black neighbors moved in and then, more powerfully, as he responds to being called out for his own, more nuanced racism.   I won’t spoil the ending here, but Herold writes, “I’d seen in the experiences of other people’s children how my own comfortable middle-class life was built on a series of injustices large and small … I’d still assumed someone else would clean up the mess that my family had left behind, still assumed someone else would shoulder the burden of repairing America while I kept reaping its riches.” Disillusioned is not prescriptive, yet this clear call to action motivates. QUOTE OF THE MONTH “If you haven’t already, you will turn to the world one day and ask what it demands of you. You will look out on your community and want it to be better. I write this, then, as a letter to you as you begin to roll up your sleeves and engage in the hard labor of making your world a better place. “ The Work is the Work: Letters to a Future Activist Publishing May 7, 2024 Broadleaf Books, 205 pages Brian Johnson Book Giveaway!  Congratulations to last month’s winner Paul H. Grier. Thanks to our generous partners at Bethany House, they received Joy Marie Clarkson You Are a Tree: and Other Metaphors to Nourish Life, Thought, and Prayer. This month, one fortunate reader will receive a copy of this month’s quoted book The Work Is the Work by Brian C. Johnson, kindly donated by the folks at Broadleaf Books. If you're reading this note, then you're all set! Know someone else who should be reading Page Turners? Send them this link and they'll get entered for a chance to win, too. The contest closes on May 22.   OTHER READS A Faith of Many Rooms: Inhabiting a More Spacious Christianity by Debie Thomas, reviewed by Sarah S. Scherschligt Somehow: Thoughts on Love by Anne Lamott, reviewed by Amy Pagliarella Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure by Maggie Jackson, reviewed by Amy Pagliarella Trash: A Poor White Journey by Cedar Monroe, reviewed by Amy Pagliarella

Join Faith and Money Network TONIGHT for a free 90-minute webinar with Miguel Escobar, author of The Unjust Steward: Wealth, Poverty and the Church Today. On Wednesday, April 24, from 7:00-8:30 pm Eastern, Escobar will discuss what early Church thinkers have to say about money and generosity. Register now >