Absolutely devoured this read. Made driving to the grocery store so much easier! Definitely will recommend this listen to a fellow book nerd

Garland compares beliefs about the afterlife, funerary issues like mummification and embalming, and general attitudes to death and dying across the peoples of the ancient world. Unfortunately the ancient world in this book only covers the various ancient societies of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, Rome (only the original kingdom, not the full empire), plus the Etruscans, Jewish people, early Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and Zoroastrians. That's a lot of course, but look at a map and you see what a very small part of the ancient world. Nothing east of India or west of Italy, north of Italy or south of Egypt. So while it is really interesting, I'm hoping for a volume two covering the Far East, Africa, Australia, and the whole western half of the world.

People traveled in the 12th-15t centuries. Merchants sought new markets, diplomats finagled treaties, and anyone who could get the necessary funding and permissions took religious pilgrimages. Bale explores the most common holy and trade routes based on what the travelers wrote in journals and guidebooks. It is very interesting, but too limited. Bale points out several times that Christians (Roman and Eastern/Greek), Muslims, and Jewish pilgrims visited many of the same places in Constantinople and Jerusalem. We only have the Christian, and almost exclusively Western European Christian, stories. One small chapter near the end follows Asian travelers’ adventures in the west. Ma Huan (Chinese Muslim), Het’um (Armenian Christian), and Rabban Bar Sauma (Christian Mongol) don’t represent the majority of nonEuropeans. A broader range of viewpoints and less personal commentary from the author would improve the book.

Absolutely loved this book. Will for sure read more by this author. HEA plus hockey romance, what more could you ask for. Lots of spice also!!

Dowager Queen Ravenna has ruled through subtle and not-so-subtle manipulation of her late husband and now her son. King Roland hated his father and fears his mother. Queen Falaise, alternately bullied and ignored by men, might be a lot than more than anyone realizes. Denzel is Roland’s cousin and closest friend, but where do his loyalties really lie? Kade Carrion, Queen of Air and Darkness and Roland’s illegitimate older sister, returns to court. Is she part of the plot to kill the royals and use the fae to start a war with the neighboring kingdom? Years of distrust separates the family. They might survive if they work together.

Annie Adams is settling into village life after solving her great aunt’s murder. She meet’s eccentric Peony Lane, the woman who predicted Great Aunt Frances’s murder way back in 1967. Peony has another old prediction, one she gave to the wrong person. And this one also leafs to a dead body in Annie’s new home and Annie fitting together pieces from the latest murder with a cold case.

Very interesting read on women of color and their stories in the United States …………………..,..,.:::..:..

Love the book great storyline

BBC radio asked C. S. Lewis to talk about Christianity and morality for the everyman after the worldwide destruction of WWII. Lewis describes himself as an amateur Christian unable to debate the finer points of higher theology. His focus is more being a good person and living an ethical, and what that means for Christians and non-Christians. Mere Christianity is the printed version of those radio chats.

This is always an ongoing read for me. I bought the special edition from b&n years ago and read it with my teen and tween