Whistler, Ann Patchett. HarperCollins (ISBN: 9780063511637) 2026.
Summary: When Daphne Fuller runs into the stepfather she hadn’t seen for forty years, they reconnect, understanding the bond between them.
It was supposed to be a day for Daphne and Jonathan Fuller to enjoy being together at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Then Jonathan notices that an older man is following them. And they are unable to elude him. Finally, they talk to him to discover that the man is Eddie Triplett, Daphne’s stepfather. It has been over 40 years since she last saw him. She’d more or less put the brief time her stepfather was in her life away in a box. He’s now in his seventies but still working as an editor at a major publishing house.
And yet we discover that there is a deep bond, forged in a traumatic accident. Between meetings in the present, the story flashes back to the accident and the events that unfolded that winter night. While Daphne’s sister Leda was in the hospital for appendicitis, Eddie picked up Daphne after school on a cold wintry evening. Before taking her home in their big Chevy station wagon, he wanted to take her to out to a raspberry farm at the top of a hill. However, he missed a turn and they slid off the road into the woods. Eddie injured his left ankle, trapped under the emergency brake, as well as his left shoulder. Daphne, in her seat belt, only had a bad facial cut.
During their time in the car, we learn the story of Whistler, a horse in a story Eddie never published. The author never submitted it for publication. The horse rescues its owner and the story was so powerful that Eddie had a rendering of Whistler in his office. We come to see there is more than one Whistler in the story.
Jonathan, a hospital administrator Daphne met while caring for her dying father, Buddy Zabriskie, is away in Wisconsin, cleaning out his parents home. He’s also reconnecting with the past. In fact, reconnecting and understanding is an important part of this book. When she and Eddie go to meet Skip and Polly Hotalling, she learns the real reason her mother divorced Eddie. It wasn’t because of the accident. She comes to a reckoning with all three men who had been “fathers.” And she comes to understand more of her mother, with whom she hadn’t been close.
Most of all, as Daphne revisits the events of forty years ago, she recognizes qualities that have been part of who she is–with Eddie, with Jonathan, with the girls she teaches. She also learns lessons about life’s impermanence from Eddie and how accepting that can yield happiness.
Acceptance of life’s givenness seems to be a quality of Patchett’s most recent books. There is a maturity here that I can’t help but thinks reflects a maturity in Patchett. As always, Patchett writes with exquisite beauty. Added to this are the deepened insights of coming to terms with one’s past, one’s people, and one’s self.
New Testament Ethics, Cherryl Hunt, Nicholas J. Moore, and Timothy J. Murray, editors, foreword by Luke Timothy Johnson. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (ISBN: 9780802884503) 2026.
Summary: Critical and constructive essays discussing Richard B. Hays “The Moral Vision of the New Testament” thirty years later.
What Hays does in this book is establish a methodology of moving from the texts of the New Testament to applications to contemporary issues. He follows a four step process. He begins with describing the moral witness of the New Testament texts. Then, he synthesizes that material into three focal images he argues are foundational to New Testament ethics. From here, he engages the hermeneutical or interpretive task, drawing upon text as the “norming norm” but also weighing church tradition, reason, and experience. Finally, he addresses the pragmatic task of using this framework to address five “test cases” which vary in terms of the amount of textual material available.
In this book, a wide array of scholars engage Hays’ work thirty years later. Sadly, Richard Hays passed away in 2025, before this work’s publication. However, it honors his scholarship in the best way possible, carrying the conversation he began forward. The book is organized into three parts after an introductory essay by the editors.
Part 1: Hermeneutics: Approaching New Testament Ethics
This part addresses the methodological questions arising from Hays’ proposal. Andrew Cowan challenges Hays’ emphasis on narrative, asserting that other New Testament genres contribute paradigms for ethical decision making. Likewise, Andrew Goddard challenges his ideas about narrative, but from the perspective that scripture might better be understood as drama. Miles Tradewell focus upon, affirms, and extends Hays’ work on metaphor, incorporating recent scholarship.
Channing Crisler addresses Hays’ three focal images of community, cross, and new creation, proposing justification as a fourth. While justification is an important New Testament theme, I was not convinced that it spans the full New Testament corpus. Finally, Walter Moberly compares Moral Vision with The Widening of God’s Mercy, describing what changed for Richard in his views about LGBTQ sexuality. He observes that Hays does not change his reading of the texts but sets them within a widening trajectory of God’s mercy. He also notes the distinctive contributions of his son, Christopher.
Part 2: Exegesis: Mapping New Testament Ethics
The contributors in this section focus on the description of the contribution of particular texts or authors to New Testament ethics. The ethics of material possessions in Luke’s gospel is the focus of Carl-Magnus Carlstein and Rebekah Eklund. Specificallly, this advances Hays’ work in addressing at length a topic hays only briefly touched on in his conclusion. Then Kai Akagi considers the role of the fear of the Lord in moral motivation as it appears in Acts.
Richard B. Hays noted the inclusive focus of love in John’s Gospel. However, Elizabeth Corsar takes exception to that, arguing for a strong connection between love and mission, and that this is consistent with the rest of the New Testament. She considers it to be another focal image. Andrew Boakye explores the connection of the resurrection to ethics, arguing it is foundational to human equity. Finally, Amy Peeler discusses the theme of patient endurance in Hebrews and how it relates to his three focal images. She also suggests a fourth focal image, that of covenant. Given that Hays did not discuss Hebrews in his work, this essay makes a signal contribution.
Part 3: Themes: Practicing New Testament Ethics
The essays in this section focus on Hays’ “pragmatic” task, taking specific issues, offering examples of using the New Testament in ethical discernment. Annalisa Phillips Wilson discusses sex and celibacy in light of 1 Corinthians 7, avoiding either simplistic valorizing of marriage or exalting celibacy. Likewise, Elizabeth Hare and Nicholas Moore focus on relationality in Luke-Acts against the global health crisis of loneliness. They examine the narratives of Zacchaeus, Aquila and priscilla, and Apollos.
Yung Suk Kim takes Hays discussion of ethnic conflict further, looking at Paul’s body metaphor. Then Cherryl Hunt applies Hays’ methodology to the ecological crisis. Her essay underscored how little material in the New Testament directly addresses this theme, compared to the Old Testament. She gets at this by radically reinterpreting Hays’ focal images, extending them to the whole creation. Finally, John Barclay concludes in what is perhaps the most challenging of the essay in addressing wealth, and the New Testament warnings of its dangers.
Concluding Comments
I thought this volume a fitting tribute to Hays. Many of the essays emphasized the enduring value of his methodological framework as well as his focal images. I particularly appreciated the extension of his work on the topics of wealth and possessions, especially John Barclay’s concluding essay. Likewise, Hays did not utilize the full New Testament canon in his original work and so Amy Peeler’s work on Hebrews and the idea of patient endurance most helpful. And Kai Akagi and his essay on the fear of the Lord in Acts and its OT resonances of great value. I think, were Hays have been able to write an afterword, as was planned, he would have been deeply appreciative of both the critical and constructive work of these essays.
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
Becoming Neighbors, Amar D. Peterman. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (ISBN: 9780802884121) 2026.
Summary: Seeking the local common good through shared tables, neighbor love, building together, and faithful presence.
Many of us have despaired as we look at the deep national divisions in the politics of our country. Why can’t our political representatives come together for the common good of all our citizens? I’ve about concluded that this is a quixotic quest and only a work of God can change things, which I still pray for.
But there is an old saw that “all politics is local.” Furthermore, while we are instructed to pray for our leaders, we are commanded to love our neighbors. In this book, Amar D. Peterman takes that command seriously and presses into what that love might look like in the real neighborhoods where we live. This follows the pattern of the incarnation, where God took on flesh and broke bread with real people.
In fact, Jesus spent a lot of time at tables. Peterman reflects deeply upon this as a core practice of neighboring. He explores why we would desire this and roots it in love of God and those with whom we share the table. In fact, we join what God is already doing in our neighborhood. We recognize God has already been loving our neighbors and we love them in God. So we look for good in those we encounter, believing the good God is present. We believe community is possible because the God who is present is community, the eternal fellowship of three persons in one Being. And because of the diverse nature of our communities, the goodness we encounter is a potluck. Each dish reflects the story of our neighbors.
Neighbor love isn’t a feeling but something we do. Peterman outlines six practices of neighbor love: compassion, humility, translation, resonance, lamentation, and accompaniment. The last four spoke to me. Translation speaks in the neighbor’s language. Resonance listens to the tone of our neighbors and matches it. Lamentation aches for and mourns what grieves our neighbors. Accompaniment is presence, showing up for others.
He describes neighbors as building together, and in fact, this happens, whether a playground, a community garden, or even a shared enterprise. We can take great encouragement that Jesus, our prophet, priest, and king joins us in this work. Prophets cast vision and clear rubble. Priests come with the vision of the table and sketch out what that might look like in a community-a food pantry, a shared dining space, a community garden. Then kings marshal the resources to support the vision and lead out in realizing it. But we will only know what to build through faithful presence, accompaniment.
Finally, Peterman explores what it means to live as neighbors. He suggests the image of being hopeful gardeners, believing in the power of Jesus to bring his resurrection life. Peterman also likens us to kintsugi artists, taking the given fragments and mending them together. Neighbor love is not controlling but waiting and working to see how God will bring the broken fragments of a neighborhood together.
What Peterman does in this book is cast a theological vision of neighbor love. I have to admit wrestling with what that means in our relatively private suburban neighborhood. I feel we are a long way from neighborhood potlucks. But our pastor has challenged us to get to know our neighbor’s names and pray for them. On walks, I’ve met some, and had to confess my chagrin at not knowing the names of those who’d lived as neighbors for some years. I do think restoring local community is a starting point. I wish there were more of a roadmap for what this looks like in neighborhoods like mine. Perhaps faithful presence, the attentive waiting to see what God wants to build is the starting point. And Peterman’s six practices of neighbor love are a good guide.
When I was in college ministry we talked about “developing world-changers.” But in my retirement years, I have to admit to resonating more with Peterman’s message of loving my physical neighbors well. That may actually be the greater challenge. It is certainly part of the greatest commandment!
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
Summary: Shortly after moving, Oscar starts seeing things and joins school journalists to solve a mystery.
Oscar had just moved to a new town in time to start his freshman year at Centerville High School. Due to a limp from an accident, he worried how he’d fit in. Of course, there were bullies to help realize his worst nightmares. At home, after the first day of school, he was thinking over the day when a mysterious silver orb appeared in front of him replaying a scene from the day. Was their old house haunted?
Then he began to see orbs elsewhere, and in front of other people. They seemed to occur whenever people were reflecting. But this didn’t help with his most pressing struggles. The bullies. The self-absorbed Mr. Shell, a health teacher who advised student council, and the ever-present Shane and Penelope. And he missed his friends, especially Regan, who seemed put off when he told her about the orbs.
Mrs. Robinson (“Mrs. R.”) saved the day. She was his English teacher and advisor for The Argus, the school paper. Although he said little, she seemed to take a special interest, as did Annie, the student editor of the paper. Slowly, he was finding friends. The staff of The Argus. A wheelchair-bound student named Timothy. Bobby Kim, an athlete. An art student. Eventually, Mrs. R and several of the students including Annie help him see he’s not the only one with unusual gifts. As a group, they describe themselves as Sensates.
And in short order, they have to put those gifts to work. Someone has spraypainted what seems like a racist message on a display case for the Scotties, an all-girl pipe and drum group. The questions go deeper than the vandalism and who did it. Very quickly, the school’s investigation is stopped. And pictures of the vandalism are removed from social media. Who is behind this and why? The Argus journalists and especially the Sensates put all their investigative skills and gifts to work. Even Timothy helps out, deploying his knowledge of how to use the old mimeograph machines and typewriters in the basement of Oscar’s dad’s bookstore.
In the process, Oscar not only forms new friendships but also comes to understand the role of prayer and how God can help him as the team investigates a dark conspiracy. He also learns that words are powerful and that, as Mrs. R is fond of quoting, “The truth will out.”
This is the first in what will be a three book Sensate Saga. One thing we discover at the very end of this first book is that not all the Sensates are on the side of good. The books are written for middle grade readers. In addition to being a page-turner, I found myself, even fifty years out from high school, connecting with feelings of fitting in, dealing with bullies, and the different personalities of teachers. I remember my own stumbling attempts to figure out what it meant to trust God at school.
In addition, Everts makes his lead character a bi-cultural student with a disability. Mrs. R is Black and the student journalists include East and South Asian students in addition to Oscar. Annie models strong female leadership. There is a strong anti-racism message. This is a book that connects with diverse audiences. But above all, this is good storytelling. I look forward to reading the next two books in the Sensate Saga!
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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
This was the month I read Jill Lepore’s book on the constitution for our nation’s 250th birthday and finished my fourth Jane Austen novel. I also finally read Richard Hayes landmark book on New Testament ethics. Then I reviewed the second discussion guide for moms, just as good as the first, from Kathy Tuan-Maclean and Tara Edelschick. In theology, I read wonderful books on God’s glory, on the atonement in Leviticus (!), on cultural apologetics, and on biblical interpretation from an Indigenous Peoples perspective. Then, I discovered The Felse Investigations, by Ellis Peters, reading two of them. Along the way, I reviewed John Green on tuberculosis, an inspiring memoir beginning with a near-fatal fall, and a book on disability. I would also highlight books on the peace prayer of St. Francis and a rich book on the eucharist. There are a number of other treasures in this list–twenty-two in all! Maybe you’ll find some good ones for that last month of summer.
The Reviews
Desolation Mountain (Cork O’Connor, 17) William Kent Krueger. Atria Paperback (ISBN: 9781501147470) 2019. When a U.S. senator’s plane crashes, Cork seeks the truth behind the crash and Stephen, a recurring dream. Review
Feasting onHope, Hannah Miller King, foreword by Esau McCaulley. InterVarsity Press | Formatio (ISBN: 9781514011140) 2026. Through her own story of loss, shows how Communion sets our grief within the larger reality of Christian hope. Review
Reading Evangelicals, Daniel Silliman. Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (ISBN: 9780802886477) 2025. A study of how the Christian fiction evangelicals read in recent decades shaped the evangelical imagination. Review
Make Me an Instrument of Your Peace, Mark DeYmaz. NavPress (ISBN: 9798898020170) 2026. A reflection on the Prayer of St Francis and how we might be transformed into instruments of peace. Review
The Red and the Green, Iris Murdoch. Open Road Integrated Media (ISBN: 9781453201190) 2010, first published in 1965. The tangled lives and loves of a Dublin Irish family at the time of the Irish Rebellion of Easter Monday 1916. Review
Reading the Bible on Turtle Island, T. Christopher Hoklotubbe and H. Daniel Zacharias, foreword by Shari Russell. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514007563) 2025. A reading of scripture that takes North American indigenous culture and experience seriously. Review
The Gospel After Christendom, edited by Collin Hansen, Skyler R. Fowers, and Ivan Mesa. Zondervan Reflective (ISBN: 9780310175476) 2025. An intro to cultural apologetics, explaining how it is done and in what context, and what questions it answers. Review
Beauty and Resistance, Jonathan P. Walton. InterVarsity Press (ISBN: 9781514012284) 2025. A rule of life for those engaged in justice efforts in which beauty and resistance flow from a rested life. Review
Enacting Atonement (Studies in Christian Doctrine and Scripture), Roy McDaniel. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514012529) 2025. A study of the burnt offering of Leviticus 1:1-9 and how it displays the logic of atonement fulfilled in Christ. Review
We the People, Jill Lepore. Liveright (ISBN: 9781631496080) 2025. A history of the Constitution, focusing on the amendments and how difficult it has been to amend the constitution. Review
The Knocker on Death’s Door (The Felse Investigations, 10), Ellis Peters. Mysterious Press (ISBN: 9781504027151) 2015, first published in 1970. Felse investigates two assaults, one a murder, by a church door that has a legend associated with its knocker. Review
Moms on the Way (IVP Bible Study Experience), Kathy Tuan-Maclean and Tara Edelschick. IVP Bible Studies (ISBN: 9781514014202) 2026. A seven week Bible study for groups with personal readings on following Jesus through the challenges of motherhood. Review
The Earth Will Be Filled, (Essential Studies in Biblical Theology), Donnie Berry. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514010778) 2025. The glory of God in scripture, that God reveals his glory to his people and through them, to fill the earth. Review
Words that Shape Us, Ken Waters, foreword by John Ferré. Integratio Press (ISBN: 9781959685296) 2025. A comparative analysis of four evangelical periodicals coverage of American politics and faith from 2016 to 2024. Review
Theo of Golden, Allen Levi. Atria Books (ISBN: 9781668236512) 2025. An old man moves to Golden, sees portraits in a coffee shop and in powerful personal encounters gives them to their owners. Review
Persuasion, Jane Austen. Penguin Classics (ISBN: 9780141439686) 2003, first published 1817. Will Anne Elliot retrieve the missed opportunity of a broken engagement with Captain Wentworth eight years later? Review
The Way of Dante (Hansen Lectureship Series), Richard Hughes Gibson, afterword by Nicole Mazzarella. IVP Academic (ISBN: 9781514013380) 2025. Lectures exploring how C.S. Lewis, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Charles Williams read Dante’s “Divine Comedy.” Review
The Moral Vision of the New Testament, Richard B. Hays. HarperOne (ISBN: 9780060637965) 1996. A methodology for New Testament ethics centered on community, the cross, and the new creation. Review
Falling Into a Good Life (Literary Scholar), Laurel Richardson. Paper Stars Press (ISBN: 9781737862451) 2026. Laurel Richardson miraculously recovered from a serious fall leading to a reinventing of her life in a new place. Review
Everything is Tuberculosis, John Green. Crash Course Books (ISBN: 9780525556572) 2025. A scientific and social history of this deadly disease seen up close in the struggle of one young man to live. Review
A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs (The Felse Investigations, 4) Ellis Peters. Open Road Media (ISBN: 9781504027090) 2015, first published in 1965. When a poet’s tomb is opened, two newer bodies are found, the poet’s is missing and his wife’s buried alive. Review
Best Book of the Month
Everyone I know raved about the book. So I was prepared to be disappointed. Instead, I was absolutely delighted with Allen Levi’s Theo of Golden. In encounters with people, Theo notices and names the best in people and invites them to live into that. Not only that, he is humbly and sometimes, anonymously generous. Genuinely good characters who aren’t sickly sweet are hard to create. However, Levi succeeds with Theo. Even sadness and anger are turned to good. Then the book gently invites us to consider being Theos in a world desperately in need of them. I’m late to the party on this one, but if you haven’t read it, it will warm your heart!
Quote of the Month
The idea of the “glory of God” is difficult for all of us to wrap our minds around. But in The Earth Will Be Filled, Donnie Berry surveys how the glory of God is portrayed throughout scripture. Thus he offers this definition, that I found quite helpful:
“Glory refers to all the fullness of the triune God–the fullness of his wisdom, love, creativity, beauty, strength, compassion, justice, life, joy–all that makes him weighty and wonderful, made manifest for us to see, experience, respond to, and, perhaps most surprisingly, participate in” (p. 7).
What I’m Reading
I’m just beginning The Wounded Generation, by David Nasaw. Before we knew about PTSD, the veterans of World War II returned home. But they experienced its symptoms. My father was a World War II veteran and proud of his service (so were we). But he never said much about his time in Europe, apart from meeting a famous general. I wonder now if he carried invisible wounds from that war.
I’m also reading The Black Agenda, a set of essays written during the pandemic about Black aspirations. Sadly, much of this falls on unreceptive ears at present. With the film adaptation of The Odyssey, there is interest in reading the classics. Nadya Williams offers a great introduction, especially for Christians, to reading the Greek and Latin Classics. Guards! Guards! is the eighth in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, and like all of them, just good fun.
Finally, Oh What A Day by John B. Hatch with contributions from Phil Keaggy chronicles the artistry of this pioneer Christian recording artist by walking track by track through his first solo album. This takes me back to my Christian roots in the Jesus Movement. He sang at the same rally where I first testified publicly to my faith, on the front lawn of my church. We were not only from the same hometown of Youngstown. We also lived for a time on the same street, he renting from a woman whose grass I cut. I heard him work on some of the music on this album and perform the songs live. With this book, I’ve dusted off my fifty-year-old recording and am appreciating anew the sheer musicality of songs that were part of my own spiritual journey.
The Month in Reviews is my monthly review summary going back to 2014!It’s a great way to browse what I’ve reviewed. The search box on this blog also works well if you are looking for a review of a particular book. So, thanks for stopping byand feel free to share this with others!
I wish we could be done with talking about AI, at least as it has to do with the world of books and publishing. But this week brought more disturbing stories. Booksellers, including antiquarian booksellers receiving requests from AI companies to purchase old books. What is driving it is that with all the AI-slop in publishing, AI companies are looking for “slop-free” books to train its AI. Also, because of some court rulings deciding that “bought books” used to train AI may fall under “fair use” rather than copyright provisions, going this route is more attractive to avoid litigation.
Book publicist Kathleen Schmidt highlighted another problem. Writers are running into problems with “false-positive” AI scans of their works. And because AI scrapes so many of these writers, it may become increasingly difficult to distinguish human versus AI authored works. It makes me wonder if publishers might give up at some time. Schmidt’s article is so important I’ve featured it below.
I don’t know how to put the genie back into the bottle. But here’s what I’d like to see. Publishers say a hard “no” to AI works. Amazon says a hard “no” and stops allowing people to upload ten “self-published” books a week to their site. All booksellers and libraries reserve their shelves for human generated works. And those who submit AI works dishonestly are banned from publishing for at least ten years. And put in place protections to prevent rare and important works from being destroyed.
Five Articles Worth Reading
“Who Is Emma M. Lion, and Why Can’t Readers Get Enough of Her?” is the title of a profile of Beth Brower. Her self-published “diaries” of Victorian Emma M. Lion have been a hit. I found this fascinating simply for the fact that it is off the beaten path of what I read.
People have argued for some time of the importance of The Bible simply for cultural literacy. In “The Bible Belongs in the Classroom,” Adam Kirsch is the latest to make this case. But I think he might be saying more than he even intends when he concludes, “But if reading snippets of the Bible in class inspires any students to keep exploring, they might well end up shocked that this is a book their teachers and parents encouraged them to read.”
Kathleen Schmidt’s article on “AI Accusations and Book Publishing” underscored for me the growing distrust of author submissions that has resulted from AI generated text and the threat this is to both aspiring and established writers.
Then one of the more fascinating reviews I came across this week was of The Disease of Boredom: From Ancient Philosophy to Modern Psychology by Josefa Ros Velasco. In “The Noonday Devil,” Valerie Stivers discusses acedia and the centuries of Christian thought about this “deadly sin.”
“Read the Novels and Forget Everything Else” explores the life of Patrick O’Brian who wrote novels, particularly the Aubrey-Maturin sea stories that were better than he was. I loved these books, both for the descriptions of sailing tall ships and for the deep relationship between Aubrey and Maturin.
Quote of the Week
Emily Brontë, born July 24, 1818 gives this blunt definition of honesty:
“Honest people don’t hide their deeds.”
Miscellaneous Musings
I’m curious whether the Odyssey will result in any long-term interest in the classics. I suspect more will come from those in the home-school and classical education movements.
I’m a good way into Ann Patchett’s Whistler. I’ve read a number of her works and have felt that as she matures, so do her characters in their outlook and choices. I wonder if others have felt this.
Finally, I’ve been wondering what I was reading in 1976. The only book which immediately comes to mind is Os Guinness In Two Minds, a fascinating book about doubt, still one of the best in my mind. He wrote so many other significant books, including The Call.
Next Week’s Reviews
Monday: The Month in Reviews: July 2026
Tuesday: Don Everts, Oscar and the Mystery of the Glowing Orbs
Wednesday: Amar D. Peterman, Becoming Neighbors
Thursday: Cherryl Hunt, Nicholas J. Moore, and Timothy J. Murray, New Testament Ethics
Friday: Ann Patchett, Whistler
So, that’s The Weekly Wrap for July 26-August 1.
Find past editions of The Weekly Wrap under The Weekly Wrap heading on this page.
