Books I Read In June

I read more books in June than any other month in at least a year and a half. After my mom died my mind was elsewhere, so reading wasn't a priority. I feel like I'm finally getting into a new normal mentally and emotionally, and the first thing to come back has been the desire to read.

Our second God's Outlaws Wild West VBS lesson was on Ruth, and I found this small book called A New Time & Place: Preparing Yourself to Receive God's Best about Ruth Journey of Faith. I loved this look at how Ruth left the "old" everything behind when she made the decision to join Naomi in Israel and picked up the "new" everything instead. Her switch is compared to ours when we're saved - we leave the old ways, old motives, old thoughts behind when we choose to follow Christ. Such a good book with lots of new insights to share with the teens.

For my history book, I found Confronting the Presidents at HalfPrice Books. Score! Bill O'Reilly adds some lesser-known stories about each of our presidents to their familiar history to analyze how effective they were as leaders. There was so much I didn't know, and I'll probably have to read it again someday to process it all. Each chapter ends with the death of the president and transitions into the next with a hint of what's to come. I loved that it was the good, the bad, and the ugly of each president in a 250-year biography of our Commander-in-Chief.

Passing through Barnes and Noble a couple of months ago I happened to see the title Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone. Who wouldn't be intrigued by a title like that? Me, usually. I've never been into mystery or thrillers, but lately I've found a few that have been pretty intriguing. The layout of this plot is incredible, interesting, and completely unique. I was hooked and read it in like two days.

At the end of the book I learned that Benjamin Stevenson wrote a sequel - Everyone On This Train is a Suspect. It continues the story, taking it to a moving crime scene with a new cast of suspects. So much fun! And at the end of that book, I learned that there was a Christmas sequel - Everyone This Christmas Has A Secret. And do they ever! The whole trilogy was addictive, and I was reading every word to see if I could solve them along with him. I was close...

I also read two books that I'm not going to recommend today. I'm not even going to share the titles or authors with you because I wouldn't read them again. And that's ok. It's totally fine to not love every book you read or think other people will get anything out of it. That's part of the adventure of reading.

So I read seven books in June, and my heart couldn't be happier. What was on your TBR pile for June?

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