Books

No one has done more than N.T. Wright to make the broad sweep of the scriptural narrative speak vividly to laypeople--while challenging the academy by pressing profound motifs as far as they can go.

Twain wearied of lecture tours and struggled with guilt over his absence when two of his daughters died. In his final years, the public seemed to want Twain himself more than his books.

Eugene Peterson's new memoir, The Pastor, will be out in February (Century subscribers can read the excerpt from the book in the February 8 issue.) If any pastor has claimed the vocation, it's Peterson, who has grounded and inspired pastors for many years with books that include Under the Unpredictable Plant and The Contemplative Pastor.

Marilynne Robinson's first nonfiction volume since The Death of Adam is de­manding and elegant. Readers expecting a de­fense of theism against the new atheist fundamentalism, however, will be dis­appointed.

Adults underestimate children's capacity to experience God and reflect on that experience. This inhibits the gifts children and the church can bring to each other.