PicoBlog

THE AIM for this newsletter is to share with you my analysis of a recent article in The Atlantic by Jerry Useem that tells the story of the decline of America’s manufacturing might and the consequences paid by Boeing after twenty-five years of deliberate decisions by five successive CEOs to extract the company from their original constancy of purpose as a builder to merely an assembler of what others have made.

Earlier this month, as you have likely heard, a door blew off of a Boeing 737 Max 9 in midair. Fortunately, while one teenager’s shirt was sucked off, nobody suffered serious injuries. Airlines have been inspecting the doors on their 737 Max 9 aircraft, and they’re reportedly finding issues with bolts that keep the doors in place. Late one night last week, I had some time to ponder this while sitting on a Boeing plane that was having a technical malfunction on the ground.

I originally wrote this comparison article right after our book fair wrapped up in September. That was before the news broke about Scholastic’s decision to have an “opt-out/-in” option for “diverse books.” This is a complicated topic, and I particularly appreciate this comment from Pen America (a non-profit organization that “stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide”): “What we understand was conceived as a practical adaptation to keep book fairs going in a fraught legal and political climate is clearly at risk of being twisted to accomplish censorious ends.

There is a good rhetorical question wedged somewhere in the middle of the insane, intertextual self-published book Sadly, Porn, by the blogger of The Last Psychiatrist fame. Which is worse: if your serious partner of a long time cheated on you full of lust, or with no lust? Most people would choose “no lust” but, he argues, this is worse. Because you have made a life with someone who is OK with cheating on you with someone they’re not even attracted to.

(This review contains spoilers.) Brazen: My Unorthodox Journey from Long Sleeves to Lingerie is the much-awaited memoir by Julia Haart, star of Netflix show ‘My Unorthodox Life.’ The book is billed as a triumphant feminist story of a woman who escaped a fundamentalist community- the ultra-Orthodox yeshivish world- to the freedom of modern, secular America. However, the act of writing reveals more truths than we intend. Upon reading the book, I was far more sympathetic to Julia Haart than I had been when watching the show.

Elisabeth Elliot: A Life by Lucy S. R. Austen (Crossway, 2023). When I was growing up, the name Elisabeth Elliot meant one thing to me: Passion and Purity, her 1984 book that helped shape the views of an evangelical generation on love, sex, and marriage. It was a very long time before I could hear her name without mentally wincing. Elliot’s life and career, in fact, were a strange mixture of striving to live authentically for God, and advocating standards that she herself had found impossible to live up to.

The Woman They Wanted: Shattering the Illusion of the Good Christian Wife by Shannon Harris (Broadleaf Books, 2023). Consider this review a sequel of sorts to my review of Elisabeth Elliot from a couple of months ago. In a very real sense, Shannon Harris was an heiress of Elisabeth Elliot’s legacy. Shannon’s husband, Joshua Harris, was deeply influenced by Elliot’s Passion and Purity when he wrote I Kissed Dating Goodbye, his seminal book on Christian courtship.

Because I am a giant nerd, one of my favourite things in life to do is watch a movie or show immediately after reading the story it was adapted from. In the past, I was often left disappointed when a movie wasn’t exactly what I expected based on the book. And I felt, like many do, that the book is always better. But the book will always be better, and we will always be left disappointed if we go into an adaptation with that attitude.

Billie Breslin has traveled far from her home in California to take a job at Delicious!, New York’s most iconic food magazine. Away from her family, particularly her older sister, Genie, Billie feels like a fish out of water—until she is welcomed by the magazine’s colorful staff. She is also seduced by the vibrant downtown food scene, especially by Fontanari’s, the famous Italian food shop where she works on weekends. Then Delicious!