Let's go California

I'm really going. I'm thrilled! I still can't believe it. I never expected this could become reality. So many things had to come together!!
We couldn't go to Greece this summer. As a consequence I still have two weeks of vacation from my job.
My sister and her husband have friends in Sacramento - who have an empty house where Uschi and Billy passed the last two winters - and there's room for us.
They have invited me before, but I had neither the money nor unused vacation days. And my husband would never enter an airplane.
My niece is working as an air hostess - for just one year. That means cheap tickets and she'll have the same days off like me and can take me with her (I have to be accompanied by her to get the cheap ticket) and a friend of hers will join us.

I take it as a gift from my heavenly father!!!

What do I expect?

Because of all the movies, TV-shows, songs and books I've got an idea, an image in my head. Now I will at least partly be able to compare cliché and reality.

There'll be so many new experiences, starting with the long-distance flight. How will I cope without cigarettes for 12 hours?? What about the famous jet lag?

Vacation without my family - that's new. Ok, they are family, but it's not the same.

The women's trip, four women four days on the road.....That'll be fun!

Of course  I absolutely have to put a foot if not more into the Pacific. I doubt I'll ever again have the opportunity.

Eight more days to wait and then....

California, I'm coming!

Let go

Some things we have to hear again and again. 

We know the truth, we believe it, we promise ourselves to let it sink deep into our heart and to live according to that truth.

But time passes.

Problems arise.

We forget.

We don't see anymore.

We still know.

But it's not knowledge that changes live.

It's faith and trust.

And we need to hear it again.

Sometimes the truth hits our heart, when we don't expect it. 

Sometimes it comes along while reading a novel.

This wonderful book touched my heart with God's love in a way not many books do.

We must let go.

We must let go of our fears, our anxiety, our grievance, our sorrows. (Matthew 6:25-34)

We must let our hearts fill with His love to find His Kingdom within us. (Luke 17:20-21)

Our heart will know again that it's true: 

"You will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I am in you." (John 14:20)

Ted Dekker has been given a talent and he didn't bury it but made the best of it. 

(Matthew 25:14-30)

He didn't put his lamp under a bowl and with his books he is the light of the world. 

(Matthew 5:14-15)

Of course this abredged version has been published with a reason: to coax readers to buy and read A.D. 33 - and yes. This plan works out: I've just pre-ordered to receive it on October 6.

Two bestsellers

The Book Thief

Yes, it's definitely a bestseller and I'm always sceptical towards bestsellers.
It's not only a bestseller, it's also about World War II, the Holocaust, Nazi Germany....a historical novel, not my preferred genre and supposed to be sad.

But, as so often, my daughter Anna urged me to read it. And, also as so often, she was right.

This is a wonderful book about books, about friendship, about love, about life and death.

There have been written millions if not billions of reviews about it all over the world. Can I say something new about it? Probably not.

It took me in immediatly. It made me feel all sorts of emotions. It was sweet, funny, sad, hopefully and devastating. Just as Death describes the human nature:
"I wanted to ask her, how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words so damning and brilliant."

Ok, to love this book you must love one-word-sentences (if they are well-placed) and strange metaphors and it must not disturb you to be interrupted by the narrators voice, you must accept to know some things before the story reaches there.

As a German I have a point of critique: I've never met anybody who used the word "Saumensch".


Now I'm looking forward to this one:

I'm so glad to have found it for only 1,99 €

Here's what Ted Dekker wrote about it:

AD 30 is my best selling and best reviewed novel in years, so some might wonder why I would do an abridgment. Actually, it was extremely difficult and took Erin Healy (my life-long editor) and me a full month to do, but the result is amazing. It carefully eases back on historical details that don’t affect the story while leaving the characters, the full plot and story entirely intact. The last half of the novel is virtually unchanged and the nail-biting climax completely untouched. In some ways, it’s better than the full length version, depending on how much detail you like.

And it's still 432 pages long!

Yes it's historical, and it is a bestseller - but it's a Dekker, and I love his writing!