Off the Shelf: Home

Marilynne Robinson won the Pulitzer Prize for her novel Gilead, so for me to attempt to tell you what a marvelous writer she is, I find subtly amusing.  But she is, and her book Home makes an impression that is difficult to compare to other books that I have read.  How she is able to beautifully express such ordinary things of life is a wonder that can only be known in the experience of reading the story itself.  How deftly she draws the reader in with the cords of life, family, home, and faith.  In a word, this story is bittersweet, but beautifully and hauntingly so.

Perhaps Home strikes so deeply to my own soul because I have been a Presbyterian for practically my entire life; because I am a pastor; and because I have children (two sons and a daughter) whom I wonder about – what their futures hold, and what their faith will look like in the years to come.  I also have many, many fond memories of the home in which I grew up, which includes baseball -  the smell of a leather glove, the feel of a new ball, the sound of the ball striking the glove, and the simple pleasure of playing catch.  Ms. Robinson’s depictions are not so foreign, and that is, perhaps, why this work has made such a deep impression.  To say that this book is thoroughly enjoyable would be misleading.  There are times when it is hard to read, and your soul aches, and yet you continue because the story is your own.