Let Me Explain - I was looking through our shelves the other day, and having just added a few new donated books, something had caught my eye. Amongst some of the Christian romance and Biblical fiction novels was a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo. Now, I thought to myself, “what is this classic, known for its themes of betrayal & revenge, doing among these other novels?” But as I looked around some more, to my surprise, I found more than 10 literary classics in the midst of the many other novels in the library. There’s Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, My Antonia by Willa Cather, The Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, and so many others. Through this post, I’m going to share what a couple of these are about, and which ones I would recommend to our patrons.
The Basket of Flowers by Christoph von Schmid - James, the king's gardener, teaches his 15-year-old daughter Mary all the principles of godliness through his flowers. She is falsely accused of stealing, and the penalty is death. Mary remembers her father had taught her: that it is better to die for the truth than to live for a lie, and that the worst pillow to sleep on is the pillow of a guilty conscience!
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain - A nineteenth-century boy from a Mississippi River town recounts his adventures as he travels down the river with a runaway slave, encountering a family involved in a feud, two scoundrels pretending to be royalty, and Tom Sawyer's aunt who mistakes him for Tom.
What I would recommend - I’ve always had a special place in my heart for stories that weren’t written during our time. There’s a certain comfort that can be found in the way they were written, and who they were written for. And they’re called classics because they have stood the test of time, and kept the love of thousands of readers worldwide. With that being said, I’m not sure if I can recommend any specific ones. They all deserve to be read and experienced. But if you wanted something in particular to start out with, I’d recommend The Trail Stopped Here. That one is special because it was written by our previous director, Glenn Hascal. It’s a sweet story about a family that stops in Nebraska after being on the Oregon Trail. But please, come take a look at the amazing books recently found in the crevices of The Cross Reference Library.