New Books (June 2004) (QuakerBooks)

It’s rare that I read a book and want to send it to every single one of my women friends right away, but GRACE NOTES: THE WAKING OF A WOMAN’S VOICE by Utah Friend Heidi Hart is an unusual book. It is an intricately composed story of the author’s interior journey towards an authentic and resonant voice; and to Quakerism. It’s written like a musical score with chapters that have 6 repeating parts, each a little puzzle rich with Hart’s lyrical descriptions of her experience. The stories, as in any musical score, spiral back on one another, repeating and ascending toward an inspiring spiritual clarity. She reveals a great deal (just enough) about the workings and vicissitudes of her heart.

Heidi Hart is a poet and it shows in her carefully crafted prose. She explores the crags and storms of her life with startling honesty. She tells the story of her marriage and coming to terms with her husband’s depression; she tells of her difficult relationship with her mother, who was walled in by her sense of propriety, and their slow dance back to understand one another; and she tells of her experiences of Mormonism, the faith of her family, which she feels doesn’t answer her spiritual hunger. In each hard tale she finds and uncovers the soft kernel of light. She also tells the stories of great openings in her life-her growing friendship with her music partner; her discovery and deepening relationship with Salt Lake City Meeting; her experimentation and the revelations in her singing, and her re-connection to the ghost of her teenage self on a visit to the Zuni pueblo. The images she conjures are vivid and heartening, all the while Hart tells the story of her journey back to her self. “Ever since I was ten years old, I’d felt myself yearning to ‘go astray.’ For me, that didn’t mean drinking and cavorting with boys; it meant being myself without fear.”

I can’t do this book justice in this note to you. The full weight and power of it can only be experienced first hand. It’s a book I plan on reading again and again and finding my own stories in the process. This book does what all the best spiritual autobiographies do - helps you along into contemplating your own journey and opening up the themes and threads that run through it.

I like this book so much that if you order it by June 2nd, you’ll receive a 15% discount. To order, just follow the link below to www.quakerbooks.org or call us at 800-966-4556. Put the code EM004 in the notes field of your web order or just tell us the code when you call.

TRACT PRICES LOWERED AND A SPECIAL OFFER FOR MEETINGS: If you haven’t bought any Quaker Press of FGC tracts for awhile for your meeting, I hope the following reduction in prices and the special offer will make it easier to do so. We had many people express dismay over the higher prices announced in the 2004 QuakerBooks catalog and heard the concern. The Friends &… series and others have gone down to $.60 when you buy them in bundles of 10s. We’ve also lowered the number needed to get the 100 count discount - now if you buy 50 or more of a single title, the price goes down to $.35 each.

In addition to the lower prices, we now have a fund available for monthly meetings to subsidize purchases of these items. Generous donors felt strongly about making these available for meetings and were willing to provide money to support the cause. For as long as the money lasts any monthly meeting that orders 100 or more Quaker Press of FGC tracts will receive a $10.00 credit towards the purchase. This credit applies to any combination that makes up 100: you can buy 10 each of 10 Friends &… tracts or 50 of Friends & Worship and 50 of The Quakers by William Whalen or any other combination that adds up to 100 total. If you’d like to take advantage of this offer, we’d ask that you call in your order (800-966-4556) and mention this message. If you’re buying fewer than 100 Quaker Press of FGC tracts, you can order them via our website (link here), by mail or by phone.

ERRATUM: I made an error in my last ‘Book Musings’ that embarrasses me because it’s a substantive error. In my comments about Sarah Mapps Douglass: Faithful Attender of Quaker Meeting-the View from the Back Bench I mistakenly said that Sarah was a member of Arch Street Meeting. This isn’t true-her mother applied but was rejected and, though Sarah was a faithful attender, she was frustrated by Friends’ racism and, so, never applied for membership. It was awhile since I had read the pamphlet, but I apologize for the inaccuracy and will take more care when proof reading my future notices.

MEETING NEWSLETTERS: A number of folks have asked if they can excerpt some of my ‘Book Musings’ for their monthly meeting or yearly meeting newsletters. Please feel free to do so. All I ask is that you mention that QuakerBooks of FGC is the source for the information (and the books!)

New Books (June 2004)

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New Books