Category Archives: Blog Stuff

Phil Long (@Plong42) Reviews my Book

Blog Stuff, Book Reviews, Christology, Miscellaneous

Phil Long as reviewed my book Christology in Review over at his blog Reading Acts. It’s a favorable review—thanks be to God—but Phil was surprised to see that I didn’t review the Michael Bird edited How God Became Jesus. To be honest, I’m surprised that I haven’t reviewed it either. I read it when it first came out and I began a post (which I believe is still in my drafts) summarizing each chapter but for some reason I never got around to finishing it. It’s been so long since I’ve read the book that I’ll have to go back and read it again!

Thanks to Phil for taking the time to read and review the book. I have produced a corrected edition in which I have fixed all of the typographical errors I spotted in the original version. I also fixed the format, which I wasn’t happy with in the original version. It looks and feels much more like a real book now. I’ll be sending Phil a copy of the update when they come in. I’d also note that I’ve added 2 other reviews to this corrected edition and a bibliography of the books reviewed. The latter became necessary since I removed the bibliographic details from the reviews themselves.

I’ll post on all that another time.

B”H

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WordPress Desktop App

Blog Stuff, Technology

I can’t remember if I saw Jim West mention this on Twitter or Feedly, but there is a desktop app for WordPress that allows you to blog without your web browser. I’m using it right now. So far, so good. Here’s a screenshot of what it looks like:

Screenshot 2016-01-28 12.26.34

I’ll need to figure out how to justify text but I’m sure it won’t be too difficult.

B”H

New Year, New Dedication

Blog Stuff

I hardly blogged at all last year. I didn’t blog much the year before that either. So in 2016 I’d like to dedicate myself to blogging more. I’d like to… The truth is that I probably won’t. It seems like my workload and schedule gets more and more hectic as time goes by so it’s doubtful I’ll increase my blogging output. I’ll give it a shot though and see what I can come up with.

BTW, Happy New Year!

B”H

Receive and You Shall Review?

Blog Stuff, Book Reviews, Enjoyable Posts

There’s been some discussion on Nijay Gupta’s blog about what he calls a discouraging trend in the world of book reviewing. “Some publishers,” says Gupta, “are becoming more picky about who they send books to, and also some are refusing to send out print books at all to reviewers…” He also laments the practice of sending ebooks with expiration dates. I find the latter to be deplorable. Always have. I forget what book it was that I received years back that had an expiration date on it but it never got reviewed.

Gupta and those who have commented on his post have all pretty much expressed the desire for hard copies over ebooks. I’m with them. One hundred percent. The general consensus is that reviewers should receive some sort of compensation for the reviews they’re providing because each review is publicity for the book and the publisher. I’m not opposed to such thinking. I’ve commented plenty of times on the symbiotic relationship between publisher and reviewer. We get books, they get reviews. Works perfectly.

Now let me quickly say that some people prefer digital books these days so they’re quite happy with books coming to them in PDF, mobi, or epub formats. That’s good and well. It’s great that publishers have the books available in such formats. I’m still all about hard copies but I have about two dozen important works on my iPad in PDF (thousands of PDFs on an external hard drive). It’s great to have them all available to me at once in a searchable format. I can’t envision myself ever making the switch to all digital but if I did then I’d be very grateful to receive an ebook.

But I’ve meandered long enough. The thing I wanted to comment on was something that Jennifer Guo said in her comment on Gupta’s post. She said:

I agree. I’m old fashioned as well and prefer print by leaps and bounds (what kind of book nerd does not need to mark up their books? not to mention smell the pages wink emoticon ). The bigger point is what Christopher mentioned. While I do review an ebook once in a while from the publishers that refuse to send print, I refuse to review a “disappearing ebook.” Reviewing takes time, and it’s also free publicity for the publisher. A free copy is fair compensation, but if you don’t get to keep even an ebook, I do not see it as fair compensation. We might as well just get a library copy and not spend the time to review then!

I understand the concept of fair compensation. I do. I even agree with it. It’s a bait and switch to send a book for review that later gets taken away. Not cool. It’s the last sentence that stuck with me. Is the idea that we should only review the books we’ve received for free from publishers? If so, why? Why wouldn’t we want to take the time to write about the books we check out of the library (not that I’d ever check a book out of a library)? Why not write about the books we purchase with our hard earned cash?

Some might argue that those reviews could/would be better since the reviewer feels no obligation towards the publisher for sending them a gratis copy. For my part I reviewed the books I bought before I ever knew that I could contact publishers and ask for free copies. Reviews have been a part of my blog since its inception. I continued to review books that I bought well after I started receiving them for free. Now I haven’t reviewed anything in a while, but when I get back to it I’ll continue doing what I’ve always done. But who cares about me?

My point is that I don’t think book reviews should be contingent upon receiving free books in any format. If all the publishers in the world suddenly formed a union and decided to no longer provide free copies to interested reviewers would that mean the demise of the book review? That would be most unfortunate. Would we all of a sudden stop thinking about the things we read and consequently stop having the desire to share those thoughts with others? I would hope not!

Receiving free books is a wonderful benefit of reviewing books but I don’t think it should be the primary goal. In my opinion the main goal should be the dissemination of information. Having the means and ability to inform others about works in their fields of interest is a great privilege. I can’t count how many reviews I’ve read over the years that helped me determine if a book was worth my time, or informed me about the contents of a book I couldn’t get my hands on. I wouldn’t say that it’s my duty to return the service, but I’ve long felt that it’s my honor.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the subject; especially those of you who review books for internet or print publications.

B”H

A Budding Scholar You Should Know

Blog Stuff

Chris Tilling has taken on a PhD student. It’s about time! His name is Justin Hagerman and he maintains a blog called “Virtue in Paul’s Letters.” Justin’s stated focus is reviewing the work of scholars writing on Paul while he begins his own in depth study of the Apostle beginning with Galatians. So bookmark his blog, add it to Feedly or whatever other aggregator you use, and interact with him.

B”H

Dueling Series

Blog Stuff, Humor

If I may give a brief summary of how Peter Enns’ “Aha Moments” series and Michael Kruger’s “Does the Bible Ever Get It Wrong?” series read to me.

Enns’ Series: I came to the Bible with the wrong idea about how the Bible should be. Now I know better. I’m so bright.

Kruger’s Series: The Bible’s not wrong. You are. You should have considered that you were wrong before you lost your faith.

B”H