I know last week’s big book list about living as “resurrectionaries” had enough good stuff to keep our bookworms busy for months there is one more aspect of a resurrectionary life that I want to highlight and that is nurturing a redeemed and lively imagination. I’ll name a good handful that will be very helpful here (including a few on poetry) which will lead into our reader’s guide to the work of poet-priest-literary scholar, the Reverend Malcolm Guite. We’ve been a fan and promoter of his poetry for maybe fifteen years; I think the first collection we discovered was Sounding the Seasons (and one of our very first buyers may have been the late Leslie Bustard of Square Halo Books.) Guite’s brand new first volume of his Merlin’s Isle four part “Arthuriad” is called Galahad and the Grail and it is getting rave reviews. We have autographed copies. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

You see, to live in the power of the resurrection surely means more than ginning up enthusiasm for dedicated discipleship; sure we need commitment and zeal but it seems that if Jesus’s defeat of Death means anything, it means that we are in a whole new world or “new creation” as 2 Corinthians 5:17 puts it. We need to be able to imagine what it looks like for Christ’s regime to break into human history. I’m convinced we need to learn to see through Godly lenses which means we need to reboot our imaginations. They need “baptized” as C.S. Lewis famously put it. Hence, the practice of reading, including fiction and poetry and literary memoir.

(And this really is the premise of all of Guite’s remarkable books, that we must “lift the veil” to discover a sacramental world being renewed by and in and for the Risen Christ.)

I have highlighted here before a stunning book called Discipling the Diseased Imagination: Spiritual Formation and the Healing of Our Hearts by Dordt College professor Justin Ariel Bailey (Baker Academic; $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99.) I wish it had explored a bit more of the essentially aesthetic aspect of this, but, nonetheless, is is a rich and deep study of praying well, deeply, for the transformation of the “eyes of our heart.” As Alex Sosler puts it on the back cover, “the imagination is the center of our discipleship” and this book helps us reimagine in a way that offers “the moral imperative of possibility.”  Highly recommended.

Discipling the Diseased Imagination will help readers understand just how powerful and formative the imagination is to mind, heart, and spirit. This book will inspire readers to refill and reform the imagination in everyday ways that will restore it to its glorious, God-given purpose. — Karen Swallow Prior, author of The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images, and Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis

The modern sickness of the soul runs deeper than most diagnoses are able to reach. Discipling the Diseased Imagination is the treatment plan the church sorely needs. With a rare blend of intellectual depth, pastoral care, and elegant prose, Bailey prescribes a vision for the Christian life that is honest, humane, and hopeful. — Joshua Chatraw, Beeson Divinity School and Samford University, author of Telling a Better Story: How to Talk about God in a Skeptical Age   

Another book that might be in a similar wheelhouse is the wonderful Becoming By Beholding: The Power of Imagination in Spiritual Formation by Lana Davis (Baker Academic; $27.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $22.39.) Davis got her PhD from Baylor and teaches at Indiana Wesleyan University. This is a very rich and deeply thoughtful book.

Listen up:

Becoming by Beholding is a work to behold. Not only is this book a study in beauty, imagination, and spiritual formation; it also models the very practices it preaches. To read it is to witness beauty and imagination at work and thus to leave its pages better formed and more ready to be formed by all the goodness the world has to offer. — Karen Swallow Prior, author of The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images, and Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis

Becoming by Beholding ushers us into a rich, strange, and beautiful art gallery that unveils our own hearts and minds. Davis’s engaging tour draws deeply from the Christian tradition of spiritual masters to show how the architecture of Chartres Cathedral, iconic imagery of Jesus, Station Island’s stations of the cross, and the literary genius of Dante teem with spiritual insights that reveal Christ and his life in us. — Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung, Calvin University; author of Glittering Vices

Do you think nonfiction is more serious, grown-up, and useful than moving stories, beautiful buildings, and pretty pictures? Let Davis guide you through the Christian artists and makers who testify across the centuries that the stories and images we behold indelibly shape our souls. — Jeffrey Bilbro, Grove City College; editor-in-chief, Front Porch Republic, author of Reading the Times

Beauty and Justice: Creating a Life of Abundance and Courage by Haejin Shim Fujimura and Makoto Fujimura (Brazos Press) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99. I have written about this already, inviting folks to pre-order it (and it is one of our personal favorites this season, now out) but it deserves to be named here as we think about how new creation theology brought in by the power of resurrection might play out in our culture. Beauty and Justice: Creating a Life of Abundance and Courage by Haejin and Mako Fujimura  is a perfect book to help us think and be inspired to care not only about aesthetics, the arts, creativity, and our holy imaginations but how that might be informed by the Biblical call to do justice. In a world of tragic hurt and war do we have time for beauty? Give the virtues of beauty, though, can we harness goodness to fight injustice? Written by a thoughtful lawyer /activist and world-class visual artist — both very good writers, too! — this certainly reminds us of the glories of living after the resurrection with “abundance and courage.” Wow. I am in awe.

Maybe my favorite way into thinking about the redemptive role of a redeemed imagination for ordinary Christian resurrectionaries is the lovely, delightful, must-read guide to reading widely, the wonderful World of Wonders: A Spirituality of Reading by Jeff Crosby (Paraclete; $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19.) I named it a favorite book of 2025 and started the new year off with a fun online webinar with Jeff chatting about the book and the nature of the reading life. (You can watch or re-watch that HERE.) I suppose I ought not overstate this but I am sure it is nearly an axiom for many of us: the very best models of faith, the most noble people we know, the prophets and mystics and leaders and quiet servants are all readers. I can hardly imagine growing as a person of faith without books as tools for spiritual formation and the reformation of my  desires. So, yes, buying and reading books matters, especially if we have a wide diet to exercise the mind and widen the heart. World of Wonders will inspire and guide you.

There is a chapter in World of Wonders that is tremendously important, and I suspect one that is under appreciated among us. It is the chapter called “The Power of Paying Attention: Reading Poetry” (with a closing reflection by Luci Shaw.) The previous chapter (“The Power of Story: Reading Fiction”) is really, really good, but my hunch is that nobody skipped that chapter. But the poetry one? Come on, you can admit it…

Re-visit those two chapters and you will better understand what I mean here when I talk about allowing God to give us a renewed mind and a transformed imagination. Deeply rooted in the aesthetic dimension of life — perhaps as discussed so colorfully in the famous Rainbows for the Fallen World by Calvin Seerveld — the art of reading poetry can help.

After that chapter of Jeff Crosby’s in World of Wonders if you want a serious dive into how to appreciate poetry as part of your spiritual formation and Christian life, I highly recommend Word Made Fresh: An Invitation to Poetry for the Church by Abram Van Engen (Eerdmans; $26.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $21.59.) Jamie Smith calls it “a master class and love letter.” It really is the best comprehensive argument for why people of faith need to pay attention to poetry. It does inspire church folks to use poetry in worship and such but it really isn’t as much about the church, as such, but just how all of God’s children need the art of poetry.

What to know how some poets describe their work as a way of helping others see and imagine and feel and live differently?

You will love dipping into the many interviews found it the wonderful Rabbit Room project An Axe for the Frozen Sea: Conversations with Poets About What Matters Most by Ben Palpate (Rabbit Room Press; $18.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $14.40.) I’ve reviewed this before (noting how interestingly it is written, bringing you into the conversations with colorful description of the meetings) but wanted to suggest it again as it would be so good for anyone wanting to deepen their imaginative capacities. And, yes, there is a great interview with Malcolm Guite. This really is a fun book and highly recommended.

 

Speaking of great conversations with poets, Baylor University Press just released a remarkable work pulled together by two professors and working poets, George David Clark of Washington & Jefferson University in Western Pennsylvania and L.S. Klatt (a good, long-time friend) formerly of Pittsburgh and for many years, now, a beloved prof at Calvin University in Grand Rapids. It is called Playing with Fire: Christian Poets Reflect on Faith and Practice (Baylor University Press; $32.99 // OUR SALE PRICE =$26.39.) While I am positive this serious book will be of interest — that’s putting it blandly; it may be very exciting! — for ordinary readers, it is a must for poets and writers and English teachers.  It is so new I haven’t seen it yet, but it is shipping any day now. I trust the many rave reviews it has already gotten. Here are two you can trust that explain this smart work a bit.

These lively reflections on how faith and poetry intersect cover a surprising range. The writers’ deep appreciation of poets who preceded them infuses their essays with edifying gratitude. Poems, personal stories, and threads of theory offer readers rich food for thought, incentives to return to beloved poets, introductions to new ones, and ample reason to rejoice. — Marilyn McEntyre, author of When Poets Pray, Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies, and Start with a Word

This book is a symphony of words and a chorus of voices from which emerges a song about poetry. Hearing the singular Word echoing in the song of the Muses, these poets reflect on what it means to faithfully answer the call to create. Wonderfully oblique, bringing their poetic verve to prose, these essays are moving testimonies (the first paragraph of George David Clark’s contribution made me weep). Wander in their words and rekindle-or find-a devotion to poetry. — James K.A. Smith, Professor of Philosophy, Calvin University, author of Make Your Home in This Luminous Dark

Nature Poems to See By: A Comic Artist Interprets More Great Poetry Julian Peters (Plough Publishing) $29.95 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.96

Speaking of poetry and the imagination, one of the brand new and nothing-short-of-brilliant examples of a marvelously creative way to exercise our imaginations is to behold the amazing, new collection by Julian Peters who uses a variety of graphic novel / adult comic stylings to illustrate classic and contemporary poems. Like his previous (and equally amazing) Poems to See By: A Comic Artist Interprets Great Poetry, the ever-interesting Plough Publishing invited Peters to re-interpret visually almost 25 poems of nature. In a variety of illustrative styles he does everything from “Stopping by a Woods on a Snowy Evening” to Hopkin’s “God’s Grandeur” to “Daybreak in Alabama” by Langston Hughes. From Emily Dickinson to Joy Harjo to Gwendolyn Brooks to Dylan Thomas to Wordsworth and Rossetti  and more — including some Asian writers of haiku, Nature Poems to See By is fabulous beyond words.

THE WORK OF MALCOLM GUITE

For a variety of reasons for this BookNotes column I want to highlight the work of Malcolm Guite. As you know from a previous BookNotes, we have been touting his new Galahad and the Grail which was so very handsomely produced by Rabbit Room Press. It released about a week ago. He’s an important literary figure, an ally and mentor in helping people of faith think deeply and nurture a sanctified imagination; he’s a working poet and writer at the top of his craft. Here are the books of his that you should know.

For what it is worth, my next “Three Books from Hearts & Minds” podcast (which you can watch on YouTube or listen to at Apple Podcasts or at Spotify) is a conversation with yours truly and my always energetic pal from the CCO, Phil Schiavoni, talking this time about Malcolm Guite. Google it in a few days and or watch our Hearts & Minds Facebook page where I always post the links. Enjoy!

Galahad and the Grail: Merlin’s Isle: An Arthuriad Malcolm Guite, illustrated by Stephen Crotts (Rabbit Room Press) $34.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $27.99

The accolades are building up, from the visionary sense of Guite’s project (the last person to do an large, epic poem of the Arthurian cycles was Tennyson over a century ago) to the sturdy and excellent craftsmanship of the book itself (kudos to Stephen Crotts for the amazing illustrations) to the poetically vivid storytelling. The award winning novelist (Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell and Piranesi) Susanna Clarke writes in the foreword that this is “an astonishing achievement, a ballad that picks you up and sweeps you onward into adventure, solemn magic, and beauty.”

The good folks at Rabbit Room note that Guite is in the epic footsteps of Spenser, Milton, Dante, and Tennyson “and is a story to be enjoyed by young and old alike, a story to be read aloud among friends and family, a story to be cherished for generations to come.” Will you take up the tale?

Our autographed copies are offered while supplies last.

Watch this beautifully filmed trailer for the book to see if it might inspire you. (It has some wonderful footage of a very, very old and exceptionally rare manuscript which you don’t want to miss.)

We are taking pre-orders for volume two in the Merlin’s Isle series, coming early November  2026, The Coming of Arthur, also illustrated by the exceptionally talented Stephen Crotts. (Rabbit Room Press) $34.95 // OUR PRE-ORDER PRICE = $27.99

Lifting the Veil: Imagination and the Kingdom of God Malcolm Guite (Square Halo Books) $18.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $15.19

I know I described this in my last BookNotes, thinking that reading about imagination would be a key aspect of discipleship informed by resurrection. I wrote that, for resurrectionaries needing a short but weighty reminder or some guidance about a faithful use of our imaginations, the four talks in Lifting the Veil: Imagination and the Kingdom of God might be good for you.

The chapters are, “Imagination and the Kingdom of God”, “Christ and the Artistic Imagination”, “Christ and the Moral Imagination”, and “Christ and the Prophetic Imagination.”

In an epilogue Malcolm cites a Blake poem and reminds us that “all prophetic art is intended to arouse us and stir us to action. How do we awake from the deadly sleep?” This is the resurrectionary question — how wake up, how do we lift the veil?  Pondering this book is part of the answer.

The Word Within the Words Malcolm Guite (Fortress Press) $14.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $11.20

This little volume is in the fascinating “My Theology” series of short, compact-sized testimonials by aa vast array of contemporary thinkers, theologians, and scholars. I love this so much as it is a succinct introduction to the good insight that Christ Himself is the Word and therefore speech and language — words! — matter.  In Guite’s lovely prose he invites us to think how poetry itself (and, more widely, the poetic imagination) can help us (as it helps him) understand and interpret our faith.

There are short chapters on Scripture, liturgy, and sacraments, lots of Bible reflection, some theology and history and all kind of a sort of poetry, which after all, can help us stand in wonder at the Logos that “underlies all things.” As Guite nicely asserts, poetry is “capable of transfiguring our vision and transforming our lives.”

Mariner: A Theological Voyage with Samuel Taylor Coleridge Malcolm Guite (IVP Academic) $42.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $34.39

This is in the great Studies in Theology and the Arts series that IVP Academic does (oh, they are all so good!) This may be Guite’s most academic study, a serious look at Coleridge and his famous poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”

Guite shows that Coleridge’s own life paralleled the experience in his famous poem. As the publisher notes, “On this theological voyage, Guite draws out the continuing relevance of this work and the ability of poetry to communicate the truths of humanity’s fallenness, our need for grace, and the possibility of redemption.”

Malcolm Guite has established himself as one of the leading Christian poets of our time. This positions him to offer a distinctive reading of a poetic giant of the past, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. As expected, Mariner is exceptionally rich, penetrating, and absorbing. — Jeremy Begbie, professor of theology, director of Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts, Duke Divinity School, Duke University

Faith, Hope and Poetry: Theology and the Poetic Imagination Malcolm Guides (Routledge) $62.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $50.39

If Mariner is one of the more magisterial gems of Guite’s scholarly work, this is certainly his crowing achievement in this genre. It is his breathtakingly vital poetics, a major contribution to theological reflection on the poetry and more. It is in the prestigious “Routledge Studies in Theology, Imagination and the Arts” line, for which serious students can rejoice.

Malcolm Guite, in this wide-ranging and original study, helps us see how poetry is — if we let ourselves be drawn in and shaped by it — a means of making connections with the fundamental way things are, and so too a way of connecting with a God who is himself a pattern of ‘connection’ as Trinity, open to share the divine reality with created life. Here are materials for a profound theology of the imagination, developed in dialogue with writers both familiar and unfamiliar, beautifully combining close reading with wide horizons. — Rowan Williams, author of A Century of Poetry: 100 Poems for Searching the Heart and Dostoevsky: Language, Faith, and Fiction.

 

 

 

 

 

• In Every Corner Sing: A Poet’s Corner Collection (Canterbury Press) $23.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.19
• Heaven in Ordinary: A Poet’s Corner Collection (Canterbury Press) $23.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.19
• Sounding Heaven & Earth: A Poet’s Corner Collection (Canterbury Press) $20.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.79

These three lovely volumes are each collections of Guite’s beloved back page columns from the UK The Church Times. Most of us here in the States don’t get to see these short essays but they are wonderul. It is said he offers acute observations, drawing together everyday events and encounters, landscape, journeys, poetry, stories, memory and a sense of the sacred.

On summary of one notes that it offers “more than seventy reflections that create momentary pauses in the bustle of life to take soundings, to savor an experience and hold it for a moment to the light before it slips away and ask, ‘Are there some hidden depths here?’”

Some of these “soundings delighting sound itself: in words, in sic, in bells and birdsong.” This is sweet, thoughtful, rich and reflective. No one is better, but each is a lovely collection.

POETRY

Sounding the Seasons: Seventy Sonnets for Christian Year  Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

One of his most popular this offers lovely, useful poems in the sonnet form for the liturgical calendar. This is a somewhat expanded edition and his best-selling collection. Highly recommended.

 

 

 

The Singing Bowl: Collected Poems Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $16.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $12.80

This includes some of his earliest published work (from two out of print chap books.) It got a rave review in the importnt New Directions journal and has a blurb by Holly Ordway who says “we need Christian writers who can speak about both the dark and the light.”  Very good.

 

 

 

Parable and Paradox: Sonnets on the Sayings of Jesus and Other Poems Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $18.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $14.40

In a way, this is a return to the form of Sound the Seasons and while not exactly a sequel, does offer exceptional poems inspired by gospel texts. Hooray.

There are 50 sonnets that focus on many passages in the Gospels: the Beatitudes, parables and miracles, teachings on the Kingdom, and the ‘hard sayings’ – Jesus’ challenging demands with which we wrestle.

And, as it says on the back, “A sequence of five sonnets on ‘The Wilderness’, exploring mysterious stories of divine encounter such as Jacob’s wrestling with the angel, poetic reflections on music, hospitality and ecology.” There are seven short poems celebrating the days of creation. Nicely, there’s a biblical index pairing the poems with scripture readings for use in worship.

Love Remember: 40 Poems of Loss, Lament and Hope Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

Reflecting on the Holly Ordway quote, above, we are glad for this blend of works on loss and lament, and a grace-filled, sober hope. I wasn’t sure if I should list this here as it isn’t mostly his work but his selections, curation, and discussion of these forty amazing pieces. Some you will know, some you may not; there are lots of classic poets and some fresh voices.  This is a really, really valuable resource and I do suggest it..

 

After Prayer: New Sonnets and Other Poems Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $18.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $14.40

This is an extraordinary bit of work. Brit-lit geeks (and, well all of us, really) might enjoy knowing that the title sequence (as the book jacket explains) “is written in response to George Herbert’s beautiful and well-loved poem ‘Prayer’,and comprises twenty-seven sonnets which discover behind the poem’s quick succesion of dazzling images for prayer a deeper soul-story and a spiritual journey that reflects the heights and depths of human experience and mirrors the poet’s own journey.”

He’s up to something important here, standing on the shoulders of the elders, entering the conversation within the canon, even, but, at the end one realizes these are just lovely, even inspiring poems. Very nicely done.

David’s Crown: Sounding the Psalms Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

Oh my, this fairly recent collection is all inspired by the Psalms. It may be the one we’ve sold the most of and is well-loved by both seasoned poetry aficionados and newbies. There are 150 poems each one inspired by one of the Psalms.

As the publisher notes: “A corona is a crown, the pearly glow around the sun in certain astronomical conditions and a poetic form where interlinking lines connect a sequence. It is the perfect name therefore for this new collection of 150 poems by the bestselling poet Malcolm Guite, each one written in response to the Bible’s 150 psalms.”

Some of these are provocative, many are exquiste. The idea of a crown is cool  I’m not a fan of the cover, but the book is truly excellent.

Give it a try — and if it gets you more engaged in reading the Psalter, all the better, eh?

Word in the Wilderness: A Poem a Day for Lent and Easter Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

This is, in format, somewhat like the above-listed Love, Loss in that it is a devotional based on poems by others. He chooses a Lenten themed poem and reflects on it. Very good stuff, for sure. From Saint John of the Cross to Dante to Seamus Heaney to Czelaw Milosz to several of his own, this is fabulous.

If you get this now you may not be able to wait until next Lent, as so much of this is so rich and meaningful. Yes!

 

Waiting on the Word: A Poem a Day for Advent, Christmas and Epiphany Malcolm Guite (Canterbury Press) $16.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $12.80

This, too, is, like the one above for Lent and Eastertide, is a set of reflections inspired by poems, far flung from across time and space, as they say. Most are British but there are others, some are quite contemporary.

As above, there is an expert and often moving poem selected, then reflected upon. I hesitate to say it is “explained” as that isn’t quite it, but he ruminates bringing Advent waiting ad hope showing how these artful poems help us live into this season of the church calandar. There are pieces about Advent, yes, but some are classic Christmasy and on into Epiphany.

Nice choices, thoughtful stuff. I don’t know what I like better, his literary chops as a major critic or his priestly and pastoral work as a caring Christian leader. Bless the Lord, my friends!

Stations of the Resurrection: Encounters with the Risen Christ Malcolm Guite & Guli Francis-Dehqani, illustrated by Iain McKillop (Church House Publications) $22.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $18.39

Stations of the Resurrection offers reflections on each of the resurrection appearances described in the gospels from the bestselling poet Malcolm Guite and the much admired writer and bishop, Guli Francis-Dehqani, accompanied by color illustrations from the priest-artist Iain McKillop. Bishop Guli draws on her first hand knowledge of Middle Eastern culture to explore these stories and Malcolm Guite offers a sonnet in response to each of them – many published here for the first time – with reflections on the texts that inspired them. This imaginative and inspirational resource also includes the complete Stations of the Resurrection liturgies from Common Worship Times and Seasons that commemorate each of the nineteen events, allowing the book to be used for both personal devotional use and liturgical celebration.

…AND MORE

Wardrobes and Rings: Through Lenten Lands with the Inklings  Malcolm Guite, Julia Golding, and Simon Horobin (Canterbury Press) $21.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $16.80

Yes, this is a Lenten reader, a daily devotional with a full third of the pieces written by Guite. The whole book, though, exudes a fabulous familiarity with the Inklings and friends, with short, inspiring reading on Charles Williams and Dorothy Sayers, etcetera, etcetera. The title is fabulous, isn’t it? This is a must for fans!

Thank you, Malcolm Guite, for your Inkling-ish willingness to collaborate.

 

The Lost Tales of Sir Galahad edited by Jennifer Trafton, illustrated by Ned Bustard (Rabbit Room Press) $29.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $23.99

There is only one chapter here by Guite but as we now know he has been living in these Arthurian tales for a long time. This is a delightful and actually remarkable book — leather-covered with illustrations by Bustard, cleverly reported as recently found memoranda — with a handful of creative authors each offering an imagined new chapter of the Galahad stories. By turns whimsical and curious, spiritual and exciting, these are from the likes of Jonathan Rogers (a YA fiction wrier and Flannery O’Connor scholar, no less), Junius Johnson, Andrew Peterson, Doug McKelvey (famous for Every Moment Holy), Mark Bertram, Annie Nardone, and, of course, the 400-line ballad by Malcolm Guite. I had to list it here, eh?

Ordinary Saints: Living Everyday Life to the Glory of God edited by Ned Bustard (Square Halo Books) $24.99 // OUR SALE PRICE = $19.99

There’s a bit of a story here that’s fun and perhaps important. As you may know this is a big collection of inspiring (short) essays about how doing ordinary things can glorify God. Leaning into a spirituality of the mundane (and, I might add, the priesthood of all believers) common but Godly folks write about everything from gardening to making playlists to making love, from raising chickens to working in retail (by yours truly.) Some pieces are a bit serious (grand-parenting, mourning, Calvin Seerveld on knowing, Curt Thompson on being present) but one of the standouts is Malcolm Guite’s entertaining piece on smoking his pipe. In fact he created three poems about it, too (and explains why) so you not only get this rare essay by Guite on glorifying God through this relaxing practice but get three poems not published elsewhere.

And here, then, is the story: designer Ned Bustard used a great piece by Stephen Crotts of Guite smoking a pipe to illustrate that chapter and, or so I’ve heard, Guite liked it so much he ended up asking Stephen to the UK where they hiked around dreaming up the design for Guite’s Galahad. Everybody loves the Crotts’s black and white linocut and wood engraving in Galahad and the Grail (not to mention the cover design) and we might suggest this is where their collaboration began. That linocut first done for Ordinary Saints now graces the back flyleaf of the cover of Galahad the Grail. Hooray.

Every Moment Holy Volume III: The Work of the People compiled and edited by Doug McKelvey & Ned Bustard (Rabbit Room Press) 

standard edition – larger-sized leather-bound hardback $35.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $28.00 OR personal edition –  smaller-size leather-bound soft, flexible $25.00 // OUR SALE PRICE = $20.00

Please remember to tell us which size you want.

Many know and love the four Every Moment Holy editions. The first three volumes are done in two editions or versions, the larger hardback or the smaller flexible compact one. Volumes I and II are both by McKelvey & Bustard but Volume III is a bit different. The art is by various illustrators using their own styles of woodcuts, linocuts and other black & white prints. And the prayers are by a variety of authors, writing out lovely litanies for ordinary life and daily things. What a way to sanctify the mundane, to liturgically offer prayer for real world episodes. Some of the prayers are older, classic, even, and some are crafted by modern writers. And yes, Malcolm Guite has more than one offering here. It’s a big book laden with lovely words and mature praying, but figured we should alert you that Guite is a contributor. So is Stephen Crotts. Thanks be to God.

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BookNotes