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BOOKS IN BRIEF | February 2012
© 2012 Polish American Journal
reviewed by Florence Waszkelewicz Clowes, MLIS
www.polamjournal.com
TO SUP WITH THE DEVIL
by John Dabrowski
Word Association Publishers, 2011
259 p., $$16.95
Dabowski provides a book that will stretch the imagination of the reader. Minor changes can have a lasting effect. Using fictional and real characters, Dabrowski draws the reader into “what if...”
Following the death of President Roosevelt, Vice-President and Polish-American Ted Kazmarak’s first order was to make a deal with Hitler to help push the Soviets back to the old Curzon line. He wanted Germany as a buffer against the Russians and keep the Germans from turning Communist. As a youth in Poland, Kazmarak had seen the destructive forces of Stalin’s Communism, as well as the discovery of the atrocities of the Katyn massacre in 1940. His other concern was America’s own development of an atomic bomb and that Russia might be on the same level.
The blend of imaginary and real figures is well done, providing an interesting concept of events that could have happened in a critical time of world history.
THE MERMAID OF WARSAW and Other Tales from Poland
by Richard Monte
ill. by Paul Hess
Frances Lincoln Books, 2011
105 pp., $8.95.
This small book contains folktales not usually known to the public, with the exception of “The Mermaid of Warsaw.” The eight tales provide a glimpse of lesser known regions on the country. Monte provides a voice for these tales that will draw everyone into a time of long ago and make believe. Black and white illustrations accompany the tales.
TETHER ME NOT
by David Dachauer
Brown Books Publishing Group
2011, 210 pp., $11.95.
Dachauer provides the reader with sentiments, lovely and sad, in this novel of love lost and found. The intuition and premonitions his family members had are passed on to him. As a child, his grandfather introduces him to the spirituality and beliefs of the Indians, telling him he had a gift and not to lose it. The Creator speaks to us in many voices, be it owl or hawk.
David deeply loves his wife, and is devastated when she divorces him. Feeling he will never love again, he raises his children, and learns to balance his life, letting go of love, then gradually moving on and learning to love again.
CREATED EQUAL
by R.A. Brown
Tate Publishing, 2011
236 pp., $25.99
If all men and women are created equal under the eyes of God, why can’t a woman become a priest? Alexandra Kowalski has desperately wanted to become a priest for many years and when she is refused admission to the seminary, hires well-known trial lawyer, Thomas O’Reilly, to help her. He finds no basis for the Catholic Church to exclude women in the priesthood and takes his case to court. The Church hires Monsignor Enrico Renzulli, a Harvard educated attorney who believes the law suit should be dismissed because the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution grants all citizens freedom of religion and a federal court should not interfere with the rules of any church.
This legal thriller seeks to find any basis in the Bible that excludes women from becoming priests. The role women played in Jesus time has changed drastically, but not in the minds of present day ecclesiastics. Throughout the years, rules have been made by bishops and popes, not God. Once priests were married, but not today. Once indulgences were sold, as a way to wash away your sins, but not anymore.
Yet a married Protestant minister can become a Catholic priest and not divorce himself from his wife. Why in 2010, did Pope Benedict XVI revise ecclesiastical vows and strengthen rules on sex abuse, and include that any priest ordaining a woman would be severely punished.
On the sideline an extreme and tyrannical sect concocts a plot to stop the heresy against God and kidnap Alexandra, ending in a murder. Timely topics are brought out, such as the separation of church and state, ordaining women, how Catholics feel about females in the priesthood, at a time when they are able to participate in many parts of the mass and the equality of all under the eyes of God.
A thought-provoking and gripping novel told by Brown, a successful attorney working for several multinational companies.
© 2012 POLISH AMERICAN JOURNAL, P.O. BOX 328, BOSTON, NY 14025-0328 | (716) 312-8088 | Toll Free (800) 422-1275
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