My order from Amazon got here a little earlier than I expected.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been plotting and planning my spring break reading.  As it stands right now, I’ve got three books and one movie to make the most of.

Usually there’s a new Eugene Peterson or N. T. Wright book to read through during my breaks.  This time around, my “developmental” book is James K. A. Smith’s Imagining the Kingdom, which is the second in his Cultural Liturgies series.  The first book, Desiring the Kingdom, helped me fill in some of the gaps that my “worldview education” inadvertently missed.  Smith admits that he has written this series in a way that tries to meet the needs of both church and academic institution, which can make it a frustrating hybrid for some.  In many ways, his work strikes me as being in the same vein as Steven Garber: serious philosophy mixed with cultural touchpoints (in the introduction alone we’ve got Wendell Berry and David Foster Wallace).

Simon Garfield’s On the Map was the first book I purchased for break.  It kind of fits my “anthropological” book fix.  The book is “a mind-expanding exploration of the way the world looks.”  I’ve got maps on my mind because some of my students are working on their own (in the same vein as those based on Pilgrim’s Progress).  I’m always in need of understanding how to represent things graphically.  Maps seemed like a good place to start.

My fiction for the break is a brand new novel with a good bit of buzz: Ned Beauman’s The Teleportation Accident.  Besides the buzz, all I know about the novel is that it is supposed to be a wonderful blend of multiple genres.  I’ll see how that goes.

And the movie?  Thanks to 50/50 and Warm Bodies, I’ve become a fan of Jonathan Levine.  So I tracked down a copy of his first movie: The Wackness.  It’s been called “hilarious and heartfelt.”  The heartfelt part is pretty evident in Levine’s other movies, so I’m hope that stands true for this one as well.

I’m sure other things will pop up in the two weeks leading up to break, and I’ll take those as they come.  But these three books and one movie are my goals.  I’ve already started in on one, and I’m loving it.  I may not be going anywhere for break this time around, but I’m ready for good things anyway.