Diamonds in the Dust - brief book review

Diamonds in the Dust by Shirley Mowat Tucker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


My five-star rating is based on the quality of the story although I would give a different mark for a quality of writing -- maybe 3.5. However this author will learn and grow and improve and is well worth watching.

The story line is dramatic, frightening, and ultimately bears a Christian message of forgiveness and resolution. The characterizations are deep and thoughtful. The author has clear insight into what makes people violent, fearful, angry, and hopeless, and how their internal choices can redeem them.

You will learn a lot about the sorry state of affairs in South Africa if you read this book -- stories of ordinary people dealing with the devastation of murder, AIDS, child rape, starvation, poverty, being orphaned and abandoned ... and how people can reach out to help each other heal.

In spite of the dark themes this is not a dark book. It is realistic and hopeful. I couldn't put it down.

Brideshead Revisited

One of my all-time favorite novels is Brideshead Revisited.

I caught him with an unseen hook and an invisible line which is long enough to let him wander to the ends of the world and still to bring him back with a twitch upon the thread.  (Chesterton, from the Father Brown story "The Queer Feet" - famously quoted by Lady Marchmain in Brideshead Revisited)

Joy and Sorrow

From "The Prophet" by Khalil Gibran

Then a woman said, "Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow."

And he answered:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

And how else can it be?

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?

And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."

But I say unto you, they are inseparable.

Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.

Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.

When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.

In Flanders Fields

By Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow...
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Now, more than ever - the Micawber Principle

Wilkins Micawber is a character in Dickens' book David Copperfield. One of Mr. Micawber's characteristic phrases is the hopeful and forward-looking, "something will turn up."

The "Micawber Principle" is based upon his observation:

"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery."

In case you are confused by the olde English money, it translates as the personal financial principle of finding happiness by spending less per year than one earns, even if it's by a nickel.

Good idea? You bet it is!