Nov 15, 2016

Join Us for an Advent Book Exchange!

Wouldn’t it be nice to spend some time this Advent with a new book? We all need the humanizing influence of stories in our lives, and we at SDMW would like to host a book exchange.


The rules are simple. I will collect the names and addresses of all participants. With the help of my husband’s spreadsheet skills, I will randomly pair each participant with a recipient to whom to send a book. Adding a little note about why you like the book would be a nice extra touch. Everyone will send one title and receive one title.

The book should be:

·         One you enjoy and want to share with a fellow-Lutheran woman
·         Story-driven (i.e., novel, memoir, non-fiction narrative)
·         Either new or used, but in good reading condition
·         Reasonably cheerful (avoid anything excessively disturbing. The overall message should be hopeful even if the characters experience suffering and tragedy)

It’s sort of like a secret Santa Christmas exchange, except that it’s not secret, affiliated with St. Nick, or for Christmas. Ahem.

Anyway, are you in? It will be fun!

Send me your name and mailing address by Thursday, December 1st (sister-daughter-mother-wife (at) googlegroups.com). 

I will reply with your recipient’s info within a few days, and you should mail a book no later than Thursday, December 15.


Happy reading!

7 comments:

  1. This is the coolest idea ever. I'm so sharing this with my friends!

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  2. Is there any way to determine what would be a good book for the randomly selected recipient? My main thought is how easily someone could end up with a book that they have already read or maybe even own. Maybe that isn't generally a problem, but I'm sure my list of recommended books contains titles that many of this blog's readers have already encountered and enjoyed.

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    Replies
    1. Good question! This year, we'll just gamble and see how it turns out. :-) We may look into a more complicated system next year, but for now we're keeping it simple. I plan to try to a book that isn't super well-known as my contribution.

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    2. I do have a few options that would be less-known (although one of them is probably well-known if someone is a fan of Jane Austen). I'll just have to determine whether any of them really meets the criteria. I'm also hesitant about possible options because all of them are "literary classics"--might be a little too much of an adventure in literature for some people. Any more recent novels I'd recommend are going to be too well known among Lutherans (Katie Schuermann's novels for example.)

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    3. Jane Austen is always appropriate. Everyone should read her work! Ahem.

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    4. True, but then I'm taking a gamble about whether the recipient is already well-acquainted. However, chances are I'll probably end up picking one of her books since they are too good not to share.

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