Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl

Do not resent your place in the story. Do not imagine yourself elsewhere. Do not close your eyes and picture a world without thorns, without shadows, without hawks. Change this world. Use your body like a tool meant to be used up, discarded, and replaced. Better every life you touch. We will reach the final chapter.

Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl is a book that is hard to adequately describe. It's a Christian book in the sense that N.D. Wilson is a Christian, and an apologetics book in the sense that it dabbles in natural revelation and points and laughs at wrong-headed philosophy. But it's also a philosophical book itself, a book of musings on the world and the meaning of life. Told in N.D. Wilson's signature exuberant rambling metaphorical style, it's a book full of (as the title states) wide-eyed wonder at God's marvelously intricate spoken world.

For God's world, says N.D. Wilson, is a spoken world, a great story, and in that context Wilson wrestles with free will, the problem of evil, and the existence of God. If God is the author and we are his characters, what rights does He have? What rights do we have?

Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl is a book that makes you stop and take a look at the world with fresh eyes. Realize that there is someone behind the universe, spinning it, keeping it going with nothing but the power of His words. Be reminded that you and I are merely words, speech and sentence and punctuation in the greatest story ever told. We are the cast, thrust onto the set in the middle of filming. We are players shoved from the wings onto the bright lights of the stage.We are all riding the tilt-a-whirl.N.D. Wilson gives us some clever, unique, and beautiful observations along the way.

Review by Lauren Shearer Lauren Shearer writes words for fun and profit. She also makes films, but everyone knows you can't make a profit doing that. Her other hobby is consistently volunteering way too much of her time. You can read more of her reviews here.

Review by Lauren Shearer
Lauren Shearer writes words for fun and profit. She also makes films, but everyone knows you can't make a profit doing that. Her other hobby is consistently volunteering way too much of her time. You can read more of her reviews here.