A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Own Life
Donald Miller
Nelson, 2009, 288 pp., $19.99
donaldmillerwords.com

Angry Conversations with God
Susan Isaacs
FaithWords, 2009, 256 pp., $19.99
susanisaacs.net

After Blue Like Jazz sold a million copies, Miller became the Voice of a New Generation of Christians. Three books and hundreds of talks later, Miller again explores big themes through small things, such as his life, his dog and his friends.

When Steve Taylor and Ben Pearson say they want to make a movie (see bluelikejazzthemovie.com), Miller wonders what kind of character he is and what kind of story he is living. He even finds the will to change his story by eating less, watching less TV and reconnecting with his long-absent father.

The concept of story is a good hook to knit together Miller’s anecdotes and reflections on faith; but will average-Joe readers identify with Miller as he bikes across the United States, hikes to Machu Picchu, attends a Hollywood screenwriting seminar and drinks with wealthy philanthropists?

Miller and actress/comedienne Susan Isaacs are touring together this fall. Isaacs calls her memoir “snarky,” which means snide and irreverent. It’s also funny as heck, insightful and even inspiring.

Isaacs is frustrated that her Christian experience falls short of the perfection she was promised. She is also frustrated with well-meaning Christians who dismiss her career setbacks with clichés such as: “God definitely protected you from success!”

She takes God to marriage counseling to iron out their conflicts. Along the way she takes shots at men, churches and pastors (including the one who told her not to audition for a role in “dark” movies, such as The Addams Family, and later praised the film in his sermons).

Both honest and humorous, Conversations takes readers inside Isaacs’ long, snark night of the soul.