Michael Tomlinson

Some Books I’ve Read and Enjoyed
I was really lucky growing up that my family loved to read for pleasure. On cold winter weekends in Amarillo, Texas where I was raised, the entire family would go to the library, spend a few hours exploring and come home with great piles of books to read and share. Mom would make a pot of chili so you could just eat whenever you wanted and we'd lay around the house listening to the north wind howl, reading our books and occasionally interrupting each other to read something we just had to share. I was only 7 or 8 but if mom thought something she and dad were reading was suitable for a child, I'd get to read it, and my sister, too, and we'd all talk about it around the supper table for weeks.
My folks were partial to books about early pioneers, the settling of the old west and particularly Alaska during the gold rush. It was great to pass those books around until we'd all read them and knew the characters and events by heart and could retell the adventures and laugh together about them.
I'm glad I grew up reading because I still do a lot of it. So much of my joy in life and my learning and growing and passion has been heightened by the words of people courageous enough to put their dreams and imaginations and experiences to paper.
Sometimes I describe the books and what I thought about them, sometimes, I just list them. I love reading from suggested lists of other people and I hope you do, too. - MT Recent Reads - May 2001 1. The Land of Laughs by Jonathan Carroll I really liked this book of wry humor and fantasy. 2. Duane’s Depressed by Larry McMurtry A wonderful book by one of my all-time favorite authors. This is the third in a trilogy over thirty-some-odd years. First was The Last Picture Show, then Texasville and now, Duane’s Depressed. I love the dialogue in every McMurtry book, whether it’s old cowboys in Lonesome Dove or modern couples in Terms of Endearment. 3. East of the Mountains by David Guterson What a fantastic book! I loved this even more than his Snow Falling on Cedars. I highly recommend this book. 4. Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier Just about everyone knows about this book which won the National Book Award. It took me about six starts to get into it and then, when I did, I loved it. A true work of literature about a soldier making his way home after the Civil War. 5. Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott This is a truly inspiring book to read, especially if you are trying to write honestly, yourself. She tells you how and also, how important it is to do so. And she is one of the funniest writers I’ve ever read. Amazingly honest and bold. 6. Sweet Potato Queen’s Book of Love by Jill Conner Brown Wow. The most out loud laughs I’ve ever had in a single book. I read this over a weekend because I was staying with a friend who wouldn’t let me take it with me, though she’d read it about a dozen times. Truly hilarious and intelligent and irreverant and sweet. 7. Plainsong by Kent Haruf An incredibly well-written book. I love great dialogue and this book has it. 8. A Cure for Gravity by Arthur Rosenfeld I don’t often read mysteries, and this is more a novel with a subplot of mystery. I enjoyed it. 9. The Point and Other Stories by Charles D’Ambrosio I can’t recommend this one highly enough. Charles is a master, I loved his voice and the way he looks at the world. All the stories are tragic, but they all are bouyed by a spark of hope. 10. Dr Cat’s Helping Handbook A Compassionate Guide for Being Human, by Cat Saunders Ph.D. Heartwings Foundation www.drcat.org I don’t read many books anymore about helping yourself to get emotionally and spiritually healthy. It’s not that I don’t need help, it’s just that I read so many of them and after that, you just need to do the work and access the teachings in your own life. But I have to say, this book is so wise and kind and gentle in it’s lessons, in it revelations, that I think the world would be a much better place if everyone read it. Cat talks about all kinds of addictions, not just the popular ones. She shows how we can all come aware and break free of unconscious habits that keep us from feeling and loving. I highly recommend this book. 11. Blindness by Jose Saramago Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature A powerful and shocking book about a sudden plague of blindness that surges over the world. 12. More Letters From a Nut by Ted L. Nancy Yes, I read the silliest things imaginable. This guy has written some of the most hilarious letters you’ll ever read. I’ve read from both his books at my retreats and the entire group was all in the floor laughing. 13. Timbuktu by Paul Auster I read this kind book in Monterrey last summer when I was hanging out for a few days after a concert there. I bought it in a little beach gift shop and started reading it on a bench under the twisted pines. It was a very enjoyable read. 14. Montenegro by Starling Lawrence A beautiful novel about a part of the world I have known nothing about except for the terrible stories of war and racial hatred. It’s an adventure novel of sorts, but very literary. It helped me to understand for how long and how complex the feuds between Serbs and Croats have gone on. I think there have been another 8 or 10 books over the last year or so, but I’m drawing a blank here. Hope you choose some of these and enjoy them. MT
More Books Below
Traveling Mercies by Anne Lomott Straight Man by Richard Russo The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield The Man Who Listens to Horses by Monty Roberts For Kings and Planets by Ethan Canin The Palace Thief by Ethan Canin Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt Milroy the Magician by Paul Theroux The Cowboy Way by David McCumber Letters from a Nut by Ted L Nancy River God by Wilbur Smith The Unimaginable Life by Kenny and Julia Loggins Top Dog by Jerry Jay Carroll Comanche Moon by Larry McMurtry The Art of Doing Nothing by Veronique Vienne A Reasonable Life by Ferenc Mate A Civil Action by Johnathon Harr Collected Poems of WB Yeats edited by Richard J Finneran Selected Poems of Rainer Marie Rilke commentary by Robert Bly Breakthrough Thinking by Nadler and Hibino
More Books...with Reviews
A Soldier of the Great War and A Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin
	"Mark Helprin is my absolute favorite author of the last few years. His powers of description are so brilliant and perceptive as to become something spiritual."
The River Why and The Brothers K by David James Duncan
	"Both of these books had me laughing so hard in the first third and then feeling powerful mixtures of emotion for the remainder."
The Seat of the Soul by Gary Zukav
	"One autumn day in Boulder my friend, Chuck Pyle, turned me on to this one and it's one of the five books I have bought the most copies of to give away, probably 20 or more. Gary's sense of human experience and spiritual/psychological evolution is the clearest, cleanest explanation I have ever read."
Bringers of the Dawn and Earth; Keys to the Living Library by Barbara Marciniak
	"These are also books I've bought several of for gifts, Barbara shares very clear and loving information from a Pleiadean perspective."
Return of the Bird Tribes and Starseed, and The Third Millenium by Ken Carey
	"These are powerful spiritual works, as are all of Ken's writings. Much of his vision has moved through me into my songs."
The Horse Whisperer by Nicholas Evans
	"It is hard to believe that this is a first book for this author. What a tremendous story of human and animal healing."
The Education of Littletree and Watch for Me on the Mountain by Forrest Carter
	"Littletree is a book for everyone and I've damn near bought everyone a copy over the last ten years. Alot of laughter and tears and an incredible book for people to read aloud to each other."
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
	"This book is legendary, a Pulitzer Prize winner. The book was published years after the suicide of the author. One of the funniest books I've ever read."
Texasville and Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
	"I've probably read eight or ten of McMurtry's books and these are two of the best, especially Lonesome Dove, so funny and exciting and sad. One of my very favorite."
Song of Soloman by Toni Morrison
	"My friend, Jeff LaBow, has been telling me for years to read this woman's books, now I know why. Her characters are so alive and her observations very wise and accurate. She is a brave writer."
Possessing the Secret of Joy by Alice Walker
	"This is a book I highly recommend, especially to men. It is painful to read but still a story of triumph."
All of Carlos Castaneda's books, especially the first four;
The Teachings of Don Juan A Separate Reality Journey to Ixtlan Tales of Power
	"These books are so dear to my heart because they started me on my spiritual journey. In 1977 a woman named Theresa, who was dying of cancer placed Journey to Ixtlan in my hand and told me to read it. My life changed forever."
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
	"Marquez has the rare ability to slow down the reader to his pace, to cause you to savor the passage of time and and breathe life with his characters."
Mutant Message Downunder by Marlo Morgan
	"When my friend, Melodie Hall, gave me this book six years ago I had never heard of it. It was years before I began to see it in stores. I loved how it was almost amateurish, kind of a journal, it felt more real and truthful because of that. It is really a powerful spiritual book."
The P'taah Tapes, An Act of Faith by Jani King
	"Another friend, Kimberly Kirry, gave me this one and it is truly a gift. This book is Pleiadean information about living in the heart and teaches how to transmute fear to ecstacy. It has been a very helpful book in my life."
The Tao of Leadership by John Heider
	"My friend Danny Deardorff gave me this book when we were recording Face Up in the Rain together. It is a book about integrity and I go back to it again and again for insights."
Unconditional Love and Silence of the Heart by Paul Ferrini
	"What a great teacher this man is. In the first paragraph of each of these books I was immediately absorbed. Powerful and spiritual."
Desert Notes by Barry Lopez
	"John Allen, a writer-friend in Montana back in the late 70s turned me on to this and many of the books here. Barry Lopez writes about nature in a passionate and compelling way that puts you right there in his head and heart."
By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept and The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
	"I thought I was reading By the River. . . mainly because my friend, Paula Rodriguez, who gave it to me had considered it a very special book. It wasn't 'til the last third of the book that I found myself completely stunned by the depth of human understanding. It is a wonderful book."
The Sky Fisherman by Craig Lesley
	"I chose this book to give to my good friend, Rick Grant, who had not taken the time to read a book in quite awhile. It did the trick, he finished it and has been reading books non-stop over the last few months since."
Signet of Atlantis by Barbara Hand Clow
	"This book aroused some kind of ancient memory in me. It involves past-life recall and Pleidean information. I learned alot about the roles of animals on this planet and the spirituality of sacred of sexuality."
Indian Creek Cronicles by Pete Fromm
	"I found this book in a great little rustic gift shop up in the Cascade Mountain town of Leavenworth. The story of a young man's winter alone as a lookout in the frozen Rockies."
Nobody's Fool by Richard Russo
	"You probably saw the movie and for once, just about every funny or tender line in the movie came directly from the book. An incredible writer."
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
	"This is a very compelling early 1900 western, really believable and also quite violent. I'm getting ready to read his next book, The Crossing, as soon as I finish my current book."
Dance Me Outside and Moccasin Telegraph by WP Kinsella
	"Kinsella is best known as the guy who wrote the book, Shoeless Joe, that became the movie, Field of Dreams. His characters are really funny and sometimes, very tragic. These are books that get passed around friend to friend."
Banished Knowledge by Alice Miller
	"Alice is a very well-known European Psychologist who writes powerfully revealing books about children and the effects of their upbringing. Really insightful."
The Control of Nature by John McPhee
	"Part of my song, River Alive, came directly from the chapter in this book about the artificial and fragile control of the Mississippi."
Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins
	"This is my favorite Tom Robbins book and it was a gift from my friend, Tawney Forbes. As are all his books, it is hilarious, but it is also truly spiritual. One of the best opening paragraphs I've ever read."
Tom Mix and Pancho Villa by Clifford Irving
	"A Colorado friend gave me this book just before I took off for Mexico. The book takes place in Mexico and it was great to be there and breath the air and feel the sun while reading it. Though this is a novel,Tom and Pancho actually did know each other."
Milagro Beanfield War by John Nichols
	"My favorite book of a pretty famous trilogy. New Mexico peasants against Big Time Developers. The movie was good, too."
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
	"I feel pretty silly reccomending classics like this 'cause I figure everybody knows it already. But just in case you don't, read it, our youth culture has been profoundly shaped by this book."
Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns
	"A really funny look at a southern family in the early 1900s, especially an endearing boy named Will Tweedy. I learned a lot about how generation after generation passes on guilt and judgment but mainly, this is a fun book."
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S Thompson
	"I read this book working in a lift shack halfway up the hill at Big Mountain Ski Resort in Whitefish, Montana in 1979. It influenced me to write numerous wacky, perverted short stories to hand to friends as they floated by on the lift up to the top of the mountain. People were heard to comment, "That quiet Texas kid wrote this?"
Whispering Winds of Change by Stuart Wilde
	"I've read many short pieces by Stuart but this was my first full book. He's got very opinionated views on life and spirituality and some of them are really profound."
He, She, We and Ecstasy, Four separate books by Robert Johnson
	"A psychologist who uses mythology to bring to light the psychological workings of men and women. Really important books."
Nine Faces of Christ by Eugene E Whitworth
	"A book about the thirteen years of Jesus' life that somehow didn't make it to the modern bible. Very uplifting and insightful."
The Magian Gospel of Brother Yeshua by Charles C Wise, Jr.
	"This book also is about the years and many details of Jesus' life that are a mystery. It was a mysterious gift to me ten years ago. After reading it I twice bought a whole case of these to give away."
Right Use of Will by Ceanne DeRohan
	"Powerful and disorienting views on the human spiritual evolution. The disorientation is on purpose, to break down old beliefs and open the reader to new possibilites and spiritual concepts."
Only the Little Bone by Ethan Canin
	"Ethan writes stories as if he is the characters he invents. I love his sense of healing and forgiveness."
Montana 1948 by Larry Watson
	"A mystery of sorts and also a coming of age story about a young boy in the 40s. I gave it to a friend and she really loved it."
Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
	"This was another gift from Danny Deardorff during the recording of one of my CDs. Rilke was light years ahead of his time. I get something from him no matter how many times I read it."