Post by shirley on Sept 25, 2012 21:04:17 GMT -8
So I read Donald Miller's latest (I think) book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. Blue Like Jazz was Donald Miller's first best seller and the book he is probably best known for. The reviews for A Million Miles in a Thousand Years suggested this book was closer to Blue Like Jazz than any of his other books, but by a clearly more mature Don. This caught my attention because I really loved Blue Like Jazz when I read it six years ago, and felt that I too have matured a bit since then.
A Million Miles in a Thousand Years is about “living a better story”. That is, living a purposeful life that makes for a great eulogy, instead of simply going through the motions of life. Though the message of the book was certainly not lost on me, I feel that some of the brash humor and poignancy I recalled from Blue Like Jazz was missing. Actually, I just re-read it, and I'm not wrong.
Miller tells his stories well and has some thought provoking points. I would say this is by far his least religious book – in that God, Jesus, and/or the Church are not central to his message, and in fact rarely mentioned. You could say he's encouraging individualism, but his better story is not about improving your personal life, but about what you do for others, because this gives you a good story to live and leaves a good story to tell.
In Blue Like Jazz Miller uses writing metaphors to drive home his point. He does the same thing in A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, relating it to the writing of the script of the recently released movie titled Blue Like Jazz. I find writing about writing awfully cliche, but then I find myself relating to it, and then doing the same thing myself, so I really don't have the right to criticize.
I wound say, as a whole, the book is not extremely profound, But if you get the feeling you should be doing more with your life, then you might relate to the Don who sits on his couch and thinks about riding a bicycle and feel motivated when he gets off his bottom and rides across America.