This is the actual book, written in 1949, which inspired the script of the movie the Sound of Music. It is Maria and her family's autobiography, covering some early details of the Captain and Maria's separate lives and the history of the family from Maria's position as teacher to the young Maria all the way through the late 1940s. After reading the World of the Trapp Family (reviewed below), I finally picked up this book which I had started to read years earlier, but never finished.

This is really a rather remarkable novel about the battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania – probably the most famous battle of the Civil War. The Southern Armies, under General Lee, decided to invade the North in order to strike a blow that would "hit home" and make the Northerners wish to end the war. North and South met in the small farming town of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania and engaged in bloody battle for three days. The cost in human life was devastating to both sides.

The sequel to Surprised by Truth provides even more stories of how the grace of God, the witness of others and important conversations about the truth, brought these men and women back to the fullness of the Catholic faith.

This documentary video presents rather compelling evidence, from diverse fields of science, that the Shroud of Turin is the authentic burial cloth of Christ. Scientists and doctors also explain the sufferings of Jesus based on the evidence present on the cloth in conjunction with other historical data. Because some scenes from Christ's Passion are dramatized, the movie may prove too intense for very young, innocent children. It would be more suitable for older grade school and high school ages.