text: Today on The Literary Life Podcast, our hosts Angelina and Cindy chat with Cindy’s longtime friend and, according to her, the “smartest woman on the internet,” Wendi Capehart. Wendi is an adventurous mom of many and has lived throughout Asia. Now she lives the life of an at home librarian caring for her disabled daughter and spending time with her 15 grandchildren. She also serves on the AmblesideOnline Advisory board.
  Angelina starts off the conversation asking Wendi about her reading life beginning with her childhood memories of reading. Wendi talks a little about how books helped her survive and heal from the trauma of living in an abusive situation. They also discuss what the difference was for Wendi in leisurely reading and reading for school. Wendi shares some of the reasons she began homeschooling her own children, as well, and how she kept reading voraciously even after she became a mother.
  Angelina and Wendi talk about the brain and changing your reading habits to digest and enjoy more challenging books. Wendi shares how she built a library while one a military budget and moving frequently. They talked about too many things to mention in this summary, but you can scroll down for the many book titles mentioned in this episode!
  Listen to The Literary Life:
  “We’re all fools,” said Clemens, “all the time. It’s just we’re a different kind each day. We think, I’m not a fool today. I’ve learned my lesson. I was a fool yesterday but not this morning. Then tomorrow we find out that, yes, we were a fool today too. I think the only way we can grow and get on in this world is to accept the fact we’re not perfect and live accordingly.”
  Where science does not teach a child to wonder and admire it has perhaps no educative value.
  Now the story of Christ is simply a true myth, a myth working on us in the same way as the others, but with tremendous difference–that it really happened–and one must be content to accept it in the same way, remembering that it is God’s myth, where the others are men’s myths. That is, the pagan stories are God expressing himself through the minds of poets, using such images as he found there, while Christianity is God expressing Himself through real things.
  C. S. Lewis
  If Only I Were King
  by A. A. Milne
  I often wish I were a King,
  And then I could do anything.
  If only I were King of Spain,
  I’d take my hat off in the rain.
  If only I were King of France,
  I wouldn’t brush my hair for aunts.
  I think, if I were King of Greece,
  I’d push things off the mantelpiece.
  If I were King of Norroway,
  I’d ask an elephant to stay.
  If I were King of Babylon,
  I’d leave my button gloves undone.
  If I were King of Timbuctoo,
  I’d think of lovely things to do.
  If I were King of anything,
  I’d tell the soldiers, “I’m the King!”
  The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury
  Towards a Philosophy of Education by Charlotte Mason
  The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C. S. Lewis by Alan Jacobs
  Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt
  Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne
  The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas
  The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
  The Little Prince by Antione de Saint-Exupéry
  The Sea Around Us by Rachel Carson
  The Heroes by Charles Kingsley
  The Water-Babies by Charles Kingsley
  The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Graham
  Kim by Rudyard Kipling
  The Chestry Oak by Kate Seredy
  The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis
  The Rescuers by Marjorie Sharp
  The Borrowers by Mary Norton
  Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
  Ben Hur by Lew Wallace
  The Bears of Blue River by Charles Major
  Support The Literary Life:
  Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support!