Amena bares her soul on "How to Fix a Broken Record" and shares the lessons she's learned along the way. This book is inspiring and encouraging and a must-read for anyone that has their own "broken records" that need fixing. It offers hope for redemption and healing.

This was my very first ARC book to review, and boy did I start on a high note. This book is funny and endearing. You feel like the author is sitting right next to you like a best friend, telling her story and giving you sage advice. The author has a way or writing hard things in a way that also hugs your soul. Amena’s story resonated with me. I felt her struggles, pain, and joy. This is a quick read that leaves you feeling seen and uplifted.

(This review is late posting because, well I was new to the game. I participated *extensively* in the dialogue with the editor in our ARC group. But somehow, I didn’t know this review was separate. *insert facepalm )

I was introduced to the stylings of Amena Brown Owen via If:Gathering 2014, in a spoken word performance she did with Ann Voskamp, Esther Generation. Oh how that label has followed me. Maybe you were born for such a time as this. It was electrifying. An erstwhile poet myself, I had always known that the spoken word poets could be powerful, but really, I. Had. No. Idea.

When I found out that her new book was called How to Fix a Broken Record: Thoughts on Vinyl Records, Awkward Relationships, and Learning to Be Myself, as a lifelong lover of all things Vinyl, I knew this was going to be something that resonated with me. “Your soul holds a massive record collection: melodies, rhythms, and bass lines. Memories that ask you to dance and memories that haunt you in a minor key. Lies that become soundtracks to your days while truths play too softly to be heard.”

In this book Amena tells us her story. Her God story. Her self love story. Her marriage story. Her family story. Her finding herself story. And through these stories she weaves the imagery of a God in pursuit of her, the whole her, not just the pieces. A God whose words can eradicate the lies we tell ourselves. A God whose love transcends the love that we think we need, that we think is all we get. Amena affirms the truth of our age, that the lies we tell ourselves everyday, on repeat, like a record skipping, are just that, they are lies. And this God that pursued her, has so much more melody to offer than we can begin to orchestrate for ourselves.

In so many ways Amena and I have lived and live in two very different worlds, two very different stories. But her narrative is so engaging, her truths so universal, that her story beats in time with mine, and the truths that leap off her pages also leap off mine. The God she and I both love so deeply is beyond borders.

I need all my friends to read this book. For those suffering with depression, there are words of hope. For those suffering from infertility, there is soothing balm. For my pastor friends suffering Kingdom loss there is truth and holiness in Amena’s story of finding a home church. Each chapter brought something new to the fore, that I could recognize from my own day to day experiences. And every story screamed out, ME TOO, you are not alone.

23270225_1598992500161649_8325867393102079571_oNow days after finishing this, the imagery I cannot get out of my head is that of broken records. Negative messages, painful repetitions that play over and over in your mind. This imagery works on my heart in a powerful way. For me records are a love passed down from my father, that I am slowly passing down to my children. From my father I learned who the Beatles were, the best of Cat Stevens, and never to close doors with music, listen to everything, take in everything. I also learned how to love and be loved. My dad is not your church-going Christian, but from him I learned what a good father is, and my relationship with God is the deeper for it. I learned kindness, and generosity, I learned patience and tolerance. So the broken records have that b side, of a record well played, of grooves worn into my soul from constant repetitions of joy and love. What then am I passing on to my own children? What grooves am I wearing into their little selves? A love of the Beatles again, a love of well written words, kindness. And perhaps a little something of that holy beat that dwells in all of us.

Amena put words to the longest refrain of my soul, trying to understand this holy, miraculous God in this cubicle dwelling, black and white seeking world:

“I’m living every day trying to hold the tension of fully trusting in a God my humanity will never completely understand."

Ours is a God who defies boxes, who breaks out of definitions, and brings walls crashing down. All we can do, as Amena does here so eloquently, is continue spinning those records, telling each other our stories, and piece by piece we get a fuller picture of who this God is. As our small narratives weave together, we can see his face more clearly.

Pick up this book, you will not regret it.

I knew of Amena Brown as a poet, and you get glimpses of that gifting in this book when you read certain passages. The biggest takeaway for me were the life lessons she passed along. Writing from her experiences as an African American woman, but applicable truths for all women. I loved the storytelling! We're discussing this book in our book club in a few weeks, and I think it lends itself nicely to conversation about a number of topics.

How to Fix a Broken Record

Thoughts on Vinyl Records, Awkward Relationships, and Learning to Be Myself
by Amena Brown

Zondervan Non-Fiction

Zondervan
Christian

Pub Date 07 Nov 2017

I am reviewing a copy of How to Fix A Broken Record through Zondervan and Netgalley:

In this book Amena Brown opens up about heartbreak and healing, and healing. She reminds us that our soul has a huge collection of melodies, rhythms and bass lines. There are memories that make you want to dance, and some that haunt you in a minor key.

In this book we are reminded that God loves us unconditionally. That whether or not we feel worthy to be loved we are loved by Jesus. She opens up about not feeling worthy about the mistakes she made a long the way but despite that all Jesus was there.

Amena Brown often reminds us that failures of our past, the words we hear have a effect on us. The painful repletion’s can become loud at the most inoppurtune times, causing us not to speak up or reach for our dreams.

I give How to Fix A Broken Record five out of five stars!

Happy Reading!

I will hereby admit that I had heard Amena speak before, but not perform, and hadn't read any previous books. So, I was a fan, but not a lunatic obsessive. In this book, though, she reveals herself and her journey in such vulnerable and beautiful ways, it's going to be hard to maintain that status. Amena's writing (about everything from songs that changed her life to the broken records we all play in our heads to the chance to discover her ancestry to the churches she attended and what they meant throughout her life to the loss of a baby and the desire to get pregnant) is poignant and reflective and beautiful without feeling *poignant* and *reflective* and *beautiful*. Instead, it feels more like a dear friend talking to you over coffee, but with a great turn of phrase and depth of feeling. 
*I received an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. The opinions are my own.*