I loved the first collection of essays edited by Jay Allison. I found them powerful and challenging and insightful. I don't know if it's the time of my life or another factor but I was severely underwhelmed by this collection. It may be in part because these essays are much shorter and there is less time to really delve into each person's story before moving on to another one. I wasn' very impressed. ( )

A friend let me borrow this, since she thought I'd enjoy it and now I need to read the rest of the books. I loved this book, even though many of the essays made me cry. (Or perhaps because of that...) Many of the essays are very inspirational and moving. I'm so glad NPR compiled them and I look forward to reading the rest! ( )

This book is the follow-up (by 2 years) to This I Believe. It’s hard to say much about this sequal that I haven’t already mentioned in my review of the original, other than to say, “It’s a Must-Read”. The one thing it lacks, relative to the companion book is the photos of the essayists. I do, however, appreciate that in both books, there is a small biography of each author at the end of each essay, for two reasons: a) it gives one some background information about the person, and b) being after the essay, your appreciation of their thoughts are not skewed while reading what they have to say. I’m hoping that there will be yet another book from this NPR spot published soon. ( )

Read this book. Read volume 1. Get some perspective. Life your life. ( )