If you have children between the ages of four and ten, I commend to you the Bible Story Book by Elsie E. Egermeier, who sounds like a Dr. Seuss character, but isn’t. Originally published around 1922, Elsie’s (can I call her Elsie? Egermeier is SO hard to spell!) book provides a chronological overview of the…
A couple years ago, I read an op-ed in the paper where the author bemoaned how toy manufacturers always marketed their products as “educational.” Nowadays, it seems as if every dolly and digger needs some sort of salubrious rationale before a kid can play with it. What’s the problem with simply having fun? the author…
Editor’s Note: We are very pleased to welcome our very first ever Guest Poster here at Story Warren. Carrie Givens is a fine writer from Pennsylvania who we met at Hutchmoot in Nashville last year. I’m grateful she said “yes” when I asked if we could post her book review to SW. If anyone would…
A couple of days after Thanksgiving, just minutes before I left to take the visiting half of my family back to the airport, my brother Nate pulled me aside. “Can I borrow Peace Like A River?” he begged. He needn’t have begged, because he knew I would instantly grin and agree. The mention of that…
Trickle-down imagination, SD Smith calls it: “We want to share [things] that will inspire, encourage, and foster holy imagination in you. Children become engaged when we are engaged.” (Why Story Warren) That’s what Russ Ramsey’s Behold the Lamb of God has done for my family this year. An advent narrative with twenty-five readings, Ramsey’s book…
Fantasy is a two-edged sword. It can amplify our disenchantment with the world, or refresh our appreciation of it. William Jay Smith does a great job communicating the romance of domesticity and refreshing our appreciation of life in his poem, “The Toaster.” He uses the unfamiliar (dragon) to refresh our wonder at the familiar (toaster). Tolkien…
Advent is a season of anticipation. When Christmas comes, we celebrate the arrival of our Savior! But before that, we identify with the children of Israel and their generations of desperately hoping God would do as He promised. We need Jesus to come again. Our broken bodies and entropic world cry out for it. I…
A few weeks back I shared why I love and appreciate the writings of my friend (yes, my friend –I’m rubbing it in) Sally Lloyd-Jones. It was sort of anticipatory to receiving Thought to Make Your Heart Sing. I had seen the book briefly, but we didn’t have it yet. Now we do. And wow….
Note: This review contains numerous spoilers. To read more about tales of winter, check out my original Story Warren post here, as well as my review of Jonny Duddle’s The Pirate Cruncher. Any honest plot summary of John Christopher’s young adult The Sword of the Spirits trilogy will have most conscientious Christian parents squirming in…
If you want to read to your kids, but the stories you choose seem hit or miss, let me offer a few genre suggestions based on age breakdowns. This might help you to hit the bullseye a little more often. I learned this in college, and these categories seem to make sense, though it might…
Note: To read more about tales of winter, check out my original Story Warren post here. What child doesn’t love pirates? During my youth in south Florida, I used to wander the beach with parents, picking over driftwood, chasing sandpipers and looking for Skull Rock. No mere mental homage to J.M. Barrie, Skull Rock was…
What can I say? When I was 2—long, long ago, back in the time of caves, when dinosaurs ruled the earth and parents left children in cars—my sister (a fresh plumpy newborn) and I were left in the back of our Humber car while our parents popped out—just for a second. When they left us,…
