Annie on My Mind

Name of Book:  Annie on My Mind

Author:  Nancy Garden

Publisher:  Farrar Straus Giroux

ISBN:  0374303665

Audience:  Age 14 up

Summary:  In November of her senior year in high school, 17-year-old Liza meets Annie Kenyon in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Though their worlds are full of contrasts – Liza goes to a private school, while Annie attends a terrible public high school; Liza is from a fairly wealthy family, and Annie’s parents and immigrant grandmother live in a shabby neighborhood – the girls become good friends and then lovers.  The realization of her homosexuality shakes Liza to her core and causes severe repercussions in her family and school as well.

Literary elements at work in the story:  Annie on My Mind is a series of letters that Liza begins to write to her friend Annie and then discards as she tries to process the relationship they had before both went off to college.  Interspersed is Liza’s first-person narrative of their seven-month love affair and the subsequent calamity that befalls them when others find out about their relationship.  The reader sees the whole story through the eyes of Liza, as she struggles to understand and then accept who she is and rejoice in her love for Annie.

How does the perspective on gender/race/culture/economics/ability make a difference to the story?  Now nearly thirty years old, this novel portrays the prejudice that surrounds the topic of homosexuality in our culture.  Some details are quite dated – smoking is more acceptable, high school seniors can legally buy wine, etc. – but the underlying theme of the power of love stands the test of time.  Much is made of the rigid, small-minded moral code of Liza’s private high school, although it is not clear that the general population of the time was any more open in their dealings with gay teens.

Theological conversation partners:   This novel would be a good book to use with teens in discussions of what it means to grow into the people whom God created us to be.  It might also be instructive to look at the scripture passages used as weapons by one of Liza’s friends against her [Lev. 18:22, Romans 1:26] as a way of exploring the historical injunctions against homosexuality in the Bible.  Juxtaposing that scene with the Pharisees’ use of the law against Jesus (particularly Matt 22:35-40) might give rise to interesting discussions about what place social, civil, and moral laws have in our lives.

Faith Talk Questions:

1. What issues of trust were broken during the time that Annie and Liza were using the teachers’ home as a place to meet?
2. How were the teachers, Ms. Widmer and Ms. Stevenson, influential at FosterAcademy?
3. How did Liza’s friend Sally use scripture when Liza tried to explain her relationship with Annie?
4. How was this use of scripture similar to/different than the way the Pharisees used it when Jesus healed on the Sabbath in John 5:5-16?

This review was written by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Beth Lyon-Suhring.

Teens and Questions of Faith: American Born Chinese

Title: American Born Chinese

Author: Gene Luen Yang

Illustrator: Color by Lark Pien

Publisher: First Second

ISBN: 1596431520; 240 pages

Audience: Ages 12 and up

Summary: American Born Chinese tells three separate stories: The Monkey King, of Chinese legend, wants to be accepted in the Heavenly Council as a deity; Jin Wang, an American born Chinese boy, wants to be accepted by his peers in junior high as American; Danny, an all American blond, wants to be free of his embarrassing Chinese cousin, Chin Kee, whose yearly visit alienates Danny’s friends forcing him to move to a new school each year.  The Monkey King is refused entry to the dinner party of the gods because he wears no shoes and is a monkey. He demolishes the banquet hall and most of the guests, then returns to his kingdom to master the additional disciplines of Kung Fu and ward off any punishment.  He is no match, however for Tze-Yo-Tzun, the creator of the universe. Jin Wang enters a new school and spends the first half of the year without any friends until Wei Chen, a newcomer from Taiwan joins his class. With Wei Chen’s help he gets a date with Amelia and curls his thick black hair so that he’ll look more American. Chin Kee arrives, ruins Danny’s beginning romance with Melanie, and insists on accompanying him to school. Chin Kee’s actions confirm every prejudice about  Asians. Unbelievably, the Monkey King, Jin Wang, Wei Chen, and Danny become part of one story in which nothing is quite as it seems.

Literary elements at work in the story: This is a graphic novel that relies on pictures more than words.  But don’t underestimate this method of telling a story.  A picture of solitary Jin on the playground conveys loneliness more than any words.  The visual is critical in the Monkey King’s encounter with Tze-Yo-Tzun. Jin tells his story in first person. The Monkey King is a popular, well known fable in Asia with some modification in this book.  Tze-Yo-Tzun is possibly a historical philosopher and poet but his words come close to our concept of God.  This is a charming, complex, satisfying, story with humorous situations that any adolescent will recognize. It was a 2006 National Book Award finalist and the 2007 Michael L. Printz Award winner for excellent in young adult literature.

How does the perspective on gender/race/culture/economics/ability make a difference to the story? Racial prejudice plays a significant part in this story.  Caucasian young people accept and declare inaccurate facts about Asians.  Chin Kee represents prejudices Caucasians have against Asians.

The Asian characters themselves are all academically gifted.

Theological Conversation Partners:  A central theme of this book is self-acceptance and the implication is that you have been created this way. An old woman tells Jin that he can become anything he wants if he will give up his soul. Psalm 139 is quoted extensively by Tze-Yo-Tzun when he is chiding the Monkey King for his refusal to be a monkey.  When the monk who will lead the Monkey King to humility explains why he serves it sounds very much like, “We love because he first loved us.” The completion of the Monkey King’s test of virtue leads him to a manger, a new born babe, and his parents.

Faith Talk Questions:

1. Do you know any Asian young people in your school?  Are they accepted as who they are?
2. What do the Monkey King, Jin, and Danny have in common?
3. Psalm 139 is quoted by Tze-Yo-Tzun to remind the Monkey King that he was created in love to be a monkey.  Is this a good use of the psalm?
4. Do you see any problem with the idea that God created us to be who we are?  How does this tie in with Christ’s call to make us something more or being a new creation in Christ?
5. The old woman tells Jin that he can be whatever he wants in exchange for his soul.  What does this mean?
6. Why is a manger scene included in the Monkey King’s path to virtue?
7. How does Jin help Wei Chen regain his identity?
8. Transformers play a part in both Jin and Wei’s lives.  In what way are they a good symbol for this story?

This is the second review in our series on Teens and Faith.  Next week, This Gorgeous Game will be reviewed.

Oggie Cooder

Name of Book:  Oggie Cooder

Author: Sarah Weeks

Publisher: Scholastic

ISBN: 9780439927949

Audience: Ages 8 – 12

Summary: Oggie Cooder is the class weirdo. Donnica Perfecto is his chief nemesis. She wants to win a talent show audition and thinks Oggie’s carving of cheese into shapes is the best way to win. But it is Oggie that inadvertently wins. With Donnica as his manager he is bound to succeed. Soon Oggie learns that fame has its downsides and that Hollywood is Donnica’s dream, not his.

Literary elements at work in the story: The plot is understandable and appropriate for the age level. It is clear and well organized, fast paced and funny. The characters, though quirky, are believable. The secondary characters are a bit stereotypical – spoiled girls, jock boys – but they do not distract much from the story.

How does the perspective on gender/race/culture/economics/ability make a difference to the story?: This is an imaginative story about friendships and the urge to be popular. Oggie’s conflict between fitting in and finding himself is very relatable.

Scripture: Romans 12:17-21

Theology:  Oggie knows what the writer of this passage knows; that kindness, not revenge, is what really matters in life. Oggie had all kinds of reasons to resent those around him, especially Donnica.  Donnica used him and yet in the end, Oggie not only lets it go, but works to make Donnica’s dream come true. Live as Oggie did and you too will be able to leave vengeance to God where it belongs!

Faith Talk Questions:

1. How do other kids at Oggie’s school feel about him?
2. How would you feel about someone in your school like Oggie?
3. Have kids ever teased you for what you have worn or something you have done?  If so, how did you handle it?
4. Oggie sits with his friend Amy at lunch every day. Why do you think nobody else wants to sit with them? Are there kids that sit alone at your school?  Why?
5. It is very important to Donnica to become famous. This seems to be a popular trend in our society. Why do you think it is so important for people to be famous? What would be good/bad about being famous?
6. Even after all that Donnica puts Oggie through, he still allows her to be his manager. Why do you think this is?
7. What can you do to live up to the words in this passage from scripture?

Review prepared by regular contributor Janet Lloyd

One Special Me: A Book Celebrating How God Made Us Special

Name of Book:  One Special Me: A Book Celebrating How God Makes Us Special

Author:  Allia Zobel Nolan

Illustrator:  Pauline Siewert

Publisher:  Thomas Nelson

Audience:  Ages 3 and up

Summary:  This children’s book shares the story of several children from different racial backgrounds that all have different physical features. They each take turns sharing one of their features that they like and why it’s special to them. As each character celebrates his or her uniqueness, they also celebrate that God made them special and they have special gifts because of how God created them.

Literary elements at work in the story:  This paraphrase storybook is told from multiple first person points of view through the eyes of the unnamed children. Each highlights a unique feature of them and then celebrates the way they are made by God. The overall theme of the book is that God has created us each as individuals and that we should celebrate and be grateful for how we are created by God. This book is a special format genre book that invites children to read and learn through both sight and touch.

How does the perspective on gender/race/culture/economic/ability make a difference to the story?  While the book includes white skinned and darker skinned children, as well as children who are tall and short, the book makes no mention of children of different physical handicaps. Children are portrayed by skin color, eye color, hair style and texture, vision ability, height and arm length, and even sense of smell and lost teeth. There is no reference to economic or cultural differences among the children. Both male and female children are portrayed in the book.

Scripture:  Psalm 139:14 (ICB)  “I praise you because you have made me in an amazing and wonderful way.”

Theology:  We strive to live into the fullness of our identity as children of God. We know that God made us in God’s image when we were created, and we can embrace that as we embrace our identity as God’s unique and beloved creation. Everything that God created was and is good and nothing about our identity or selves was created with less than that same love and perfection. We are created in the image of God to grow into a full life through the love of God in Jesus Christ and the strength of the Holy Spirit.

Faith Talk Questions

1. Who created you?
2. What do you think God said about you when you were created?
3. What is special about you that God gave just to you?
4. What do you love most about who God made you to be?
5. What are some special things that only you can do with the body & life God gave to you?
6. How do you thank God for the life given to you?

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary graduate Katie Todd

Things I Have to Tell You: Poems and Writing by Teenage Girls

Name of Book:  Things I Have to Tell You: Poems and Writing by Teenage Girls

Editor:  Betsy Franco

Photography:  Nina Nickles

Publisher:  Candlewick Press

ISBN: 0-978-0-7636-1035-7

Audience:  14 and up. Contains strong language and sexual imagery.

Summary:  Betsy Franco was inspired by a conversation with a teenage friend who expressed feelings that Betsy remembered in her own adolescence.  She realized how important it was for teenage girls to communicate their experiences, and this was the impetus behind Things I Have to Tell You.  In powerful poetry and prose, this collection explores the intense, unstable, lonely, turbulent emotional life of American girls coming of age.  Much of it is difficult to take as it exposes the stifling load of perfection, conformity, competition and sensuality heaped on the fragile adolescent psyche.  Secrets, anxiety, escape, tears, honesty, identities, appearances, bodies, hair, and the perpetual judgment of men saturate these strange and beautiful revelations about what they think it means to be a woman.  One wants to “break the stereotype of a girl as a dainty little thing who needs a man by her side in order to do anything,” while another brags “This coquette can get/any man she’s set/eyes upon/a female Don Juan/the best/I confess/cannot help but obsess/over me/devil walking/in one hell of a dress.” Candid black and white photos of girls in their element, hanging out, in front of mirrors, cars, boys, each other, blurry with energy and startling intimate clarity add a visual dimension to each piece. Some of them are remarkably mature, others painfully naive, all of them touch the adolescent that still lurks in middle aged hearts.

Literary Elements:  This book would be an excellent primer on poetry for high school creative writing, loaded with expressive images and metaphors:  Hair that blows in the wind because it’s growing regrets, conformity that grows back like a dandelion pulled up but with roots deep in the ground, steam that curls off bath water. Most of it is free verse and streaming consciousness prose,  executed with the discipline of clearly developed themes and the mechanics of good writing.

Theology:  God is curiously missing from the entire collection.  I find it hard to believe that there are no teenagers thinking and writing about their spiritual life.  Every one of the pieces is centered around a self in a world of other selves.  Perhaps that’s why so many of them are sad and lonely.  Their strength seems comes from resistance to peer pressure, authority, and cultural mandates. Love is something to control, except in “A Letter To My Great Grandmother,” which is a deeply spiritual tribute to the kind of self-emptying love that characterizes Christian life.

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Susan Wills

Yellow and Pink

Name of Book: Yellow and Pink

Author: William Steig

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

ISBN:  9-780374-386719

Audience: Written for ages 4-8.  This review suggests the book’s applicability to both young and mature audiences.

Summary:  Two wooden figures, one pink and the other yellow, lying in the sun discover each other and begin a conversation to figure out just who they are and how they got there. Did someone make them? Or were they just an accident – did they just happen?  They cant seem to agree.  Yellow thinks it strange that someone would make them and just leave them there without an explanation. Pink thinks something so beautiful and perfect must have been made by someone, not by chance. Nonetheless, Yellow has a theory on how it all could have happened, starting with a tree branch that falls to the ground and the wind and rain and ice and lightning and woodpeckers whittled away at it to form the person he is today.  Yellow has an answer for every question Pink come up with, some of them quite preposterous, until, when he’s finally stumped, he decides some things will just have to remain a mystery. Then a man comes along and picks them both up an carries them away.  “Who is this guy?” asks Yellow.  Pink didn’t know.

Literary Elements:  This is a charming piece of fiction hovering somewhere between fantasy and allegory. The language is skillfully simple for some deep notions that at first I thought might be too complex for young minds.  But children seem to like this book, perhaps because the conversation is so silly in places. “But how come we can see out of these holes the woodpeckers made?” asks Pink. “Because that’s what eyes are for, dummy.” How many times do we get answers to our questions that are about as meaningful as this one? The illustrations by the author are as whimsical as the conversation.  Pink and yellow are hardly more than stick figures, which make even more absurd Pink’s fascination with himself “You mean these arms I can move this way and that, this head I can turn in any direction, this breathing nose, these walking feet, all of this just happened, bu some kind of fluke?”  I especially like the Rube Goldberg style world that Yellow imagines can emerge by accident.  Also remarkable is how Steig can give these stick figures so many human qualities: wonder, confusion, stubbornness, doubt, sarcasm, evasion, and imagination, characteristics that can be understood on a variety of levels at any age.

Theological Conversation Partners:  Genesis 3:24-4:1a, John 20:28-29

Theology:  A shallow interpretation of this book is the standing argument over evolution versus intelligent design with a vote for the latter. But the ending doesn’t make a firm statement one way or the other. There’s a lot more going on about how we come to know things through dialogue with others, about the assumptions we bring into our conversations and the limits to our own mental powers to figure some things out.   Yellow’s opening question “Do I know you?” could have been Adam’s question after the fall.  Yellow’s last question “Who is this guy?” could have been Thomas’ question to Jesus. Pink at first is not particularly interested in questions until Yellow, the one searching for answers, begins to at least try to make sense of it all.  And so it goes, a sea saw of questions and explanations that become increasingly absurd until a mysterious stranger comes along and leaves us wondering what the next question should be.

Faith Questions:

1.    Does yellow have faith?  Why or why not?

2.    Does Pink have faith?  Why or why not?

3.    Is the stranger at the end of the story God?  Why or why not?

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Susan Wills.

Sonia Sotomayor: A Judge Grows in the Bronx

Name of Book: Sonia Sotomayor: A Judge Grows in the Bronx

Author: Jonah Winter

Illustrator: Edel Rodriguez

Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers

Audience: Ages 4-10

Summary: Sonia Sotomayor: A Judge grows in the Bronx is the life story of Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor’s rise from her very humble beginnings, living in the projects in the South Bronx, New York City, to her confirmation as the first Latina woman on the Supreme Court.  However, this is not Sonia’s story alone.  This is also the story of a mother’s love.  Author Jonah Winter, along with Sonia Sotomayor herself make clear that it is Sonia’s mother’s dedication, hard work, nurture, love and warmth that provide the ground for her daughter’s outstanding development.

Literary Elements at Work: There is an interesting interplay of prose and poetry throughout this biographical narrative.  Writer Jonah Winter, also a poet and a painter, frames the story of Sonia Sotomayor’s life within the context of a budding moonflower, and in so doing prepares the reader/listener for a story of extraordinary beauty and growth in surprising soil.  The book opens with the line “Sometimes the most beautiful moonflower blossoms in an unexpected place—on a chain link fence, near broken glass, next to an abandoned building, watered by someone whose name you might not even know.” It closes with the charge: “You never know what can happen—especially when you water a flower.”  Yet amidst this poetic picture, mother as gardener and daughter as flower, Jonah chronicles with stark realism the harsh realities of lives lived in poverty, with loss, with disease, at times socially outcast, and always culturally different.  Another important literary element is that the book is written in English and Spanish.  Each paragraph is first presented in English and followed by its Spanish counterpart, making this an ideal book in welcoming our Hispanic brothers and sisters into our mostly English speaking churches.  How good and comforting it must be to see and hear one’s native tongue!  Illustrator Edel Rodriguez keeps pace with Mr. Winter’s poetic and stark rendering by presenting simple and contrasting art, juxtaposing delicate images of flowers, green grass, and beautiful brown children with over-turned trash cans, old abandoned tires, hard, tall, concrete-block homes, and barbed-wire fences.  There is beauty and realism on each page.  Isn’t that just like life?

Scripture: Hebrews 11 – 12:3 :  “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen… Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.  (Selected verses, RSV).

Theology: I think it is appropriate here as a Presbyterian to rely on the words of John Calvin. Calvin defines faith as “[a] firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence towards us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”  3.2.7.

God has come to us in the person of Jesus Christ to break the bonds of sin and death so that we may live into the fullness for which we have been and are created.  Resting securely in this knowledge, we fling ourselves along with the Israelites into the dry seabed on our pilgrimage to the Promised Land, even when we can’t see it, even when we can’t hear it, even when we can’t feel it, even when we can’t smell it, and even when we can’t taste it!

Faith Talk Questions:

Sit down beside your child, let her hold the book and turn the pages.  Ask her to point to the characters and places as you read.  Repeat this process on each page, considering the following:  In the story, Sonia blossoms like a moonflower.  Ask your child, “What does that mean?  How can a girl bud and open like a flower?”  Ask your child, “What is your favorite flower?”  Tell your child, “You are blossoming like a verbena (or whatever her favorite flower happens to be)!”  If you are able, read some of the paragraphs in English and Spanish.  Many young children today know some Spanish thanks to Sesame Street and Dora the Explorer.  Ask your child to consider what it would be like living in a place where most people speak Spanish.  Ask her, “What if you needed to go to the bathroom and you didn’t know how to ask where it was?”  “What if you needed help and you couldn’t say help in Spanish?”  “What if you went to Puerto Rico and they didn’t have chicken nuggets and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches?”  “Have you ever eaten asopao de gandules, (pigeon peas) or bacalaitos, crunchy cod fritters or surullitos, sweet plump cornmeal fingers or empanadillas, crescent-shaped turnovers filled with lobster, crab, conch, or beef?” Go out and try some. The story takes place in New York City.  Find it on a map.  Google it.   Consider how places are alike and different.  Say, “In the story, Sonia’s mother reads and works and cooks so hard.” Ask your child “Why?”  Consider and list all the things children need to blossom, letting your child say what it is that she thinks she needs to grow and blossom.  Tell her what you think she needs—hugs and kisses, prayers and stories, songs and worship, school and friends, pets and walks, flowers and vegetables, teachers and doctors.  In the story, Sonia and her family play music and games.  Ask your child what kind of music and games they play.  Consider what kinds of music and games your family plays.  How are they alike?  How are they different?  In the story, Sonia wants to be one thing when she grows up and then has to change direction.  Why?  Sonia’s mother works hard day and night even though she does not know what her daughter will grow up to be.  In the story Sonia works hard day and night even though she does not know that she will one day become a Supreme Court Justice.  Is that like faith?  If so, why?  If not, why?  In the book of Hebrews, the writer lists a long account of the faithful acts of Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Joseph, Moses and others, read their stories.  How are they like and/or unlike Sonia’s mother?  Sonia?  You?  Consider as a parent where you are in each story.  Listen to your child tell where she is in each story.  Children do often step out in faith.  For example, shots hurt but children trust that parents and their doctors know what is best to prevent disease or cure an infection.  Broccoli and peas taste yucky but children trust that you know best what will make their bodies strong and healthy.  Eight o’clock bedtimes come awfully early but children trust that you know how much sleep a growing child needs.  Faith is a response to the gift of God in Jesus Christ.  Start a dialogue defining faith.

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Kim Lee

Elizabeth Leads the Way

Name of Book: Elizabeth Leads the Way: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the Right to Vote

Author: Tanya Lee Stone

Illustrator: Rebecca Gibbon

Publisher: Henry Holt and Company

Audience: Ages 4 – 10

Summary: This is the remarkable story of a remarkable woman, Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  From a very young age Elizabeth felt strongly that ALL people should matter, ALL people belonged, ALL people should have rights and protections, and ALL people should have choices.  This is the story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s life, loves, ambitions, and her campaign for a woman’s right to vote.

Literary Elements at Work: There are two important literary elements at work in this story: the extraordinary life and ambitions of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the artistry. Tanya Lee Stone tells the story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton in a straightforward and interesting narrative, unlike many other biographical early readers!  Ms. Stone tells us that Elizabeth learns for the first time at age four that boys are treated and thought of superiorly to girls.  And this injustice will set Elizabeth off on a lifelong journey to prove that girls are just as brave, just as smart, just as physical, and have just as much value as boys.  The climactic moment comes when Elizabeth realizes that the only change that will prove useful for the betterment of all women is the right to vote.  Interestingly, it was Elizabeth Cady Stanton that wrote the initial language that would later become the Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the right to vote.  It took FORTY-FIVE years from the first time the legislation was introduced in Congress to become law!  Elizabeth did not live to see women obtain the right to vote.  The illustrations are bright and colorful, just as is the woman they portray!  Each illustration gives context for Elizabeth’s life and the injustices she railed against during her various life stages.  Rebecca Gibbon pays particular attention to historical detail, giving each illustration an authenticity to the plight of women and slaves.  Ms. Gibbon uses period dress, lighting, housing, transportation, and other everyday common items consistently throughout this narrative, taking the reader/listener back to the early to late nineteenth century.  Tanya Lee Stone and Rebecca Gibbon make a delightful team in telling the spirited story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

Scripture: Genesis 1:27,  Isaiah 43 selected verses : “Thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine…Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.”  Galatians 3:28 ; Adapted from Matthew 10: Jesus summons his twelve; gives them authority to cast out unclean spirits, cure every disease and sickness; and sends them out with these instructions: go to the lost sheep, proclaim the good news, cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.  (NRSV)

Theology: God creates us, forms us, redeems us, calls us by name, honors us, and loves us.  Why?  Because we are precious in God’s sight.  This good news seems throughout history to be relegated only to a few, sometimes whites only, sometimes males only, sometimes Germans only, sometimes heterosexuals only, sometimes Americans only, sometimes the rich only, sometimes the healthy only, etc.  And…yet…the Bible tells us that God created ALL people—male, female, black, white, short, tall, rich, poor, sick, healthy, American, African, on and on in the image of God.  Thus, we need a constant reminder that God creates, forms, calls, honors and loves us and EVERYONE else.  We are to go and do likewise.  Or, as Jesus says, we are to go to the lost sheep, proclaim the good news, cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.

Faith Talk Questions:

Sit down beside your child, let her hold the book and turn the pages.  Ask her to point to Elizabeth as you read.  Repeat this process on each page, considering the following:  In the story, Elizabeth wants to ride horses, raft across a river, learn French, religion, math and science, earn money, and vote.  What does her father tell her? What do her friends tell her?  What does her husband tell her?  What does her school tell her?  What does her culture tell her?  What does the law tell her?  What does Elizabeth do?  How does Elizabeth answer her father?  Her husband?  Her friends?  Her school?  Her culture?  The law of her land?  What if someone told you, “No; you cannot learn to read!  No; you cannot ride horses!  No; you cannot run fast, jump high!”?  And you ask, “Why?”  And the answer is, “Because you are a girl!”  What do we do when the Bible tells us one thing (that we are created, formed, called, loved, honored by God and precious to God), and the world tells us something else (that we are not honored, valued, precious, loved, called)?  Does that mean God does not love you?  Form you?  Call you?  Honor you?  That you are not precious to God?  Wait for responses.  LISTEN (without interrupting) to what your child thinks. Can you think of other people that God loves and values but the world does not?  Consider African Americans, Native Americans, folk with mental illnesses, folk with physical illnesses and/or deformities, homosexuals.  List others.  Say, “God creates, forms, loves and calls all people all the time because you and I and they are precious in God’s sight!”  Say a prayer thanking God for all those that God forms and loves and calls.  Say a prayer of intercession for those who hear so often from the world, “NO; you cannot!”  What did Jesus say?  What did Elizabeth do?  What can we do?  Who does God love, form, call, honor?  Who is precious in God’s sight?

Additional thoughts:

Terezin

I was once a little child

Three years ago,

That child who longed for other worlds.

But now I am no more a child

For I have learned to hate.

I am a grown-up person now,

I have known fear.

By Hanus Hachenburg, a teenager imprisoned at the Nazi camp, Terezin[1]

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Kim Lee

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[1] Qtd. Rubin, Susan Goldman. Fireflies in the Dark: The Story of Fiedl Dicker-Brandeis and the Children of Terezin. Holiday House: New York, 2000, p. 25.

The Color of Me

Name of Book:  The Color of Me

Author:  Linda L. McDunn

Illustrator: Barbara Knutson

Publisher:  Liturgical Press

Audience: Ages 5-8

Summary: The author uses the story of creation in Genesis to begin this book.  Very descriptive language is used and along with the illustrations helps the reader to understand the many things that God created. The author also writes about how God created people of all different colors.  The fact that all of what God created was good is emphasized.  A child asks a group of people what color God is and is given many different answers.  The book ends as a rainbow forms following a rainstorm.  God is the color of all of us because we were created in God’s image.

Literary elements at work in the story:  The theme of this story really emphasizes the fact that many different creatures and people were all created by the same God.  This theme can help lead children to an understanding that they are one tiny part of a great big beautiful world with many differences in it. The theme also points out to the reader that each thing God created was created for a special purpose and is needed in the world in which we live.  This book could be the catalyst to a rich conversation with children about God to help them gain a more concrete understanding of what can be a very abstract concept for young minds.

Perspective on gender/race/culture/economic ability:  While none of these perspectives are specifically addressed in this story, the book does seek to emphasize diversity both in creatures and human beings.  Diversity is celebrated in the fact that the author repeats multiple times in the book that what has been created is “good.” The illustrations do a wonderful job of showing how the colorful diversity of our world and all that live in it makes it beautiful.

Scripture:  Revelation 4:11, Genesis 1:27, 1 Timothy 4:4, Matthew 28:20

Theology:   All that was created on the earth exists because of God.  Human beings are made in the image of God.  All that God created is good.  We are not alone because God will always be with us.

Faith Talk Questions:

1. What do you think the author means when she says that the light God created contains all the colors of God?
2. How do butterflies give “beauty to the breeze?”
3. The author says that dogs wag their tails with “unconditional love.”  What does that mean?
4. Why were people created
5. What special gifts do you have that you can share with other people?
6. Why do you think the people could not agree about the color of God?
7. How does the rainbow in the sky after the storm answer the child’s question about the color of God?

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary graduate Marcia Rauch.  For another student’s review of this book, click here.

Black is Brown is Tan

Name of Book: Black is Brown is Tan

Author: Arnold Adoff

Illustrator:  Emily Arnold McCully

Publisher: Harper Collins Publisher

Audience: Ages 5 -8

Summary: A poetic story about the everyday life in a racially mixed family.

Literary elements at work in the story: The story takes place in the family’s home and is told from both the parents point of view as well as the childrens’, at different points in the story. It shows the interaction of parents and children as well as grandparents and grandchildren, and uncles and aunts and children.

How does the perspective on gender/race/culture/economic/ability make a difference to the story? Shows that racially mixed families are no different from any other family, and that family is a truly important part of life.

Scripture: Galatians 3:27-28

Theology: God looks on each one of us, regardless of race, gender, socio-economic status, age or ability, with the same love, mercy and grace found in Jesus Christ.

Faith Talk Questions:

1. What does this story say about family?
2. Does color have anything to do with who our family is?
3. What does this book say about your family?
4. Does your family have different colored skin?
5. Does God love people with different colored skin?

Review prepared by Union Presbyterian Seminary student Mason Todd