The author
relates an incident that illustrates a special heroic trait of each Biblical
character mentioned. Each story is followed by a set of questions called
"Learning from a hero." The questions are designed to create
discussion about each story so the reader can learn from what the hero did.
Full-color
Illustrations by Amit Tayal highlight every story title page, providing
life-like representations of the people mentioned.
What
I Like: This is
a great selection of stories. I especially appreciated that the author included
some stories about women from the Bible.
Each
story includes a page with the person's name and a Bible reference for the
story. It also includes the person's "Heroic Quality." Some of these qualities
are endurance, compassion, and respect. I like the idea that being a hero
doesn't mean you have to have a "super" power, you just need an
"Heroic Quality."
What
I Dislike: Unfortunately,
the writing style is rather boring. While the author chose good Bible
characters to write about, he writes too much with the passive tense, instead
of using action verbs. For instance, consider these two sentences: "Samson
was the strongest man anyone had ever seen. When he was born, he was dedicated
to God." The word "was" is used three times in just these two
short sentences. That's okay, but I think it would have been better written
like this: "Samson was the strongest man anyone had ever seen. After his
birth, his mother dedicated his life to God." What do you think?
Overall
Rating: Very
good.
Age
Appeal: 7-10.
Publisher Info: Shiloh Kidz, 2015; ISBN: 9781634093156;
Paperback, 158 pages, $14.99.
Special
Info: Read our
reviews of other books by Glenn Hascall.
2 comments:
Active voice and vivid verbs keep kids reading.
Yes, I agree. Passive voice and verbs should be used as little as possible (in my humble opinion)!
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