A colorful and engaging animal tale set in a biblical world.
A Christian fantasy focuses on the days leading up to the Great Flood.
This elaborate tale features a cast of anthropomorphized animal characters: Judah, a lion; Sophia, a green serpent; Azel, a goat; Lumis, a wolf; and Eloshova, a black sheep. As the story unfolds, they’re all caught up in a vague mystical vision beckoning them across the landscape of a strange Old Testament world full of wonders and perils. They are trying to reach the Mountain of Gathering, where the mysterious call is drawing representatives of all living things on Earth in preparation for the Great Flood and the launching of Noah’s Ark. Milor deftly evokes this little-known world that would have existed in the brief interval between the opening of the book of Genesis and the story of the Great Flood. The conceit is brilliantly elegant in its simplicity, filling in a gap in the traditional biblical narrative with a modern-style, middle-grade adventure featuring vibrant characters, exotic locations, and plenty of exciting plot twists. These elements are guaranteed to hold the interest of young Christian readers already familiar with the famous stories of the Bible. Judah and his friends have distinct and sometimes clashing personalities. They must learn to overcome both their personal differences and the many obstacles Milor puts in their paths as they make their way across a realm the author very inventively imagines from the scant clues provided in the early sections of Genesis.
Each of the work’s chapters is accompanied by a full-color plate by debut illustrator Lopez, the author’s daughter-in-law, and is followed by an intriguing critical gloss by Milor. After a chapter featuring the villain of the piece, Nephram, for instance, the author switches his focus and pitches his commentary straight to his book’s adult readers. “Again and again, Nephram is completely baffled by what he sees concerning Judah and all the animals following him,” he writes. “In a similar way, the people of the world are often mystified by Christians, and either mock their faith, or rally against it.” At another point, when the heroes are temporarily lost, Milor again draws a larger lesson: “By providing a light to our feet, God is walking very close with us, and ensuring we stick by His side, rather than running off into the darkness ahead of Him, to places we are not ready to encounter yet. Every step we take, with the little bit of light that we have, is an active process of seeking.” These annotated sections, set off in a smaller type font, are clearly addressed not to children but to their parents and teachers as a guide to the tale’s many allegorical layers. The combined effect is ultimately winning: Adults will be as captivated by the commentary as children will be by the main story of courageous animals in peril.
A colorful and engaging animal tale set in a biblical world. (Color and black-and-white illustrations)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2020
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 237
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: April 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it...
Harris, creator of grand, symphonic thrillers from Fatherland (1992) to An Officer and a Spy (2014), scores with a chamber piece of a novel set in the Vatican in the days after a fictional pope dies.
Fictional, yes, but the nameless pontiff has a lot in common with our own Francis: he’s famously humble, shunning the lavish Apostolic Palace for a small apartment, and he is committed to leading a church that engages with the world and its problems. In the aftermath of his sudden death, rumors circulate about the pope’s intention to fire certain cardinals. At the center of the action is Cardinal Lomeli, Dean of the College of Cardinals, whose job it is to manage the conclave that will elect a new pope. He believes it is also his duty to uncover what the pope knew before he died because some of the cardinals in question are in the running to succeed him. “In the running” is an apt phrase because, as described by Harris, the papal conclave is the ultimate political backroom—albeit a room, the Sistine Chapel, covered with Michelangelo frescoes. Vying for the papal crown are an African cardinal whom many want to see as the first black pope, a press-savvy Canadian, an Italian arch-conservative (think Cardinal Scalia), and an Italian liberal who wants to continue the late pope’s campaign to modernize the church. The novel glories in the ancient rituals that constitute the election process while still grounding that process in the real world: the Sistine Chapel is fitted with jamming devices to thwart electronic eavesdropping, and the pressure to act quickly is increased because “rumours that the pope is dead are already trending on social media.”
An illuminating read for anyone interested in the inner workings of the Catholic Church; for prelate-fiction superfans, it is pure temptation.Pub Date: Nov. 22, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-451-49344-6
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 6, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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