Max Lucado: Telling the Story

Max Lucado knows the value of story from his perspectives as writer and pastor. And since the church includes both adults and children, when Zondervan began plans to launch The Story campaign several years ago, Lucado says, “In looking for tools to guide the church through the whole Bible, it made sense to add a children’s component.”

The Story for Children: A Storybook Bible (Zonderkidz, July) is one of more than 30 different products in The Story campaign and one of several aimed at young readers. Others include The Story Teen Edition (Apr.), The Story for Kids (Apr.) with foreword by Lucado, and The Story for Little Ones (June) by Josee Masse, all released by Zonderkidz.

Coauthors with Lucado are Karen Davis Hill and Randy Frazee, all on staff at Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Tex. “It’s a pretty significant challenge to put together a story book that carries children through the whole Bible, but I think collaboratively it really worked. Karen served as the shepherd of the project. Randy and I would contribute ideas and try to merge them, with Karen responsible for bringing them all together,” Lucado says.

Lucado is no stranger to writing for children. He is the author of the popular Hermie & Friends book and video series (Thomas Nelson), which is relaunching this fall, and Max Lucado’s Wemmicks, a series that includes You Are Special (Crossway), among other stand-alone books for kids.

“Children’s stories are enjoyable to write because they are simple—they don’t have so many layers. You’re not so concerned about little nuances, about how something is said. And you’re not so concerned about saying things the audience has heard a thousand times. Children are hearing it for the first time,” says Lucado.

Lucado read the audio version of The Story for Children. “That was the first time I’d read it cover to cover without stopping, and I was really caught up in the story again.” Illustrations are by Italian illustrator Fausto Bianchi.

“I hope children get a picture of the beginning and end of God’s earthly story, and some of the events in between. We’re doing a good service to children when we put context on these stories.”

—Ann Byle


Stephanie Perry Moore: Reaching a Neglected Audience

Stephanie Perry Moore walked into a Christian bookstore nearly 20 years ago and found nothing she could identify with. As an African-American woman, Christian fiction featuring Southern belles in antebellum dresses “just didn’t work for me.”

She purchased a Jeannette Oke novel, which she says did work. “I got excited about that style of writing and God said to me, ‘You can write these novels.’ But I was in my 20s and just couldn’t write adult novels,” says Moore, who lives outside Atlanta with her husband and three children. “Then I discovered teen fiction.”

Moore now has found her niche writing for African-American adults, teens, and younger readers. She is author of 40 books, including five YA series, all published by Lift Every Voice Books, an imprint of Moody Publishers. The first two books in the Alec London series (also from Lift Every Voice) will release in September.

The new series is written for 8–12-year-old African-American boys, a neglected audience Moore hopes to fill with messages of hope. “Alec London wasn’t too nice when he first appeared in the Morgan Love series, but by the end, he had started to turn around,” says Moore. “I want to teach in the new series that you can be good early in your life, and when you’re good things turn out right.”

Moore’s coauthor this time around is her husband, former NFL star Derrick Moore, in part because of the books’ emphasis on sports. “Moody thought it would be good to have a male perspective for the series,” says Moore. “Derrick and I talked the books out, then I wrote them, with him going through afterward and making suggestions.”

Each of the five books features a sport: football, basketball, baseball, karate, and track. Each book also has a strong educational component, featuring activities such as word puzzles, workbook pages, discussion questions, and a section on the book’s featured sport.

“My primary focus is making a difference for African-American kids, but I also want to help all kids,” says Moore. She gives much credit to Moody Publishers, which continues to publish her and others’ books as part of Lift Every Voice. “I’m thankful Moody Publishers is willing to meet the needs of the African-American community,” says Moore.

Moore’s biggest heart tug, she says, is getting her books into Christian bookstores. “Christian bookstores are the cornerstone for getting books to readers. It would be an added bonus if they would consistently stock books for African-American readers like they do gospel music.”

—Ann Byle


Bill Myers: Recharging with Kids’ Books

Bill Myers’s adult readers know him for fast-paced thrillers with Christian themes played out on a global stage. But it’s young readers Myers credits with keeping him fresh, at 112 titles and counting.

“One of the reasons I am so prolific is I’ll write one grown-up novel and then I’ll go and write for children,” Myers says. “It refreshes me and recharges me for the grown-up stuff. I am still tired at the end of the day, but it is goofy, silly tired.”

Myers, whose most recent adult novel is The Judas Gospel (Howard Books, June) is currently in full goofy-silly mode with TJ and the Time Stumblers, a new series for the 8–12 crowd from Tyndale. The books follow the comic adventures of a young girl with two friends from the future who help her navigate the struggles of growing up so she can develop into the world leader they know she will become.

“I think Bill has a way of incorporating humor into a book as well as life lessons, and kids do not realize they are learning something,” says Cheryl Kerwin, senior marketing manager for Tyndale. “He is good at getting you to love his main characters.”

There are six titles planned for the series so far. The first two, New Kid Catastrophes and AAARGH!!!, released in May and have 10,000 and 8,000 copies in print, respectively—“good numbers for juvenile fiction in [the Christian market],” Kerwin says. Next are Oops! and Ho-Ho-Noo! in September, followed by Switched and Yikes in February.

Tyndale’s marketing plan for the TJ series will take place both online and on the speaking circuit. In November, Myers will be the keynote speaker at the Association of Christian Schools International meeting, and more speaking engagements to Christian educators are in the works, Kerwin says.

And then? Myers says he has the juice to extend TJ into the future.

“I have some characters in this series that can keep me going forever,” he says. “You work so hard to develop a series, you always feel when they pull the plug, hey, I am just getting started.”

—Kimberly Winston


Ruth Sanderson: Drawing Kids in with Art

Eerdmans Books for Young Readers is betting that more is better with this September’s release of Saints: Lives and Illuminations, written and illustrated by Ruth Sanderson.

The new book, a paperback, will be a combination of two earlier Sanderson hardbound titles for Eerdmans, the original Saints: Lives and Illuminations (2003) and More Saints: Lives and Illuminations (2007). Together, they feature full-color portraits and bios of 76 saints, for the 8–12 age group.

“We had always been asked about a combined edition of these books,” says Anita Eerdmans, v-p of Eerdmans Books for Young Readers. “This book will showcase Ruth Sanderson’s beautiful paintings in the larger, lusher size of the original books and the requisite heft that will make it suitable for gift-giving.”

Sanderson has been writing and illustrating children’s books for more than 30 years, including Heidi (Knopf, 1984), Goldilocks (Little, Brown, 2009), and The Twelve Dancing Princesses (Little, Brown, 1990), which will be reissued by Crocodile Books this fall. Eerdmans publishes most of her religion-themed works, which besides the Saints titles includes The Nativity (2010).

“I hope it gives children a sense that from the very first century to now, people lived blessed lives, but they were not perfect,” Sanderson says from Hollins University in Roanoke, Va., where she is teaching as part of a children’s book illustration certificate program. “I hope it is an inspiration to them to lead good lives.”

The saints are presented in a combination of styles, including iconography and Renaissance portraiture, framed with the lush borders of a medieval illustrated manuscript.

“The people look like real people,” Sanderson says. “Hopefully, the pictures will draw young people in and they will want to find out more.” Eerdmans will market the books with a full-color poster featuring the portraits in miniature.

“We always give away posters at library and teachers’ conventions that we attend,” Anita Eerdmans says. “But I have never had a poster in such demand as the different forms of our Saints posters, even when I would bring the same one year after year.”

—Kimberly Winston