All I will say, is that if you have not read Epic, you must. This has to be one of our favorite books. John Eldredge, using Scripture and quotes from various famous books, shows the magnificent story God is writing for all mankind. At 104 pages long, it is an easy read, and one amazingly worth the hour or two you will put into reading it! One of the things I love is how he uses examples from other famous books to illustrate the faintest shadow they resemble of God's love story for us! :) Instead of describing the book to you, I'll just list several quotes from it, to give you an idea of it!
"And they lived happily ever after. Stop for just a moment, and let it be true. They lived happily ever after. These may be the most beautiful and haunting words in the entire library of mankind. Why does the end of a great story leave us with a lump in our throats and an ache in our hearts? If we haven't become entirely cynical, some of the best endings can even bring us to tears. Because God has set eternity in our hearts."
"Christianity, in its true form, tells us that there is an Author and that He is good, the essence of all that is good and beautiful and true, for He is the source of all these things. It tells us that He has set our hearts' longings within us, for He has made us to live in an Epic. It warns that truth is always in danger of being twisted and corrupted and stolen from us because there is a Villain in the Story who hates our hearts and wants to destroy us. It calls us up into a Story that is truer and deeper than any other, and assures us that we will find the meaning of our lives. What if? What if all the great stories that have ever moved you, brought you joy or tears-- what if they are telling you something about the true Story into which you were born, the Epic into which you have been cast?"
"Then Aslan turned to them and said, `You do not look so happy as I mean you to be.' Lucy said, `We're so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world so often.' `No fear of that," said Aslan. "Have you not guessed?" Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them. `There was a real railway accident," said Aslan softly. "Your father and mother and all of you are--as you used to call it in the Shadowlands--dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.' ....All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before." (C.S. Lewis "The Last Battle")
"If a story has been true to life in all its sorrow and hardness and longing, to life as we know it, and if it also offers that turn at the end in hope beyond hope, then our eyes swell with tears and we get a glimpse of Joy-- Joy, as Tolkien called it, beyond the walls of this world..."
Sorry to run on, but this books is *so* great! :) You have to read it! Please! It will, to quote Dad, "Bless you socks off" :)
Plot: ******************
Characters: ***************
Recommended age: 16+ (younger readers would not relate yet)
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