Writing The Bible for Children: How to Write Blazing Biblical Stories and Picture Books for Kids

Written by Jennifer Tzivia MacLeod

WritingBiblestories,pic

I was drawn to this book by the second part of the title. Because I write picture books for kids (and adults), I was curious to see how the author would connect the concept with the writing of biblical stories.

Strangely enough, she begins by stating the reasons for NOT writing Biblical stories. These include the wish to get rich, demonstrate superior intelligence or the presumption that you and your religion can teach better than anyone else. The correct reason for writing them is that the Bible is full of timeless stories that can be meaningful to any generation. Proceeding from there, the author lays out how to write such a story, how and where to search for one, the journalistic method , the technique of story flow, presenting the protagonist, writing the dialogue, and presenting your point of view.

Once your story is written, the really hard work begins. The author must edit over and over again, gather the artwork, design the cover, correctly format the work and then publish the story. Authors must know how to interpret the inconsistencies in the Bible and reconcile them with their own view of Christianity. MacLeod gives the writer some excellent pointers on how to avoid mistakes that can derail a book if the appropriate illustrations are not carefully chosen to correlate with the meaning of the text.

I thoroughly enjoyed the author’s presentation and common sense advice. Even though I have never written a Biblical story, I appreciate the relevance of the topic to that of writing picture books for children. This book is a must for writers as well as parents, librarians or teachers who are the vehicles for providing access to the literature that their children read.

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