Category Archives: Reviews

Review: Christianus Sum, by Shawn J. Pollett

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Christianus Sum, by Shawn J. Pollett (Word Alive Press, 2008)

In third-century Rome, Christians have enjoyed a time of relative peace…until the installation of Emperor Decius. One of the emperor’s key supporters is Publius Licinius Valerianus, a cruel man who schemes to be next on the throne—and whose hatred of Christianity has already cost many lives.

To refuse to deny the Christos, to adamantly declare “Christianus Sum”—I am a Christian—is to die a martyr’s death.

Roman Senator Julius Valens disagrees. In honour of his dead wife’s faith, he allows a group of Christians to worship in one of the many rooms of his home. Equally indifferent to all deities, he designates other rooms for the other gods his slaves may want to worship.

He doesn’t expect to fall in love with a slave—a Christian slave, at that. The beautiful Damarra and her friends teach him about their faith. Although he’s not convinced, his efforts to protect the Christians from persecution draw him into danger.

Canadian author Shawn J. Pollett has created a complex plot with vivid characters and a strong sense of place and time. I was hesitant to read a novel set in such a troubled era, but the story quickly drew me in. When I wasn’t reading, I was thinking about it.

With long Latin names and authentic details, Christianus Sum (the ‘u’ in ‘sum’ sounds like the ‘oo’ in ‘cook’) isn’t a fast or light read. It slowed me down and made me feel like I was there in the past, in this ornate and formal time of Roman rule. It also let me see a bit of the life and times of the culture.

The novel has plenty of drama and emotion to keep you turning pages, and I appreciated the author’s sensitive handling of the brutality. Much of the suffering is off-camera, so to speak. Readers know what’s going on without being traumatized. The ending does get quite intense, but no more so than necessary and there’s nothing gratuitous about it.

The story is told in the third person with shifts into omniscient, and although occasionally I wasn’t sure of a scene’s point of view it always became clear within a few paragraphs.

As well as the spiritual, persecution and romance threads, Christianus Sum also explores friendship, duty, battles and political intrigues. There’s a lot in these pages to satisfy a reader.

I’m not strong in history and I found myself wondering about these characters, especially the emperors and generals. Were there actual people by these names? How much of this actually happened? The author thoughtfully included an afterward to answer these questions and more.

I’ve finished the novel, but its characters have stayed with me, and I find myself wondering how well I’d stand in such a time of trouble. How my brothers and sisters in Christ would stand. These fictional characters share such a vibrant love for one another and for the Christos, and mine feels so pale in comparison.

As well as love for God, the characters have a strong trust in Him. After one rare, happy experience, we read, “Sometimes, [Damarra] wondered if God worked in unexpected ways for the sheer pleasure of watching his people look up to the heavens, scratch their heads, and ask, ‘How did you do that?’” (p. 49)

In 2009, Christianus Sum received The Word Guild’s Canadian Christian Writing Awards in three of the novel categories: Historical, Mystery/Suspense and Romance. Before that, as an unpublished manuscript, it won Word Alive Press’ 2008 free publishing contest in the fiction category.

Christianus Sum is book one in the “Cry of the Martyrs” trilogy. Book two, What Rough Beast, released in April 2010. I look forward to reading it. Both are available through local bookstores and online. Ebook versions are available through various online stores although not from my favourite, fictionwise.com. I notice a variety of ebook pricing, so shop around.

If you visit Shawn J. Pollett’s website, you’ll find an interesting introduction to the “Cry of the Martyrs” series.

[Review copy provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.]

Review: Just Between You and Me, a novel by Jenny B. Jones

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Just Between You and Me, by Jenny B. Jones (Thomas Nelson, 2009)

Maggie Montgomery has done video shoots all over the world, but the one place she doesn’t want to be is Ivy, the town where she grew up.

Maggie’s a fairly new Christian, and she senses God has brought her home for a reason…but why?

Her father doesn’t want to see her, but he’s desperate for help with her unruly niece, Riley. Riley’s mom is mentally ill and hasn’t been able to care for her.

Maggie is smart, sassy, and she comes with a lot of emotional baggage. When she shows up in her home town, her high school friend Beth is the only person who remembers her who’s not toting a huge grudge. Maggie’s feisty enough to handle it, but I found myself getting defensive on her behalf.

Handsome veterinarian Connor Blake has some harsh, preconceived ideas about Maggie, but it doesn’t take long for him to understand her almost too well. Maggie thrives on keeping everyone at arms’ length—so why does being with Connor make her want to drop her defences?

Jenny B. Jones writes with a snappy sense of humour and tight delivery. This is one of those novels that works well in the present tense, first person. Present tense usually feels contrived to me, but the character of Maggie has such a strong voice that it feels like she’s really telling us what’s happening. Combined with the title of “Just Between You and Me,” it feels like Maggie’s telling the story one-on-one to a close friend.

Like the few others I’ve read in the Christian chick-lit genre, Just Between You and Me is not all surface and fluff. Maggie’s experience changes her life, and aspects of it—and the process of her learning—can shape readers as well. For all of her daredevil reputation, Maggie has a major fear issue when it comes to relationships—and to water, because she wasn’t able to save her drowning mother.

Just Between You and Me is fresh, funny and real—and the most feel-good book I’ve read in a long time. It’s actually one of maybe five novels or short fiction that I’d count as life-changing. An added benefit for me is the title: every time I thought about the novel, I’d hear the April Wine song.

You can read chapter one of Just Between You and Me or learn more about the author at the Jenny B. Jones website. The Thomas Nelson website has a reader discussion guide you might want to check out after you’ve read the novel. Just Between You and Me is aimed at adults, but Jenny is also the author of novels for young adults: the Katie Parker Production series and A Charmed Life series. YA novels are fun, and I look forward to checking these out.

[Review copy borrowed from my local public library. If you’re in Canada, you can get it via inter-library loan… or buy your own copy. It’s worth it!]

Review: The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag, by Alan Bradley

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The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag, by Alan Bradley (2010, Doubleday Canada)

The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag is the second mystery from Alan Bradley featuring 11-year-old Flavia de Luce. The series is set in 1950 in rural England.

Flavia, her sisters and their father live in a huge old house, where she spends her happiest times in the lab of a mad (now dead) chemist.

The mystery surrounds a murder that doesn’t happen until part-way through the book. I knew it was coming, having read some promotional material. Getting to know the soon-to-be victim was an odd sensation.

A secondary plot thread involves the death of a local boy some years earlier, and Flavia is determined to get to the bottom of that too.

The world through Flavia’s eyes is an interesting place. She observes, rarely judging, and leaves readers to draw their own conclusions.

Although she’s a child, this is a novel for adults. Since I usually review books for the Christian market, I’ll add that it’s a general market book containing some mild profanity.

Flavia is one of those enjoyable fictional characters you probably wouldn’t want to live with. She has a dry sense of humour and a vocabulary that includes words like pustulent, pristine and diminutive, along with a variety of chemical terms.

When she successfully ducks an assignment from her father, he laments that she’s unreliable. Her comment as narrator: “Of course I was! It was one of the things I loved most about myself. Eleven-year-olds are supposed to be unreliable.” (p. 86)

Another character calls her terrifying, and Flavia tells us with all modesty, “It was true—and there was no use denying it.” (p. 90)

I suspect Inspector Hewitt of the local constabulary would describe her as terrifying too—but she does have his grudging respect.

The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag is a sadder story to me than the first novel in the series, but it’s still a very good read with plenty that made me smile. You don’t have to read The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie first, but don’t miss it!

Alan Bradley is a Canadian author now living in Malta. You can find him online at the Flavia de Luce website, and Flavia de Luce has her own online fan club.

You might also be interested in this interview with Alan Bradley in the Ottawa Sun,  or this article by Andrea Baillie of the Canadian Press.

The next book in the series is A Red Herring Without Mustard, releasing in 2011.  I’m looking forward to it.

Here’s a video trailer for The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, to introduce you to Flavia. The voice is perfect. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVkxr7e9YGs]

Review copy purchased from Kobo Books and enjoyed on my Aluratek Libre e-reader.

Review: The Real Enemy, by Kathy Herman

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The Real Enemy, by Kathy Herman (David C. Cook, 2009)

As the first female chief of police in the town of Sophie Trace, Brill Jessup expects to have to prove her worth. She doesn’t expect citizens to start disappearing before the paint is dry on her office walls. Now she’s dealing with a territorial sheriff , the FBI, and a panicky town council… not to mention the local superstitions.

It does keep her from having to spend much time with her husband, Kurt, but she knows it’s hard on their daughter, Emily.

Brill is understandably angry over her husband’s one night of infidelity. They’ve agreed to stay together for Emily, but Brill has no interest in rebuilding the marriage.

The novel opens with Brill on the defensive at work and bitter towards her husband—not a sympathetic heroine. She’s very good at her job (the nickname “Brill” is short for “brilliant”) but I found the strength of her anger kept me from really connecting. Kurt is almost too nice, on the other hand. His goal is to overcome the evil he’s caused with good. (The novel’s theme verse is Romans 12:21.)

Nine-year-old Emily (the older kids are away at university) is serious and well-spoken for her age, but there are children like that—and I think her parents’ struggle has matured her beyond her years.

I always enjoy Kathy Herman’s novels, for the suspense and for the relationships. She draws believable characters, and it was partly on the strength of this knowledge that I was comfortable sticking with Brill through the opening pages. I’m glad I did, because I really enjoyed the novel.

The Real Enemy is the first in Kathy Herman’s new Sophie Trace series, and I’m looking forward to reading book 2, The Last Word, and book 3, The Right Call. You can read the prologue and first chapter of The Real Enemy here, and learn more about Kathy here.

Review copy from my personal library.

Review: Having a Mary Spirit, by Joanna Weaver

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Having a Mary Spirit, by Joanna Weaver (2006, WaterBrook Press)

“Maybe you’ve discovered, as I have, that most of your New Year’s resolutions have little effect on day-to-day life except to add a burden of guilt and a feeling of failure. Continually striving, yet never arriving. Hoping, praying to be different, only waking up to find you’re not as far along as you’d hoped.

“I know. I’ve felt that way too.” (page 2)

If you’ve read Joanna Weaver’s first book, Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World, you’ll remember that she explores Jesus’ relationship with Mary and Martha: how He values the sisters’ individuality and desires each of them to have both hearts and hands for Him.

You may also remember Joanna’s engaging, at times humorous, writing style. Her insights and her writing in the first book left me ready to read anything else she’d write. I was delighted to receive this book for Christmas 2006, but for some reason it sat on my shelf until 2010.

When I picked it up this year, I discovered it spoke to the very issues God was addressing in my life. Surprise!

This is a book for Christian women who want to change—want that Mary spirit—but can’t make it stick. As Joanna so transparently points out, of course we can’t do it on our own. That’s God’s job, and He’d like to get at it if we’ll please give Him room to move.

As the back cover says, the book “directs your gaze past your own shortcomings to the God who stands ready, willing, and able to make a new woman out of you.” It’s not about us—it’s about Him.

The book’s subtitle is “Allowing God to change us, from the inside out.” Having a Mary Spirit is filled with practical teaching, personal examples, and text boxes of focused tips and quotes. It never claims the road to change is easy, but it shows why God wants to change us and how we can cooperate. Sadly, He won’t just “zap” us into spiritual maturity.

Joanna Weaver looks at some of the causes of our failure to change: self-reliance, believing lies, and perhaps chief: our natural selves, who deep down oppose the change.

One area that stood out to me was Joanna’s focus on our thoughts: the lies we accept, and the feelings we believe over the truth. It’s not enough to merely recognize these things, so she gives us clear alternatives.

For example, the chapter titled “Mind Control” offers scripture antidotes for various feelings like fear, anger, depression or confusion. I’ve found that declaring biblical truth saps a lot of impact from these feelings, so I can put them in their place and deal with what may have caused them. (Interestingly, they’re often caused by my natural self, “Flesh Woman” as Joanna calls her, trying to pull me back from God-focus to me-focus.)

The book shows that having a Mary spirit requires guarding our minds and hearts—and of course, trusting God. It includes a Bible study guide for individuals or groups, as well as other resources.

Having a Mary Spirit is definitely a keeper. It encouraged and ministered to me, and I’ll need to go back through it at times for a refresher lesson or two. You can read an excerpt here and download a reproducible Bible study guide and leader’s guide here.

The study guide is the same as the one in the book, but it lets you write workbook-style instead of squeezing your thoughts into a bound book. (And it keeps your book unmarked so you can share it.)

Joanna Weaver’s Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World is a best-seller, and I expect Having a Mary Spirit will be too if it isn’t already. These aren’t trendy books with limited shelf life. They apply to the perennial needs of Christian women.

Joanna is also the author of With This Ring, a gift book that “celebrates the beauty, delight, and mystery of married love”. And I’m excited to discover that her next book, The Lazarus Factor, will release in February 2011.

You can find Joanna at her website, Becoming His. Having a Mary Spirit is available in English, Spanish, Chinese and Korean, and in print, audio and Kindle formats. See here for more details.

Review: Unlocked, a novel by Cynthia d’Entremont

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Unlocked, by Cynthia d’Entremont (Word Alive Press, 2010)

“What if you lived in a world where killing was a rite of passage?”

Jaron, Devora and Benjamin have survived in Leviathon’s crowded Garbage Heaps for ten years, longing for the day they could leave. But the world outside the cinderblock wall is more dangerous than they know.

Abandoned in the Heaps as five-years, by the time they leave at 15 their innocence and hope are gone. Jaron still clings to memory fragments and his one possession: a key he must keep hidden.

Unlocked follows Jaron and Devora in their separate experiences outside the wall. Leviathon’s secrets run deeper and darker than its citizens know, and what the two teens discover puts them in mortal danger.

This is action-fantasy, as opposed to a slower-paced and longer epic fantasy. It’s a fast read, dark but not overwhelming. I appreciated the author’s light touch with heavy issues; readers know what happens, but the graphic parts occur “off-screen.”

It’s a novel that will appeal to adults as well as to the age 15+ readers at which it’s aimed. There’s Christian allegory for those who want to find it, but the faith element is subtle enough to make the book suitable for Christians and those of other or no faith.

The characters are believable: wounded by their environment but courageous enough to fight for what’s right. The setting, while not our own, has a city and countryside we can relate to. And the societal issues, while overtly different, include some that are very familiar: homelessness, violence and injustice.

Since I finished the novel I’ve been puzzling over the how and why of Devora’s encounter with her enemy. I think I have the “how” settled, and I have some ideas about the “why” but I’m still curious. To say more would be to spoil a key plot point, but it’s something I hope will be explained in the sequel.

Unlocked is the 2009 Word Alive free publishing contest winner in the fiction category and is now available online or through your local bookseller. You can learn more about the novel and about Canadian author Cynthia d’Entremont at her website.

Note: Cynthia is a personal friend. While that predisposed me to see the good things in the novel, it doesn’t account for how strongly the story and characters drew me in or how long I thought about them afterward. I’m now in danger of putting our friendship at risk by repeatedly asking how the sequel is coming along.

[Book source: I bought my own copy of Unlocked at the novel’s launch party.]

Review: Muninn’s Keep, by Brian C. Austin

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Muninn’s Keep, by Brian C. Austin (Word Alive Press, 2010)

“A fabled ring,

Growing conflict,

Ancient prophecies,

Ruthless enemies bent

on destruction;

All challenge Theodoric

to the utmost.”

Theodoric doesn’t know who he is, how he came to be a thræl (slave), or what he did to earn the brand of “thief” and the name “horse-killer”. Muninn’s Keep is the story of his fight for survival and identity.

Canadian author Brian C. Austin has crafted a richly-detailed historical novel set in Britain, just north of Hadrian’s Wall, late in the 9th century. The landscape and culture come alive as we read of legends, battles and pagan rituals.

Theodoric is an appealing narrator, with an innocence and a strong sense of justice—and an unbroken spirit that earns his master’s wrath. Mystery surrounds him, in his shattered memory and in the scraps of prophecy that may refer to him.

Central to the story is the finding and re-establishing an abandoned fortress, Muninn’s Keep—and the finding of the ancient Ring of Thorvæld.

Connected with the Keep is a grove formerly used to offer blood sacrifices to the pagan god, Woden. Theodoric longs for a god worthy of worship, one who doesn’t need human tricks to gain followers.

Stories of one they call Christus, and a parchment of the prophet Isaiah, give direction to his search despite the character of the one servant of the Christus he meets.

Muninn’s Keep reveals a harsh world where battles and suffering are part of daily life, but where a few courageous and true characters can make a difference in the lives of those around them. Fans of historical fiction from this era, be they adult or teen, Christian or non, will find this a good read.

I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, and for me it had that epic, sweeping feel I find mostly in fantasy novels. After such a realistic visit to the past, I’m extra thankful to be living in the relative safety of the present.

Muninn’s Keep is Brian Austin’s first novel, and I hope there’s a sequel in the works. You can read the first three chapters of Muninn’s Keep here. The book is written at an adult reading level, and is suitable for Christians and non-Christians alike.

Brian is also the author of the poetry collections Laughter and Tears, Let Heaven Weep, and I, Barabbas.

You can learn more about Brian and his various projects at his website, Undiscovered Treasures.

[Electronic review copy provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.]

Review: Too Close to Home, by Lynette Eason

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Too Close to Home, by Lynette Eason (Revell, April 2010)

Connor Wolfe is the lead detective on a team dedicated to solving—and stopping—a string of abductions. Each victim is a teen girl, and so far three of them have turned up dead. Connor has a personal stake in this case as well: his 16-year-old daughter, Jenna, fits the victims’ age range.

FBI Special Agent Samantha Cash is the forensic computer genius who may be their only hope to crack this case. When she finds evidence that the girls have been lured by an online predator, the killer starts a war of intimidation.

As if things weren’t complicated enough, Connor and Samantha each have family concerns pulling at them. And they can’t stop thinking about one another, despite Samantha’s vow to never date a cop. (Connor is a widower.)

I appreciate the main characters’ depth, and the honest way they wrestle with their faith in relation to the tragedies in their pasts and present. The novel has a good balance between characters and plot, and both deliver the reader to a satisfying ending.

Lynette Eason pulls off a taut romantic suspense novel that’s on the intense end of the suspense scale. I didn’t find it scary, but there were times I needed to put it down and catch my breath. It never stayed down for long.

I would have liked to see a bit more resolution to the fallout from the crimes. Rather than spoil the plot, I’ll just say not all parties were accounted for at the end. But that’s a curiosity issue more than anything else.

The novel’s epilogue sets up the next story and plants a serious worry in the reader’s mind. A worry we’ll have to wait until October 2010 to satisfy, when book 2 in the “Women of Justice” series comes out.

Too Close to Home is a well-crafted novel, but you don’t have to take my word for it. Dee Henderson gave it a positive endorsement, and her own best-selling romantic suspense novels prove she knows a thing or two about the genre.

Too Close to Home is Lynette Eason’s eighth novel. You can read an excerpt here or if you’ve already read the novel, check out the discussion questions here.  You can learn more about Lynette at her website, and she’s promised to stop by this blog for an interview some Friday soon.

Note: Review copy provided courtesy of Baker Publishing Group and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc. in exchange for an honest review. Too Close to Home is available now at your local Christian retailer.

Review: More Ready Than You Realize, by Brian D. McLaren

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More Ready Than You Realize, by Brian D. McLaren (Zondervan, 2002, 2006)

Brian McLaren’s aim with More Ready Than You Realize is to remind us that “evangelism” isn’t a dirty word, despite the negative connotations it’s acquired over the years. He also wants to demystify it and show us that, as the title suggests, we’re more ready to get involved than we realize.

He explains, “Good evangelism is the process of being friendly without discrimination and influencing all of one’s friends toward better living, through good deeds and good conversations. For a Christian… [it] means engaging in these conversations in the spirit and example of Christ. … Evangelism in the style of Jesus; evangelism that flows like a dance.” (p. 17)

The book tells the story of his spiritual friendship with April, a young woman considering faith. On one level, it’s an easy read. The conversations pull readers in, and we keep turning pages to see what happens. It’s also a book that requires thought as we apply what he says to our own lives.

A key premise is that Christians need to communicate our faith in a way that those around us will understand. Language, worldviews, even styles of communication have changed significantly in recent years as we’ve moved into the postmodern era.

The word “postmodern” itself raises a barrier to me, yet it’s assumed to be part of the reader’s understanding. Worse is “modern,” which I always thought meant “contemporary or up-to-date”. “Trendy,” even. But these are buzz-words of the new culture and so they’re used.

For me, this is a strong reminder of how important it is that I don’t bombard non-Christians or spiritual folk with Christian jargon. Dr. McLaren illustrates how these holy buzz-words will either be meaningless or mean something far different than intended.

More Ready Than You Realize is a helpful book and despite my struggle with the terminology its message resonated with me (oops, is that another buzz-word?).

The Bible tells us we’re to be ambassadors for Christ, that we’re to be involved in God’s work of reconciliation.

Dr. McLaren encourages us to “engage in spiritual friendship… see evangelism as relational dance rather than conceptual conquest, process rather than event, mutual learning rather than sales pitch…” and I find that far more attractive than some of the previous approaches. (In fairness to some of those modes, the book does point out the different cultures in which they began, so we see how they may have  been designed to best meet the needs of the times.)

Integral to this message is the belief that the individuals we befriend (or who befriend us) are of great value, whatever their ultimate decision about God and however long it takes them to make one.

Dr. McLaren challenges us to value the relationships more than the results, and he reminds us that the goal isn’t conversion. The goal is people (ourselves included) loving and serving God and growing in relationship with Him and with each other. The results are up to Him. Our job is simply to serve.

I’d recommend this book to Christians and to those who want to understand them, with the warning that if philosophical language is not your thing, the book may challenge you. The message is clear, and Brian McLaren is an appealing narrator. He speaks to readers as he did to April: openly, non-threatening, and genuinely interested. I look forward to reading some of his other books.

More Ready Than You Realize includes a seven-part Bible study on what it means to be a disciple and to develop others. You can find reviews, a sample chapter and interviews here.  To learn more about Brian D. McLaren, his other books and his ministry, check out his website.

Book source: my personal library

Video review: Pistachio

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Pistachio: The Little Boy that Woodn’t, from VeggieTales (Big Idea, 2010)

“Once upon a time in the small Italian town of Bologna-Salami, there lived a lonely toymaker named Gelato and his assistant Cricket.” [from the back cover]

In typical VeggieTales style, the humour flows as freely as the family values. Obviously from the subtitle, Pistachio’s theme is “listening to your parents”. Pistachio, exuberantly portrayed by Jr. Asparagus (rendered as carved-but-living-wood) is quick to tell toymaker Gelato (it’s Larry under that distinguished mop of hair) “You’re not the boss of me!”

Trouble—as well as general hilarity—ensues. Parts of the story seemed like they might be too scary for a sensitive child, but with parental reassurance (and emphasizing the funny bits) it shouldn’t be an issue. Most kids wouldn’t have a problem. As I recall, the Disney movie Pinocchio was much darker and scarier. (Here’s where I confess to not having read the book!)

The writers go to town with the Italian theme. As the story opens, Gelato’s three brothers have been lost at sea, en route to deliver meatballs to the island of Boyardee. The brothers’ names are Milano, Espresso and Dorito, and one of them looks suspiciously like Marlon Brando.  I haven’t seen the Godfather movies, but I suspect there are a slew of little insider references for those who have.

Cricket, played by the half-caterpillar Khalil, will be especially funny to those who’ve seen VeggieTales’ Jonah. Suffice it to say, this is not his first time being swallowed by a big fish.

In another inside joke, Cricket proclaims, “I’m no fool, no sirree.” Anybody remember Jiminy Cricket doing that number in a Disney short? We also have Madame Blueberry instead of the Blue Fairy, and in general, plenty of groaner jokes. Typical VeggieTales fun.

Gelato loves to teach his adopted ducklings, and now his wooden asparagus. He’s a fine example of a parent, if a bit absent-minded at times. He teaches by example as well as by words, and in sharing his wisdom and experience he hopes they’ll grow up to be wise parents to their own children.

I found the message “listen to your parents” to be clear and uncomplicated. As an adult, I’d prefer something more subtle, something that examines the possibility that occasionally a parent does not have the child’s best interests at heart or doesn’t know best how to care for the child.

However, as an adult I’m only the secondary target audience for VeggieTales. There’s plenty to entertain an adult, but the main audience is children, many at an early enough stage in cognitive development that short and direct is best.

Kids and adults alike will enjoy the bonus features, which include a discussion guide, a visit to a real marionette theatre, art and commentary and… the traditional Sing Along with Larry. You can also download a Pistachio Family Fun Guide at the Big Idea site.

For anyone unfamiliar with VeggieTales, the standard format is to take a break half-way through the story for a Silly Song. This time it’s “Obscure Broadway Show Tunes with Larry,” where he and a pretty female vegetable sing “Where Have All the Staplers Gone?” The song claims to be from the unknown musical, Office Supplies, and the writers missed a chance with one: instead of a red Swingline stapler, it was purple. It did, however, develop a delightful set of fangs at the end.

Pistachio was a lot of fun, and it reminds me I’ve missed out on the last few offerings from the folks at Big Idea. My 13-year-old says the stapler song is one of the best silly songs they’ve done yet. Of course, that sparked a lively discussion of what is the best VeggieTales silly song. And what is the best VeggieTales song, period? Feel free to leave your vote in the comments!

Note: DVD has been provided courtesy of David C Cook and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc. in exchange for an honest review. Pistachio is available now at your local Christian retailer.