Hey, everybody! Welcome back to Tumnus’s Bookshelf, where we review any and all books by and about CS Lewis and the land of Narnia. Today we will be looking at Sarah Arthur’s book Walking Through the Wardrobe: A Devotional Quest through the Land of Narnia.”
Title: Walking Through the Wardrobe
Author: Sarah Arthur
Publisher: Thirsty (October 5, 2005)
ISBN-10: 1414307667
ISBN-13: 978-1414307664
Summary: From Sarah Arthur, author of the teen devotional books, Walking with Frodo, Walking with Bilbo, and Dating Mr. Darcy, comes a devotional look at the magical world of CS Lewis’ beloved classic The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. Containing lessons focusing on Peter, Susan, Edmund, Lucy, the Narnians, Aslan, Jadis and Lewis himself, this book looks at the important lessons young people can gain from the books such as courage, honor, sacrifice, love, and wisdom.
Review: The Chronicles of Narnia already make for excellent books to read during a family devotional time, so it is only natural that an author should try to develop a brand new devotional, not focusing it so much at families reading together but Youth Groups. Sarah Arthur ahs already done a phenomenal job doing that with her previous books Walking with Bilbo and Walking with Frodo(looking at JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings) and Dating Mr. Darcy ( Jane Austen’s Pride& Prejudice) and is perhaps one of the best choices of authors to write such a book.
Her other goal is to help get teenagers more interested in the “boring and stuffy” worlds of classic literature. Each book of hers has been written sometime around the release of a major motion picture based on the works in question, making it much more appealing. Beyond their obvious marketability to the cinema, the likes of Tolkien, Lewis, and Austen are still relevant today in our world of boy wizards, and sparkly vampires and Sarah Arthur shows just how true that is.
Since it is geared towards teenagers in a youth group setting Mrs. Arthur avoids many of the issues the more “hard-core” fans will debate over. Her goal is to focus on what vital lessons we can take from the first book in the series, what points of discussion can we have about them, and how can we apply them to ourselves today.
The chapters are short and to the point, making the book ideal for a youth group setting. There is also plenty of self-deprecating humor, to keep the teens amused. More “serious” fans of the books may be turned off by these aspects, but this is not written for them. Much like the Narnian books themselves it is written for ‘everyone else” so they can steal past those watchful dragons that Lewis described once.
This book is sure to help provide plenty of great lessons for teenagers and would make a wonderful asset to a youth group setting. The only disadvantage is that Ms .Arthur doesn’t seem to have plans to write follow ups focusing on Prince Caspian and the rest of the books in the series. I for one would gladly read all of them if there were.
Four 1/2 out of Five sheilds.
I haven’t read Walking Through the Wardrobe. However, I did read Walking with Bilbo and it was very good. Ms. Arthur is talented, and she makes good points about applying the principles discussed in the books to everyday life.