Tag: christ candle (page 1 of 1)

Great Joy

Let’s appreciate, for a moment, the behind-the-scenes people who make books possible. Editors, art directors, publishers, agents—I don’t know exactly what you all do, but books like Great Joy make me glad that you do it.

The pages, cover, and binding combine to make a book that makes our family feel like we’re unwrapping something precious as I read, which I suppose we are, in a way, because the story is precious and the illustrations are warm and welcoming. But the gold leaf on the cover and the cloth binding and the very feel of the pages make the gift a thing that’s not just heard or observed but warmly felt. Somebody chose that paper and decided to ornament the cover just so—thank you, whoever you are.

Great Joy, by Kate DiCamillo | Little Book, Big Story

Great Joy‘s quiet story doesn’t need bells and whistles—it would shine in a hand-drawn, xeroxed ‘zine, I’m sure, though it may not reach its intended audience that way—but the lovely quality of the book encouraged us to slow down and savor DiCamillo’s language and Bagram Ibatoulline’s illustrations.

Those illustrations are so gorgeous, by the way, that I’m tempted to heap adjectives on them willy-nilly. But I won’t burden you with that. Instead I’ll show you pictures:

Great Joy, by Kate DiCamillo | Little Book, Big Story
Great Joy, by Kate DiCamillo | Little Book, Big Story

Great Joy reaches my daughters at different levels: at eight, Lydia delights in the fact that Frances, the story’s protagonist, reads the same verses for the Christmas pageant that Lydia read for hers; Sarah, at six, asks the same questions Frances does about the organ-grinder; and Phoebe, at almost-three, delights in finding the monkey on every page (when she wants to read the book, she points at the shelf and shouts, “MONKEYS!” until someone hands her the book).

And I, as a mother, rejoice: this story is the sort of gift that I love to give my daughters, knowing that it points toward the one who is our greatest gift.


Great Joy
Kate DiCamillo, Bagram Ibatoulline (2010)

“The Christ Candle”

The stable falls silent and then—a cry. The thin cry of an infant, so welcome to waiting parents, to a laboring mother, who breathes a sigh of relief and falls back on her improvised pillow, laughing and weeping at once. As the father wraps the baby warmly and delivers him into Mary’s waiting arms, creation shares in her delight: the wait is over. The work is done. Emmanuel—God With Us—has come.

The Christ Candle

The final post in Deeply Rooted‘s Advent series, “The Christ Candle,” went up today, and writing it was a well-timed blessing: while I prepped for gatherings and baked sugar cookies from scratch with all three girls (because we will make memories, by gum!) and tried not to curl up in a weepy, overtired, pregnant ball, I also got to meditate on Jesus as the Light of the World. Verses like this one kept me going:

The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shone . . .
For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be on his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Isaiah 9:2, 6

You can read the full post here.

Merry Christmas, dear readers! Worship the Lord in quiet ways and with great noise (and sugar cookies) today. He has come!