Jotham's Journey: A Storybook for Advent (Storybooks for Advent) Kindle Edition

My mom bought Jotham's Journey thinking it would be nice to read a chapter to the family each night of Advent. 'Simple, short, spiritual.' the author had written in the introduction. Perfect. A Christmas story for the whole family.By the second chapter we were looking at it more critically. The wide, fearful eyes of the younger children as Jotham watched his own blood drip from the fangs of a demon-jackal made us wonder how this story was supposed to relate to the birth of Jesus Christ. After discovering that this horrific scene was just a dream, we kept reading, although now slightly doubting that this would become a read-it-again Christmas favorite for our family.I will say that we were kept on the edge of our seats as Decha of Meggido relentlessly hunted the ten-year-old Jotham throughout the story, and for good reason. This man was portrayed as some sort of human fiend. He murders an old man and is proud of the fact that he killed his father at the age of twelve. Decha continues to find opportunities to assure Jotham that he will, eventually, kill him too, and his ruthlessness is proved once again when he slices off the fingers of another young boy.Jotham himself seems a bit emotional. When we mentioned to a friend that we were reading this book, he told us that when he was younger, his family had read it as well. "Screamin' Yellin' Jotham," he called the character, un-biased by us! As we continued reading, we began to predict when Jotham was going to scream. Many of our guesses were correct! The main character also has a problem with lying, but he begins learning to overcome that.Although many of the chapters in this book end in a terrifying cliff-hanger, it's not all blood and violence. Jotham finds many good friends throughout his journey, and learns much from them about the predicted coming of the Messiah. We saw nothing theologically wrong in this book, and many characters in the story come from the Bible, for example; Zechariah and Elizabeth, John the Baptist, Simeon, Anna, Mary and Joseph, and Jesus. In the end of the book, justice is served, good overcomes evil, Jesus is born, and Jotham has learned his lesson about listening to his parents.So, there's nothing that doesn't match up with the Bible's teachings. It's just that the suspenseful and overly violent plot seems to distract from the real purpose of Advent. And, although this book is meant for families, if we had it to do over again, we wouldn't have chosen it for a read-aloud. The author goes too far in describing the evil, which is just not necessary in a book for families with younger children.

This book came highly recommended, but ended up not being for my sensitive girls, ages 4, 7 and 9. Granted--the book is recommended for 4th-6th grade, and my oldest daughter (4th grade) was okay with it. But she didn't like it enough to push us to continue when I asked if anyone wanted to continue it after about the 4th or 5th painful day. I liked the scripture readings at the end, and I love the idea, but overall the story didn't feel Christmasy (4 or 5 days in, anyway) and was just too scary and violent for us. Maybe in a few years.Just for context, we are a homeschooling family that reads all the time, and enjoyed Narnia and other adventure books.

I'm rating this book as three stars mainly because of the recommended age. This story is what I would describe as historical fiction. If you're looking for strictly scripture reading for advent, this isn't it. Jotham is a young boy separated from his family because of his disobedience. His journey is to be reunited with his parents and brothers. Along the way he meets some kind people, many who talk of the coming Messiah, and one horrible, dangerous, angry man that seems to show up every time it looks like Jotham has escaped. At the end of each day's reading there are scripture verses and a short devotion guiding the reader to look forward to the coming Messiah. The book itself is well written. We were on the edge of our chairs each night and frequently had cries of "I knew it!" and groans when the reading ended on a cliff hanger. Having said that, my children range in age from 11-17. There is no way I would recommend this for the 4-8 range as the book says. The book is too intense and has too many violent scenes. Had I read this to my children at the book recommended age, I don't know that we would have made it past night one before putting the book away. Do I recommend the book? Yes....for about age 10 and above.

We read this book as a family each night of advent this past Christmas season and it was fantastic! Both of our boys, ages 4 and 7, absolutely loved the book, as did both adults reading! It was a great amount of reading each night (10-20 minutes) and the short reflection at the end of each nightly reading were the perfect way to each each day leading up to Christmas day. The boys talked about the book all the time, and at one point our 4 year old said he didn't want any presents for Christmas, he just wanted to finish the Jotham book! (The cliffhangers each night had our boys asking to get ready for bed by 4:00 p.m. the next day just to find out what happened next!). The action and emotions were intense. My boys are generally pretty sensitive to scary scenes in movies (most Disney movies terrify them) but reading these scenes in the safety of our candlelit living room as a family helped soften it enough for their ages, and make it realistic and exciting. I highly recommend this for all ages. We plan to buy the other books and do this every year at Christmas.

We are ruined forever after reading this book this Christmas! Every other storybook, and I'm afraid - Advent - book will now pale in comparison! My children are 3 and 5, and I was initially worried this book may be too advanced for them. I found quite the opposite to be true- the storyline is so suspensful that they begged and reminded me each day to read "Jotham"! I didn't edit a couple of more scarier lines of the text, but overall, they got the lessons Jotham had to learn. They truly understand the nativity and the true meaning of Christmas this year and this book made it even more "real" to them. My husband joins all the others mentioned in reviews who don't particularly enjoy reading, but couldn't put this book down and had to be stopped from skipping ahead to see what happens! We purchased the rest of the books in Ytreeide's series, including the Easter book and are eagerly awaiting reading them in the years to come. This will be a new tradition we intend to keep each Christmas season for years to come! Our only disappointment is that there are additional books written by this author!

So well written, that both the children and myself were enraptured from the very start. Highly recommended!! A story with a great twisting plot, and great thoughts at the end of every section. We will be reading this again. I'd recommend this to anyone with older children, or whose children have great imaginations. Even my three year old could follow along because of the colourful imagery painted by the text. Fabulous book!! I cannot recommend it more. This book has challenged me in great ways.

It's good story, with plenty of zip to keep it interesting. 9yr old and 7yr old boys were really engaged. It's somewhat jumpy in narrative with a few too many characters but kids really enjoyed it and we loved the reflections. Will do the other one next year.

A wonderful book for the whole family. My children were always pleading with me to read more. Exciting and well written. Loved the way it used so many biblical characters

Absolutely made our Advent. 11 year old and 6 year old sons were particularly gripped but 4 year old daughter also enjoyed.

We really enjoyed reading this book over the last few weeks. Very exciting but definitely PG 13 rated. Not suitable for very little ones.