BROOKLYN, New York — With All Saints Day approaching, our attention shifts to those heroic souls who have triumphed over sin and death.
In “Stories of the Saints: Bold and Inspiring Tales of Adventure, Grace, and Courage,” author Carey Wallace offers readers aged 10 and up an engaging glimpse into the lives of saints who performed miracles, faced wild lions, confronted demons and transformed the world.
From St. Augustine of Hippo to St. Teresa of Calcutta, Wallace takes the reader on a journey to discover 70 of the best-known and best-loved saints.
Readers will meet St. Joan of Arc, whose transcendent faith compelled her to lead an army when the king’s courage failed. St. Francis of Assisi, whose gentleness tamed a man-eating wolf. St. Valentine, a bishop in the time of ancient Rome, who spoke so often of Christ’s love that his saint’s day, Feb. 12, has been associated with courtly love since the Middle Ages.
The book also features St. Thomas Aquinas, the great teacher and Doctor of the Church. St. Peter Claver, who cared for hundreds of thousands of people on slave ships after their voyage as captives. And St. Bernadette, whose vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary prompted her to dig the spring that became the healing waters of Lourdes.
Each saint is illustrated by Nick Thornborrow in a dramatic and stylized full-color portrait. Included in every entry are the saint’s dates, location, emblems, feast days and patronage. Taken together, these stories create a rich, inspiring and entertaining history of faith and courage.
Wallace says she loves to write fiction, but as a believing Christian who attended Catholic schools as a child, she remembered the stories of saints’ lives as intriguing adventure stories and felt called to write this latest book.
“I feel like this book wrote me, even more than I wrote it. They were forming me, the saints were acting on me, I was serving them in some way,” she notes. “The power of the stories is wonderful.”
The book is meant to be the stories of the saints told as if they are great stories and they have beautiful lessons for all kids, she explains. But she’s been especially glad to see boys love the book, because it can be hard to find spiritual stories boys really connect with. “The illustrations are done by a video game designer and boys seem to like his artistic style,” she says. “He really knows how to tell a story with a picture.”
Wallace says she wanted people to appreciate the saints as our faith heritage. “We really do have these kind of ‘superheroes’ in the faith. I wanted to share them in stories that are memorable and to show their lives as a great adventure.”
She arranged the book about the saints in chronological order. “It begins with Polycarp, a convert of St. John the Apostle. It begins with someone with a direct connection to the life of Jesus on earth. It ends with Mother Teresa. In between, you get this whole beautiful scope of Christian history told through some of its most beloved characters.”
“Writing the book also enriched my faith because it also shows how rich and diverse that history is and how many ways there are to be a good Christian,” Wallace adds. “There are all kinds of people and the scope of how God worked in them really spoke to me.”
— SueAnn Howell, Senior reporter
Order online
Get your copy of “Stories of the Saints: Bold and Inspiring Tales of Adventure, Grace, and Courage” online at www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com.